This is a "homework" involving migration, root nature, return, displacement, dignity, homeland, etc., which is similar to a theme that Chen Jiming has been thinking about for a long time but has always wanted to write about, such as the west entrance in the west, the Donggan people who moved west to today's Central Asian countries at the end of the Qing Dynasty, and the migration and relocation in the past two or three decades.
"I once had a practical creative plan, planning to write about a group of people who left their hometown, settled in a distant foreign country, and brought the names of the mountains, waters, roads, and ditches of their hometown to the past, which is equivalent to rebuilding a hometown in a foreign country, and what will happen in 100 years, 200 years later." Chen Jiming said that now that we have this homework, we can just merge into one.
Chen Jiming, one of the "Three Trees of Ningxia" at that time, has been in Zhuhai for 15 years, and as the vice chairman of the Guangdong Writers Association and a professor at the School of Art and Communication of Beijing Normal University in Zhuhai, Chen Jiming was willing to accept the task of writing for the first time. Because this mission has only two words: overseas Chinese. Writing the history of the struggle of Chaoshan overseas Chinese merchants to "go to Nanyang" seems to have some predestined meaning to a considerable extent. It's just that the story of the Chaoshan overseas Chinese merchants in Nanyang is more meaningful, more complex, and more testing of an author's ability to integrate. The novel depicts Zheng Mengmei shouldering the mission of reviving the family business, and when people are getting middle-aged, they are alone in Nanyang. In a foreign country, "Ping An Pi" unexpectedly became his life's work. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Mengmei and her relatives and friends deeply understood the great righteousness of their homeland and resolutely threw themselves into the torrent of serving the motherland... Using Ping An Pi as the medium, the novel integrates into the changes in the world in the past hundred years, profoundly writes the spiritual world of a party, and writes a "Chinese heart" that cherishes love and righteousness, patriotism and love for the country.
Chen Jiming: Tell a story sincerely
This article is excerpted from an interview with Chen Jiming by Shu Jinyu, a reporter of China Reading Daily
Shu Jinyu: In terms of the structure of the novel, how do you think about it? The inclusion of a large number of letters in the novel is naturally the need for the theme and characters of the novel, and at the same time, the writer needs to have a profound literary foundation, and the interspersed between George, Mengmei and Chen Guangyuan also enhances the storytelling.
Chen Jiming: At the stage of conception, I was sure that I would make great efforts to write good letters that would inevitably appear frequently in the text. Since the overseas Chinese criticism is written, the "batch" cannot be missing in the article. I expect that this will be the hardest thing to gnaw on in the whole book – a bone. The difficulty lies in how to accurately restore the context of the time, and in the organic integration of orthodox literary dialects, Chaoshan dialects and epistolary styles. The difficulty lies in how to grasp the identity of Zheng Mengmei, a small intellectual. The difficulty lies in how to connect the content of the letter and the content of the story naturally and without a trace.
In addition, at the beginning, I thought about it, this book does not pursue large pages, abandons the panoramic mode, and strives to be simple and deep. Write about customs and folklore, but don't get caught up in it. The story structure is relatively concentrated, beware of looseness. Formally not necessarily modern, but the idea of modern fiction should always be present. The so-called modern concept, my understanding first refers to whether it can be "restrained". What are the things to be restrained? In other words, what can't be done? One is not exile, Zheng Mengmei is not Rushdie, Nabokov, Naipaul, Zheng Mengmei is not a dissident intellectual, not a writer; the second is not representation, not simply illustrating anything; the third is not legendary, although the story of the South Sea, legend is the most convenient way; the fourth is not sentimental, not interesting, although the story of the wanderers and wanderers is not lacking in sentimentality, it is also easy to be interesting, especially the Chaoshan story - such as the poetry, calligraphy and painting, tea wine, pastoral fun, talk is better than nothing, Take up space. To be sure, restraint creates difficulty. When you ask yourself to refrain, you're actually asking yourself to embrace the difficulty. As much restraint as possible, there is as much difficulty. Try to expand the meaning space within the novel, one of the ways is to make good use of letters, ancient talk, tide drama, poetry. Another way is to give the story a multi-voice structure, such as: positive narrative and back-and-forth, women who stay at home and men in the South Sea, Chinese and foreigners— so that they form an intertextual and dialogue relationship with each other. The number of words is within 200,000 or 300,000 words, and the characters should be 20 or 30 people, and the spiritual tentacles should be extended as far as possible in a limited space. At the same time, let the theme also become a structure, a secret inner structure: there are visible themes, there are potential themes, there are more potential themes, there are appropriate escapes, and there are parts that the author cannot explain, which can be called mysteries.
Shu Jinyu: The work allows us to relive a lot of old rules and old rituals, such as Mengmei once exchanged a baked sweet potato for a ring for a girl's girl, and Ah Yan asked him to return it to others; for example, later he warned himself: Ancestral land, women and poetry are three things that cannot be touched. Is "ancestral land, women and poetry" your summary, or is it a rule unique to the Chaoshan people? Is it difficult to understand and master the local characteristics of Guangdong, including terminology, dialects, etc.?
Chen Jiming: The old traditions of Chinese civilization, whether good or bad, are the most completely preserved in Chaoshan, and I have indeed seen more ancient gentleman's style in Chaoshan, from form to quality. Their dialects, customs, and so-called local characteristics are likely to be the most original and primitive appearance of Chinese civilization. Of course, I went there for only a year and knew very little. The reason why I started writing quickly is because I did have a clear plan, taking advantage of the fact that I knew very little, I quickly wrote, afraid that I would not be able to write if I knew more. And "ancestral land, women and poetry" is specially set by me for the characters. All are related to the character's family history and life experience. I would like to say two more words about poetry. I think that there have always been two important trends in Chinese society, one is jianghu and the other is poetry. The power of the jianghu is often stronger. Poetry books are always ostracized and despised, and poetry books are usually used to pretend to face. The tradition of poetry books is a very delicate tradition. In other words, poets generally have to be a little bit of jianghu at the same time to "mix" up. Therefore, in the novel, Zheng Mengmei, the protagonist from Xiqian, writes poetry as one of his taboos. Xihou is very charismatic, sleek, realistic, actionable, good at management and calculation. This design contains a deep meaning that is not difficult to see.
Shu Jinyu: The works write the history of China since modern times, the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, etc., as well as the specific content and details related to the history of the Republic of China such as the "Declaration", and more importantly, the trustworthiness and righteousness of the Chaoshan people, which give the work the meaning of red classics. You also did a lot of preparation before writing, right?
Chen Jiming: In writing this book, I asked myself to put aside my ambitions and tell a story sincerely. Restore things to the local area and see how people would be. In Chaoshan, I saw several small revolutions before the Xinhai Revolution, all taking place in the south. Sun Yat-sen's revolutionary funds came mainly from overseas Chinese. In peacetime, the love of overseas Chinese for the motherland may be abstract, but when war comes, overseas Chinese may be more active, more active, and more sacrificial than the domestic people, because the motherland has suddenly become physical and more concrete than usual. This paragraph is precisely for this consideration. Whether it is red or not is not considered. As for the trustworthiness and righteousness of the overseas Chinese batch, it is completely the characteristic of the profession of the overseas Chinese batch, and some things are not field investigation, and I do not believe it. Halfway through, I met a waterman, who died and carried dozens of gold bars on his back, and this plot happened not to be fictional, but was derived from the data. Faulkner said he wrote to look for diamond parts of people. As I write this book, I often think of Faulkner's words.
Shu Jinyu: "Ping An Batch" is a creation that fills in the gaps in the subject matter. Behind the "Ping An Batch" contains a strong sense of home and country. How to write out the characteristics of Chinese culture through Ping An, and how did you find a breakthrough?
Chen Jiming: In the process of chatting with local friends, one of the overseas Chinese batches, ping an batch, first touched me. I realized that behind the glorious life of the overseas Chinese, there was sadness hidden. This sadness is in the three words of "peace and approval". Peace should be the basic requirement, but in fact it is the highest requirement, as high as religion. The Women of Chaoshan prayed to the Buddha to worship God, and all they wanted was peace. Therefore, I decided to take the theme of "Peace Batch" and always cling to it. On the contrary, the feeling of home and country is something that I need to restrain. The feeling of home and country is the DNA of this story, and there is no need to emphasize it at all, when writing, I work harder on those aspects that are more hidden.
Shu Jinyu: The character of Zheng Mengmei is also a fresh and unique character in the literary gallery, writing a complete history of overseas Chinese through his life course, do you have any experience in the process of narration? You have a lot of research on calligraphy, and I feel that your process of writing Zheng Mengmei, especially the details of writing about overseas Chinese, is very good.
Chen Jiming: Zheng Mengmei is a figure who cannot go to Nanyang. Methodologically, I found this point first. I think that the protagonist of this story of going to Nanyang should be a person who cannot go to Nanyang for some reason. Thus, this character has roots and has his own situation. He finally went to Nanyang and had nothing to do with the overseas Chinese, and later accidentally became a merchant of the overseas Chinese. This character has only been to middle school, but his family is a scholar, he has read a lot of books, he is a rural literati, he has good poetry and calligraphy, such a situation is the most likely. The old intellectuals of Chaoshan are more or less like this. In addition, if he wants to engage in overseas Chinese criticism, he also needs such a persona.
Shu Jinyu: Implicit in the novel are your views or reflections on culture, history, including women, etc., such as George saying, "The self-sacrificing spirit of the Chaoshan weavers, as well as their intelligence and tenacity, are unique in the world for the indispensable role of a family." George criticized chinese men, saying, "You men owe money to your women, and the more successful you are, the more you owe them." "It's not so much George's discovery as yours?" The missionary Dong girl has this view in her book: once the men go out, the women's world becomes infinitely large, infinitely distant, and infinitely vast. "That's your understanding, too, right? How do you understand women, especially women in Chaoshan Province? Does Cai'er concentrate the beautiful characteristics of Chaoshan women?
Chen Jiming: The image of rural women in the old era was ignored by literary works in the past, and it was also something that I was more timid. However, this novel has a structure first, and the man outside and the woman included are two sides of the same structure, and cannot but be written. The latter, even more important, is the secret heart of the novel. The heart is always hidden in the depths. So, I wrote about such a group of women, Lao Zu, Nai Heng, Cai'er, Wangzhi, Zheng Huang, Zheng Bai and so on. I like these women myself. They are all different, but they do have some characteristics that are common to Chaoshan Ziniang. They look soft, but they are hard. How far men go, how far their hearts go. In their hearts, they can hold the whole world. I firmly believe that they are an important perspective on Chinese society. This time the expression is not enough, and I am likely to write about them well in the future.
Shu Jinyu: Your narrative is peaceful, soothing, mellow and simple, and has a gentlemanly style, which is very different from your last work, "Seven Steps Town", and different from your previous novel writing style. Is that what you're after?
Chen Jiming: "Seven Steps Town" is a completely different proposition, a work under the concept of individualism. This book, on the other hand, has different tasks, at the beginning of writing, I planned to reduce the difficulty, write a good book that is plain and honest, honest and sincere, the language is calm and quiet, not pretending to be deep, not holding a shelf. However, after I started writing, I realized that I had actually increased the difficulty not by reducing it, but by greatly improving it. Just as it is easy to draw a ghost and difficult to draw a horse.
Shu Jinyu: Can you talk about the special significance of "Ping An Ping" in your creation? What are your plans for the future?
Chen Jiming: "Ping An Batch" made me realize the significance of practical efforts, such as going deep into life and field investigation. For the writing of a long novel, it does require an author to bravely step out of the study and spend a lot of effort into life. The other is to challenge yourself, have the courage to throw away the old things on yourself, and the more you lose, the better. Writing, first of all, is to fight against yourself, against the conservative and mediocre side of yourself. These experiences were very beneficial to my future writing.