Lu Yao: There is nothing great or small in life

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Source | Adolescent Health, Issue 21, 2015

Lu Yao: There is nothing great or small in life

| Road remote

| A |

There was nothing to prepare for today, and by the end of the year, everything was messy. I have spoken here many times in the past, there are no new opinions, I hope you will raise some questions, so targeted, if you talk nonsense, everyone will not be satisfied.

I am from northern Shaanxi, Qingjian County, my family is a peasant family, and my parents are still farming in the countryside. When I was a child, the family had a large population, eight brothers and sisters, and at that time there was no family planning in the countryside. My family was poor, I was the eldest, and when I was seven years old, my family couldn't feed me and fostered me to another family.

The deepest impression of childhood was hunger, and my father was an illiterate peasant, a weak character, a very poor life, and a completely abandoned life. When you were a child, other people's children beat you up, and when you came back, you hoped to get the support of your family, but what you got was that they beat you again and didn't cause trouble. So, in society you can only rely on yourself, and you can't rely on anyone, which is the first problem I knew at that time. If you want to live, you have to rely on yourself. The family sent me to my uncle's house, a county far away from the Yan'an area, and I agreed without thinking about it. People are small, they don't do anything at home, and they vaguely think that it would be okay to go out and eat a lot in that place.

Leaving the family at the age of seven, carried by his father, he felt very uncomfortable and lonely. It was a very distant morning, wearing tattered clothes, a new pair of shoes, which were particularly difficult to put on, and the bottom floor was worn. Along the way, I asked for food and went to my uncle's house, and my father only carried two cents. The first day spent a day in Qingjian County, and the next day dawn passed through the county town, and the streets were empty, except for an old man selling oil tea, wearing tattered clothes. My father paid a dime to buy me a bowl of oil tea to drink, and found five cents. For thirty years, I did not stay in this city again, and I never wanted to stay any longer, so I did not take the stone street and rushed to my uncle's house in Yanchuan County. My uncle was also a farmer and had no children, so I could go to school when I got here. Schooling is hard and poor. Fortunately, the school is five miles away from home, and you can go home to eat. At that time, my clothes were ragged, my pants were torn and I didn't dare to go in front of others, and someone pranked me and deliberately pulled me into the crowd, causing me to laugh, and I was very sad. After finishing elementary school, I went to middle school. My uncle didn't let him, he had no children, and he raised me to take care of his old age, and he was made a farmer.

Why let me go to school? At that time, it was a collective system, the peasant concept, there was a reader, recognized the work, recognized the account. After finishing primary school, I can reach this level, and my family will not let me continue to study in middle school. At that time, the society was very chaotic, and the middle school had to go to the county town to study, take the family's grain, and exchange it for food stamps. I feel very uncomfortable not to let me study, which is reflected in the novel, through different characters. At that time, I made an agreement with my family that I could not study, but whether I could take the exam once and get admitted showed that I had the ability to not let me go to school, because you adults. I took the exam, the prefectural middle school, one or two thousand candidates, fierce competition, only admitted two or three hundred people, I was at the top. But with the arrival of the notice, it meant that I was out of school ever since. I was unwilling, and since I had been admitted, I would have to go to school. Just fighting against my family is one of my biggest choices. My uncle had all the tools of labor ready and asked me to fight alongside him. I was indifferent, threw all the tools on the river beach, ran to the county seat, found classmates, all of them were children, some of the jianghu righteousness. They helped me, and two or three friends asked the adults in the family to help me say that it had been half a month since the school started. At that time, it was stipulated that the school would not let the school go to school until ten days had arrived. There was a brigade secretary and the principal who knew each other (at that time I would go through the back door) and helped me intercede, on the grounds that it was the son of a poor and lower-middle peasant, which made it difficult to go to middle school. This is expressed in my novella In Difficult Days. The family did not recognize my actions and said I was illegal. Since I went to school, I reluctantly admitted it. Only 25 catties of grain are given every month, which is negotiated with the family, in middle school, these grains are not enough to eat, after studying, in the field to find messy things to eat.

Later, when the Cultural Revolution took place, I participated in the Cultural Revolution, and I was as fanatical and blind as the youth at that time, and I underwent all kinds of tests and tortures of thought, spirit, and behavior. Back in the countryside, teaching in primary school, had many dreams and hobbies, did not expect to become a writer. At that time, I dreamed of being an Interpol detective, fighting the bad guys on planes and trains, and finally putting handcuffs on the bad guys' wrists. I also want to do research on international issues and provide an opinion to the government departments. In short, it's all something irritating. Later, I loved to read, read books consistently, wide-ranging, read many other books, came into contact with some literary works, felt talented in this area, tried to write something, self-esteem was established, and also wrote some poetry. The living arrangements were relatively frequent, stipulating what books to read within a year, learning foreign languages - Russian, exercising, mainly influenced by Chairman Mao's adolescence, and later I also tried it absurdly once, running to the mountains in the wind and rain. I did sporadic work in the county town, did propaganda work, worked as a screenwriter in the county theater troupe, and publicized Chairman Mao's works, and this period was very chaotic. In 1973, I was recommended to go to college, I was a worker, peasant, and soldier cadet, and those universities did not want me, and finally Yanda took me in, studied for three years, went to the editorial department of "Yanhe", until 1982, professional creation.

| Two |

Now let's talk about my literary experiences and activities, and about my two parts, "Life" and "Ordinary World".

"Life" is a work of mine when I was about thirty years old, and it has become history, clearly carrying the shadow of youth, reflecting the sensitivity of my spirit at that time. It's something that's immature, but it can go on. Placed in the context of the time, it was a challenging work. In college, the class is not normal, rely on their own learning, sporadic learning, at that time is a photocopy of the textbook, I understand that these are worthless things, leaving a bad impression on the teacher, often do not go to class, only one or two go to school, that is out of courtesy, and the teacher has a good relationship. I have established a rigorous study plan myself, and it is important to learn consciously. I think the earlier a person's enlightenment period, the better, of course, some people are not enlightened for life, this is an individual situation. At that time, I thought about these questions, what kind of person should we become? How to live? Mixed, it's easy, but I don't want to be that way, and I'm responsible for myself. The study plan is very strict, I study Russian literature, European literary history, Chinese literary history, these are more reliable, are some representative works, along these, find books to read, read most of the things in various periods. I divide the time into official time and spare time, which is my official time. The other is in the reading room, buy a cake, do not come out, read the literary magazines of the time from the inaugural number to the final issue number (many magazines in the Cultural Revolution have been suspended), almost all the literary magazines, and see the whole face of literary development. The biggest dissatisfaction is Chinese literature, the biggest bad is the characters in the article, good people are good people, bad people are bad people, these are compared with ancient times, ancient times are not like this. Seventeen years of literature is not satisfied, but what should I do, at this time has not yet been formed. After the overthrow of the Gang of Four, there were many sensational works, and I was not satisfied, these just turned the original characters upside down (good people become bad people, bad people become good people). Artistically, it's simple, far from literature, and I wanted to try something challenging that would make the critics confused about whether they were good guys or bad guys. Three-year-old children know that you are a bad person, Liu Xinwu Jiang Zilong can not escape this mode, still gliding on the original track, just the sensation caused by the content. I have the courage and the confidence to challenge and answer this question. This is the ideological background and motivation of "Life". I thought I was grabbing something, at least for the novella, and I was going to offer something new. Writing is in a closed, fanatical state, written in a county guest house in northern Shaanxi, a total of 21 days, good health, not good bowel movements, nose, mouth ulceration, writing is a kind of boiling. All night in the courtyard of the guest house, the leader of the guest house opened the curtains in the middle of the night to see what I was doing? Thinking that I was neurotic, I reflected it to the county leaders, who told him that people wrote things and did not let them be disturbed. It was a full-hearted effort, I couldn't sleep while I was sleeping, I worked eighteen or nineteen hours, and I walked around with a manuscript on my back. "Life" was mentally prepared for several years, and the result was controversial, and I realized at the time that I knew it would be like this.

After "Life" was written, it led to my disastrous life, because it disrupted my life, people, telephones, telegrams, all kinds of things came, very disturbing. Different genres, including film and television, came and asked for adaptations. Sometimes a telegram came in the middle of the night, thinking that the family had died. It turned out to be a director, and I was so angry that you couldn't do it. I was miserable, I wasn't a saint, and in this way, living a life of fragmentation. Of course, I work hard and hope to be rewarded, I do not refuse the red carpet, flowers, honor, but for a long time trapped in this, I am very lonely, and people's labor wants to achieve results. But one's true happiness is in the process, not in the result. So I am particularly nostalgic for the creative life at this time, and I do not want to be affected by this lively life. I was withdrawn and reluctant to contact society, and when I encountered difficulties, I returned to the desert in northern Shaanxi. The desert is a place I yearn for, a person lying there for a long time, feeling broad, thinking far away, seeing myself clearly, making judgments, planning what to do next. You have to get out of this life, live another life, and you can't live together. At this time, I remembered that when I was eighteen or nineteen years old, I remembered that I wanted to do a big thing, and when I did this big thing, I had to be forty years old, and the dream dissipated with the passage of time, but after having certain conditions, the dream of the teenager would suddenly flash, make a wish, promise, or blow a cowhide, so as a serious question was mentioned in front of me, it was very difficult to consider at the beginning. "Life" is only 130,000 words, and this is a multi-volume large-scale thing, can it be mastered?

There are two difficulties in this part. The first is the long process, which is generally a long time, will disappear in the literary world, such a sacrifice, if there is a achievement, is a comfort, if it fails, it is finished, buried itself. This decision is a gamble of life (i'm afraid the word is inappropriately used), betting youth on the stakes, which means devoting the best years to an unknowable environment.

| Three |

Leaving the warm and melting "Life" and going to the ice and snow. Some people say that "Life" is an insurmountable peak, and a writer has a work that is the highest height of his life. I was so unconvinced, I had to try to jump over, man just wanted to keep that momentum going! Like Zhu Jianhua, he struggled to jump for several years, and finally he couldn't jump. Coming out of the desert, I woke up, and I had no intention of returning, and the knife mountain was also going to pass, desperately throwing it into this work, and making a lot of preparations for this. Step by step, I set myself a plan to read a hundred novels. This time, I read it with a purpose to see if I can find something new. In the process of preparation, the mental state of the future creation, not to create in anyone's way, I call it "no example consciousness", but this must be based on the countless examples, first find the role models yourself, reading is as important as writing. There are books everywhere, there are also in the toilet, nine times out of ten read, some have made important readings, Anna Karenina read three times, "History of Entrepreneurship" read seven times, while studying, while consciously critical of these masters. Liu Qing is the focus, and I am specifically picky. If Liu Qing thinks that the character should appear unhurriedly, I do not agree. Characters should appear in the most critical and critical places, and if they appear early, there are more opportunities for performance and rich personality. Yang Youzhi came out late, and Teacher Liu (according to Professor Liu Jianjun, the head of the Chinese Department of Northwest University who accompanied him) knew that it was too late, and there was an accident at Toad Beach, where did he go? Make a certain fuss in reading.

"Ordinary World" reflects the social life of rural areas, industrial mines and cities in the decade from 1975 to 1985. I think this period is a prelude to China's transition period, full of intensive social and political events. A particularly detailed background material is required, and the story can be made up. So I flipped through the newspaper, People's Daily, Shaanxi Daily, Reference News, Yan'an News for ten years, piled up half a house, turned day by day, took notes, and in the whole description process, I could find various things on the notes, so that the story was built on a more reliable basis.

Another kind of preparation is life. Although life is familiar, I have to put it back in place and look at it carefully, such as a brick factory, I often go to see the soil, the blank, the billet, the kiln, the fire, as well as loans, taxes and so on. Sometimes, when no one is there, he secretly tears up a tax invoice and clips it in a notebook to leave, using it when he can use it, often carrying the kind of leather bag of the President of the United States, and when he enters the village, he carries two large boxes. (Supplement: When reading earlier, in addition to long stories, I also read professional books and informative pamphlets.) Every time I came back, my clothes were dirty, I went back to the hotel, lay down on the red carpet, took a shower, got comfortable, and then went into the village again and stayed in the breeding room. There are also unfamiliar life, such as coal mines, so the first part is written in the coal mine, which can be gradually familiarized and prepared for the next two parts. In the Tongchuan Coal Mine, there was also a deputy director of the Propaganda Department, but I am sorry, never in place, I don't know who the superiors and subordinates are? There are tens of thousands of people here, living conditions are poor, and a small conference room has been converted into a bedroom and office. The canteen here only has rice, steamed buns, pickles, not even eggs, tofu (I usually do not eat large meat, rely on eggs to maintain). The only vegetable is green onions.

Writing is hard and chilling to think about. I only slept for five or six hours at night, got up and had to go to the table, keep writing, and convince myself to coax myself like a child. See the table, like on the battlefield. One winter, almost no one spoke, the language skills were lost, and it was lonely. Every day after dinner, take a walk, machine-like. Work is particularly stressful, and I go to the toilet with pens and paper. As soon as I arrived at the place, I knew that I couldn't get on, so I ran back and laid down my weapons and went again. There are many rats in the toilet, once you go in, you come out, you stand there, you don't know what happened for five minutes, you have experience later, when you go in, you first kick two feet on the door, and when the rats are in place, you can go in. There were two rats in the office, when writing, lying on the couch to watch me, there was really no way, called a few people, beat the rats! Killed one. Then I regretted it, thinking that this rat was too lonely, and maybe it was this husband or lover who killed him.

A person who has been sightseeing for a long time will also feel bored and mentally breathless. I wrote a chapter and a chapter plan and pasted it on the wall, one, two, three, four, five, and today I eliminated another chapter, and I was very happy. Hearing the roar of the train in the middle of the night, imagining the train, means a lover's date, or the joy of a long goodbye reunion. One day as soon as the train called, I put down my pen myself, put on a torn cotton jacket, and went to the train station, which was a car pulling coal, not a bus. Am I trying to pick someone up here? Or who came to see me? Sigh and go back. On Sundays, I looked out from my house at the family building opposite, brightly lit, cooking and drinking behind every window, and it was raining and snowing outside, and I was alone. The upstairs lights over there were finally extinguished, and the curtains were pulled up one by one... It was their own choice, and there was no way to do it, and hot tears poured out.

The first draft of the first part was very difficult, sitting in the jeep felt uncomfortable, and when I returned to the city, I saw the snacks on both sides of the street, which was very hungry, which for a hungry person, it was the taste of mountains and the sea. After the end of the second part, the body completely collapsed, the first day was written, and the next day it crawled underground and could not get up. Relying on the spirit, leaning over to finish the manuscript, there is no strength in the body, only the strength on the knees, lying on the floor, sorting out the draft, every breath, spending a lot of effort, getting a strange disease, the breath can be inhaled and spit out. This disease you will get without eating at the train station and carrying sacks for three days. Then see a doctor and inject something into the muscle. There was a young Chinese medicine doctor who said that he had a deficiency disease, prescribed medicines, ginseng and everything, and drank it so much that I couldn't spit it out. Can't stay in Xi'an, this is fate. I thought, it is impossible for any writer in China to complete a long story, Cao Xueqin died before he finished writing, and Liu Qing around him did not finish writing, will I?

The weather in northern Shaanxi was cool, I couldn't inhale, the body collapsed, back to Yulin, the leader was familiar with me, introduced an old Chinese medicine doctor (Chinese medicine in Yulin area was famous before liberation, very developed), after diagnosis, let me look at the tongue in the mirror, the tongue is all black, this is ginseng eat bad, only prescribed a pair of two cents of medicine, a meal is spitting, this disease was solved first. Then prescribe a hundred pairs of pills, a hundred pairs of soup medicines, like cattle eating, eat for three months, and recover slightly. Take a year off and then work on the third part. I don't pay attention to eating, I don't exercise, so in the third part of writing, I began to pay attention. The leaders of the Yulin area were invited to write in the hotel, and the meal was arranged in the kitchen, and the writing was relatively smooth. In May of 1988, the last part of the book, I came to Ganquan County to write the last part. I have a fate with Ganquan County, and my "Life" was written here, on May 25, and completed.

At this time, the Central People's Radio was broadcasting the first two parts, and they were sent to the radio station at the latest in early June, and they had to broadcast them in time. Originally, these three parts required the best part of the body to be completed at the climax, so I gritted my teeth and wrote it before June 1. On this day, my friends congratulated me on the one hand, and I also wanted to cross the Yellow River on this night and cut a short way to Beijing to deliver the manuscript. If you go back to Xi'an, you won't be able to keep up. At 6 p.m. on this day, my friends made a table of food and waited, I closed the door, did not allow anyone to come in, controlled myself, did not get excited, and wrote it immediately! As soon as I can't control it, my right hand begins to spasm, so I can't hold the pen, what should I do? I poured the kettle of water into the basin, mixed some cold water, three towels, dipped in, and put my hand in it to burn it, so that the hand was loose. After copying, throwing the ballpoint pen that I had used for six years out of the window, running to the toilet to look in the mirror, I became a different look, thinking about my situation six years ago, my last good years disappeared, sat at the table, stopped for ten minutes, silent. I am reminded of a quote from Thomas Mann in Heavy Moments: "Finally done, it may not be good, but it is done, as long as it can be done, it is good." ”

After writing, I have completely become an idiot, like a five- or six-year-old child, who wants to enter Beijing, others are not at ease, so they enter Beijing with their brother, and after following their brother's ass, they don't know what they want to do. Don't know what you're doing when you cross the street?

| Four |

This kind of labor is not a special kind of labor, and everyone must have the right attitude towards life, such as writers and peasants. My initiation teacher was my father, cowardly but very good at labor, and when he farmed, he prepared everything perfectly. Pulling grass and hoeing the ground, paying attention to beauty, he said that from anywhere, it looks like a line, very beautiful, once planted pumpkins in the ground, saying that this is not necessarily for eating, once in the autumn, the ground is full of melons, which is called "good looking". That's the aesthetic! He has a greedy spirit when he works.

I think that everyone, no matter what they do, can do a good job in their own industry, and the ultimate value of a person is not what they do. If I were a carpenter and did my best, I would be a first-class carpenter. Human life becomes meaningful in the process of pursuit, not in results, and results are not important. If we talk about the outcome, people will die, and the earth will collapse, and there is nothing great or small in the broader view.

END