<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="1" >1</h1>
Legend has it that at the end of the Spring and Autumn Period, there was a hermit who was very good at casting swords, named Ou Yezi, he had a proud descendant named Gan general, the king of Chu Wenzhi, sent someone to search for the gan general, ordered him to forge a unique sword, Gan will then caici mountain fine iron, lead the stream into a lake, smelt iron in the middle of the lake, flying smoke, red light and purple qi, feel the aura of heaven and earth, gather the essence of the sun and the moon, and finally cast two swords, but the essence of the dark blue snake, the article pieces of green turtle scales, it is the peerless divine soldier, so Gan will name this pair of swords in the name of his husband and wife. They are cadre generals and Mo evils.
Gan will carry the sword of Gan, about to enter the palace to present to the King of Chu, before leaving, Gan will instruct his wife Mo Xie, he will go there will be no return, temporarily bury the sword of Mo Evil deep in the ground, until one day the child grows up, and then dig out the sword to avenge his father. The king of Chu got the sword of Gan, drew the sword and slashed it at the boulder, only to see "the sword test a trace of autumn, the rock poured water and cut off the flow", such a good sword is indeed the only one in the world, in order to ensure that only the sword he owns will always protect the world first, the king of Chu immediately executed the general, from then on, the gan will die, only the sword of Mo Evil is buried in the courtyard, night and night mourning. Soon, The child of The Gan General Mo Xie was born, named "Chi", and when Chi grew up, he dug out the sword of Mo Xie again, and embarked on the road of avenging his father.
Unexpectedly, at this time, the king of Chu actually dreamed of Chi at night to avenge his father, so he spread the order to catch Chi, rewarded him with thousands of gold to catch Chi, Chi was cornered, he could only flee to the mountain, and was sighing and hesitating, he met a chivalrous guest, who was impressed by the life of the young Chi and was determined to avenge Chi, but on the condition that he would get Chi's sword and the first rank, and Chi immediately killed himself and entrusted him with chivalry.
The chivalrous warrior came to see the king of Chu, offered chi's head, and asked the king of Chu to put the head of the chi in the pot to cook, but unexpectedly boiled for three days, the king of Chu personally came to check, just at this time, behind the king, a cold light flashed, the king of Chu has been beheaded by the chivalrous, and then, the chivalrous himself also immediately killed himself, all three heads fell into boiling water, wrestled up, and finally, Dingzhong boiled into a pot of broth, unable to distinguish, can only be divided into three parts of the burial, leaving a "three king tomb".
This story, which is the well-known story of "GanJiang Mo Evil" in the "Search for God", is now also included in the junior high school Language textbook published by Suzhou Education Publishing House. In October 1926, Lu Xun, who experienced the March 18 Massacre, made a profound reflection on the road of the Chinese revolution, and endless emotions gathered in the pen, writing the short story "Casting The Sword" in the "New Compilation of Stories", this short story based on the above story is full of resistance and revenge, and is a profound manifestation of Lu Xun's revolutionary will and revolutionary thinking, even Lu Xun himself said:
The "Cast Sword" in the "New Compilation of Stories" is indeed written more seriously, and the "New Compilation of Stories" is not exempt from oil slippery except for "Cast Sword".
This weekend, in the bookstore, I came across the illustrator Xi Jiu's picture book "Cast Sword", which vividly reproduced Lu Xun's short story with extremely tense color contrasts, which was deeply touching.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="9" > 2</h1>
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="10" >2.1 mice</h1>
Unlike the original story of "Search for God", the story of "Cast Sword" begins on the eve of the protagonist's sixteenth birthday, when he is awakened by a rat that accidentally falls into the water. The rat that fell into the water desperately grasped the four walls of the water man in order to survive, and the young eyebrow ruler felt that the rat deserved it, and on the other hand felt that the rat was struggling pitifully, so he rescued the rat, but after saving the rat, he involuntarily trampled the rat to death.
In this repetition of disgust, salvation and killing, we see the indecisiveness that exists in the protagonist's heart. In the face of the beings at the bottom, he is disgusted with the inferior qualities that exist in them, but on the other hand, he has compassion, and in the end, he still cannot control the harm he has done to them. Very profoundly, the mother of the ruler between the eyebrows asked:
But what are you doing? Kill it, or save it?
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="14" >2.2 Revenge</h1>
The awakened mother told the eyebrow ruler about the cause of his father's death, arousing the fighting spirit of the eyebrow ruler to avenge his father:
Suddenly, his whole body was on fire, and he felt as if sparks were flashing out of every hair. His fists clenched in the dark.
Digging a deeply buried sword between his eyebrows, his mother said to him:
"From now on, you will change your gentle disposition and take revenge with this sword!" His mother said.
"I have changed my tender disposition, and I will take revenge with this sword!"
This story reminds me of the famous movie "Color Ring", in which a patriotic drama was held by enthusiastic students, and in the cry of "China cannot die", a set of montage techniques switched between pictures, and the scene of the stir-fry fire at the celebration banquet vented the students' enthusiasm to the screen.
This fierce fire is the revolutionary fire burning in the new generation of intellectuals, but this passion is only a momentary impulse, this fierce fire is so strong, so strong that it will disappear in an instant; this fist is so hard that it can only be waved in the air.
In the movie "Color Ring", Kwong Yumin, played by Wang Lihong, the leader of the students, excitedly read a poem:
Lead the knife into a fast, live up to the head of the teenager.
On the surface, this expresses the intellectuals' firm will to struggle, but in fact, it is extremely ironic that this poem was written in the early years of Wang Jingwei, who had long been the number one traitor at that time, and the students did not understand the background of this poem, but only read it repeatedly, just like in "Cast Sword", the repetition of the mother's sentence between the eyebrows, behind this repetition, is the inner portrayal of the young intellectuals who are not firm in their hearts, forcibly paralyze themselves with language, and embolden themselves.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="25" >2.3 swords</h1>
In the introduction of the mother of the eyebrow ruler, we learned about the experience of forging swords, it turned out that twenty years ago, the princess gave birth to a piece of iron, and the father of the eyebrow ruler was summoned to the palace to forge iron into a sword.
Why did Lu Xun arrange such a plot? We know that the prelude to China's modern revolution was unveiled by Kang Youwei Liang Qichao and the six hundred people on the bus, and from the palace, a huge penghu reform method began the hundred-day restoration from top to bottom.
At that time, the will of the revolution had just been conceived in the palace and ended in a hurry with the fall of the six gentlemen of The Five Lords, however, this unprecedented ideological enlightenment, the will of the revolution, was conceived, and formed in the hands of the revolutionary volunteers, becoming a cold and hard sword. However, as written in the novel, the first person to feed the revolutionaries' own swords with blood was himself. As Lu Xun wrote in his own poem:
Wishing that the cold star was not noticed, I recommended Xuanyuan with my blood.
However, just as Lu Xun changed the "King of Chu" to "King" in the original story, precisely to enhance the universality of the imagery, here, before the father of the meijian ruler went to hand over the sword, his mother said:
You have such a great credit this time.
However, meijian ruler's father was killed after all, and Lu Xun had already seen many examples of benevolent people who had contributed to the revolution being killed.
At this time, the new young revolutionaries are about to embark on a new road of revenge with this revolutionary will.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="34" >2.4 character arcs</h1>
The opening rat in the novel hints at the deep motives of the brow ruler to embark on the road to revenge – in order to save the trapped and slaughtered beings. In Xi Jiu's picture book, this motivation is further strengthened by the dream of the interlacing of the eyebrow ruler and reality, and in the clear dream of the real and the illusory, the montage technique of the lens language renders the influence of the mouse image on the eyebrow ruler.
In the dream of the eyebrow ruler, the sword turned into a glowing seed and planted in the soil, which means that the will of the revolution has been buried deep in his heart, but at this time it has not yet taken root, and he has not yet changed his gentle disposition; at the same time, the hordes of rats are scurrying at the feet of the eyebrow ruler, showing their numbness, and also showing the hesitation and compassion in the eyebrow ruler, and finally, the picture is fixed on the death of the mouse, so that we feel the sympathy and regret of these low-level beings in the dream.
Under this set of extremely creative scene switching, the inner shaping of the character of the eyebrow ruler was realized, which made him have a rich motivation to run away and completed the initial first growth, from then on, he not only carried the motivation to avenge his father, but also shouldered the mission of saving the Cangsheng Revolution.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="38" >3</h1>
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="39" >3.1 market</h1>
Carrying a mission of revenge, meijian stepped into the street market. The novel reads:
As he walked straight ahead, a child suddenly ran over and almost touched the tip of his sword on his back, causing him to sweat profusely. Turning out to the north, not far from the palace, people are crowded in dense layers, all stretching their necks. There were also the cries of women and children in the crowd. He was afraid that the invisible sword would hurt people, and he did not dare to squeeze in; but the people hugged behind him. He had to retreat in a hurry; he saw only the backs and outstretched necks of the people.
He was afraid of hurting passers-by, and his gentle disposition prevented him from drawing his sword for revenge, and sure enough, he missed the king's convoy and missed an opportunity for revenge.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="43" >3.2 viewers</h1>
The eyebrow ruler was meant to take revenge, but he was pinched by the crowd around him:
All the people on the side of the road also got up. But the dry-faced teenager still twisted the collar between his eyebrows, refusing to let go, saying that he had crushed the precious Dantian, and he must be insured, and if he died before he was eighty years old, he would have to die. The idlers immediately gathered around and watched, but no one spoke; later, someone laughed and scolded a few words from the side, but they all echoed the dry-faced teenager. When the eyebrow ruler encountered such an enemy, he was really angry, couldn't laugh, just felt bored, but couldn't get out. After cooking a pot of millet in this way, the ruler between the eyebrows has already been anxious and angry, but the people watching it are still not reduced, as if they are still relishing.
Such an absurd scene shows the numb absurdity of the viewer. Until the Black Man comes to break the siege:
The circle of people in front of them shook, and squeezed into a black man, black whiskers and black eyes, thin as iron. He didn't say a word, only smiled coldly between his eyebrows, raised his hand and gently flicked the dry-faced teenager's chin, and looked at his face. The young man also looked at him for a moment, but slowly let go of his hand and slipped away; the man slipped away; and the people watching were all bored and scattered.
The gentle eyebrow ruler cannot be relieved alone, and can only rely on the sudden appearance of the black man, who realizes the revenge of the spectator through his ruthless gaze, which is called:
Horizontal eyebrows cold to the thousand fingers, bowing down to the cow.
The spectators slipped away boredly, like the rats in the previous article, fleeing under the vengeful gaze of the black man.
The image of the black man's ruthless gaze pierces through the numb souls of the spectators, and this direct confrontation of the soul is Lu Xun's revenge on the spectators.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="52" >3.3 Black Man</h1>
In the end, the gentle eyebrow ruler still had no revenge, "He walked south, thinking in his heart, the city is so lively, it is easy to be injured by mistake, it is better to wait for him outside the south gate to return and avenge his father." ”
Outside the city, he encountered the black man again, and later we know that the black man is from Wenwen Township, named Yan Zhi Ao, we know that the Yan Zhi Ao is a pen name used by Lu Xun, Lu Xun explained:
The feast came from the house, from the sun, from the woman; from the Ao, from the release; I was driven out by the Japanese woman in the family.
The "Feast of Ao" is named after Lu Xun who felt that he had been expelled from the house by the daughter-in-law of Didi Zhouzuo, and the black man was the embodiment of Lu Xun, a revolutionary from the dark land, who promised to avenge the eyebrow ruler, but wanted the sword and head of the eyebrow ruler.
As soon as the dark sound stopped, the eyebrow ruler raised his hand to draw the cyan sword from his shoulder, and slashed forward from the back of his neck socket, and his head fell on the moss on the ground, while handing the sword to the black man.
In The picture book of XiJiu, 8 groups of storyboards have been deliberately added here, and the moment of unfolding the album is deeply shocking:
In the short self-murder plot, there are rich inner and emotional changes, the eyebrow ruler first recalls that he excavated the Mo Evil Sword, daily life, and transitioned to thinking about himself, in an instant, he changed from a gentle look to a firm look, he saw the wheel of history and the thousands of people under his feet, so he made up his mind and drew his sword to kill himself.
These 16 storyboards make the reader deeply feel the growth of the ruler between the eyebrows, and he has truly transformed from a gentle temperament into a revolutionary fighter.
The Feasters slaughtered the wolves that surrounded them, these revolutionary thieves with ulterior motives. Then a song of love was sung.
The reason why he embarked on the path of revenge was because of love, he could not achieve revenge because of his love for the world, and the Ao of the Feast decided to complete the mission of revenge for the Brow Ruler because of love, so the Ao of the Feast kissed the head of the Brow Ruler.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="63" >4. Act 3 – Revenge in the Palace</h1>
The mountain tour does not make the king interesting; Coupled with the secret report that there will be assassins on the road, he was even more disappointed. From the queen down to the courtiers, when they saw this, they did not feel helpless.
The king lived a life of poverty and luxury, and could find a reason to kill the courtiers and concubines around the king at will. What created the arrogance of the king, and what caused the situation of the courtiers and concubines? It was the riggers and the concubines themselves.
When the feaster meets the king, he must play a trick with the head in his hand, and the purpose of the trick is "for one person to see, to relieve sorrow and relief, for all the people to see, then the world is at peace", whether it is to relieve sorrow and relieve boredom or the world is too peaceful, but it is the demand of the king himself who is extremely extravagant, in a vain attempt to let the conscience of the vested interests discover that the revolution of his own life can only be a fool's dream.
At this time, the feaster put the head of the ruler between the eyebrows into the golden ding, and with his singing, the head floated and danced in the golden ding:
Driven by curiosity, the king came down to the front, "Just in surprise, the black man has pulled out the cyan sword he is carrying, and with just one swing, the lightning bolt straight down from the back of the nest, and with a thud, the king's head falls into the ding."
When enemies meet each other, they are particularly discerning, and they are also meeting in a narrow way. As soon as the king's head reached the surface of the water, the head of the ruler between his eyebrows came up and took a bite on his ear chakra. Dingshui immediately boiled and surged with sound; The two ends fought to the death in the water. In about twenty rounds, the king suffered five wounds to the head, but there were seven on the head of the ruler between the eyebrows. The king was cunning and always managed to get around the back of his enemies. The ruler between the eyebrows was negligent, and finally he bit the back of the neck socket and could not turn around. This time, the king's head was determined not to let go, he just kept eating into it; Even outside Ding Ding seemed to hear the sound of the child's loss of voice and pain.
Sure enough, the eyebrow ruler was inexperienced in the struggle and could not defeat the king, and the black man also calmly killed himself at this time, joined the struggle of Jinding, the three heads bit together, and finally, the eyebrow ruler and the feast of the Ao defeated the king, "Until I knew that the king's head was indeed out of breath, I looked at each other, smiled slightly, and then closed my eyes, looked up at the sky, and sank to the bottom of the water." ”
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="71" >5</h1>
In the original mythology of the Book of Searching Gods, the story ends here. But in Lu Xun's novel, there is still the plot of the last scene.
Ironically, when the three heads tore at each other in the golden ding, the king's close courtiers and concubines were:
From the queen to the courtiers, the frightened condensed look also moved in response, and seemed to feel the darkness of sorrow, and the skin was grained with millet one by one; However, with the joy of secrets, he narrowed his eyes, as if he were waiting for something.
And when it was all over, when it was time for "the smoke to extinguish the fire and the water waves to be unhappy", everyone "rushed to hug it." There are those who are crowded behind, and they can only peek in through the gap between people's necks."
The crowd salvaged three skeletons and began to argue about which was the king:
The farce ended with "all three skulls and the king's body buried in a golden coffin."
A revolution, revolutionaries throw their heads and spill their blood and do their best to struggle, in exchange for the spectators gathered around the watch, the king's song and dance has not been stopped, as long as these ministers, eunuchs, dwarfs and other generations still exist, as long as the people are still as spectators, dead a king will have a new king on this stage of history again, nothing will change.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" data-track="79" >6</h1>
After reading this story, let us recall Lu Xun's first vernacular novel "Diary of a Madman", in which the only madman who sees the truth of cannibalism shouts "Save the child", he wants to escape the fate of being eaten, but finally he is cured of madness and still becomes a cannibal.
In "Casting Swords" many years later, Lu Xun finally realized:
Tears must not wash away fate.
Revolutions cannot rely solely on words, but also on blood and swords.
Judging from the ending, as in "Diary of a Madman", the ending of the story, history still opens a new cycle again and again, the madman returns to the normal life of cannibalism, the people are ambushed and watching the great king's funeral, everything has not changed, which makes us feel the heavy sense of gravity generated by the wheel of history, while contemplating what the key to the revolution is.
To this day, reading "Cast Sword", we can still feel the shock brought by this story full of picture sense, and Xi Jiu, through the artistic tension of his pen, recreates this infinitely emotional novel in front of us in another form, which is a rare visual feast.