Chen Mengjia (1911.4.19-1966.9.3)
There are many articles written about Chen Mengjia. Last year's Zi Yi's book "The Chronicle of Mr. Chen Mengjia" was published to exhaust the relevant materials published publicly. The ins and outs of the suicide of this handsome archaeologist and poet are particularly interesting, but there are also obvious blind spots.
"Chronicle of Mr. Chen Mengjia", Zhonghua Bookstore, June 2021 edition
Most of the talkers started with the narrative of Xia Nai, the director of the Institute of Archaeology at the time.
In 1966, the Diary of Xia Nai recorded:
Tuesday, August 23 ... In the afternoon, Red Guards were set up in the middle of the institute, and at 3 o'clock, Su Bingqi, a "reactionary authority," was demonstrated to the public, and all the cows, ghosts, and snake gods in the center were gathered, and they marched around the center three times. I played the black flag, Niu Zhaoxun and Lin Zemin played the gong, there were: reactionary authority Xu Xusheng (not yet arrived)... Rightist Chen Mengjia... Qi Guangxiu and others, a total of 26 people.
Wednesday, August 24 ... At noon, Chen Mengjia was beaten and wore a "rogue poet" paper hat...
On Thursday, August 25, I went to the office on the morning and saw a Notice of the Red Guards on the notice board, saying that Chen Mengjia, a rightist member of our firm, had attempted suicide. I heard that after work yesterday at noon, he went to the home of a widow surnamed Cai in Dongchang Hutong (her husband died in 1963, according to Yun Zeng, who was orphaned by Chen before his death), and was dragged by the leftist masses of the central authorities, he committed suicide to resist the movement, committed the crime of counter-revolution, and also slandered the masses in his suicide note and insulted him, so he committed suicide.
Saturday, September 3, Wen Chen Mengjia had committed suicide again last night.
Obviously, what happened at noon on August 24 was the direct cause of Chen Mengjia's suicide. Readers can't help but ask, who is the key person, the widow surnamed Cai? What is her relationship with Chen Mengjia?
This puzzle can only be solved by the collector Fang Jixiao. Many years ago, Fang Jixiao purchased a large amount of materials from the Chen Mengjia's wife, Zhao Luorui's family, from the Panjiayuan Market (for the cause and effect of this matter, see Fang Jixiao's "Notes on the Origin of Ink - Thirty Years of My Collection"). In addition to books and photos, there are also many correspondence between family and friends. For several years, he has been immersed in the work of sorting out and examining.
Finally, in September last year, the book "Chen Mengjia and His Friends" was published. Fang Jixiao did not disappoint, revealing that the widow surnamed Cai was named Chen Fang, and her husband was Fang Xin (Cai Fangxin), a translator who worked for the People's Literature Publishing House. In the 1950s, cai and Chen became acquainted with each other because of the purchase of Ming Dynasty furniture. Due to their proximity and ease of movement, they have maintained a close relationship ever since. In 1957, Zhao Luorui suffered from a serious mental illness, and Chen Fang often went to his home to take care of patients. After Fang Xin's death in 1963, the Cai family was financially strapped, thanks to the help of the Chen Mengjia family. The two families need each other and support each other.
Chen Mengjia and His Friends, Sanlian Bookstore, August 2021 edition
Surprisingly, in 2015, Fang Jixiao managed to find Ms. Chen Fang, who was already ninety-two years old, and visited her several times (at the end of that year, the old man died). Thus, in their mixed meetings, we were able to listen to the parties' first-hand accounts of the historical scene.
Regarding the incident on August 24, Chen Fang said this:
At noon on August 24, I had just eaten when Mr. Chen came. He looked tired, so I sat him down and went to make tea. Mr. Chen had just picked up the teacup, and several people from the courtyard shouted loudly: Is Chen Mengjia in the house? Mr. Chen put down his teacup and was just about to get up when someone broke into the house. They were The Red Guards of the Archaeological Institute. A Red Guard pulled Chen Mengjia up, pointed at me and asked: What is your relationship? I leaned against my desk and didn't say a word. One of them said something very ugly, and Mr. Chen said, "We have nothing to do with each other, and we are looking for her to go to my house to take care of the patient." The Red Guards did not listen to his explanation at all, and their mouths were not clean, and they dragged Mr. Chen out of the room with a drag. As I was about to leave the door, I saw that Mr. Chen's eyes were full of despair, and he called my name and said, "I can't let people play like monkeys anymore." ”
As readers, I have to say how fortunate we are to see another description of this scene at the same time. It came from Gao Tianlin, one of the Red Guards who broke into the courtyard that day. Gao Tianlin's article "Also Speaking of The Last Years of Mr. Chen Mengjia" (hereinafter referred to as "Gao Wen") was published in the first issue of Diandi Magazine in 2016. His version is as follows:
On the morning of the 24th, Mr. Chen and others, Xia Nai and other so-called "bourgeoisie" and "royalists" hung black cards in the office to participate in the manual labor of building houses, and after they finished their labor at 11:30 p.m., a comrade in the technical room reported to the person in charge of the Red Guards that Chen Mengjia had entered a certain courtyard in Dongchang Hutong, and that the owner of the house was a widow... When the red guards heard about it, they regarded Mr. Chen Mengjia's visit as an irregular act, that is, he led three or four Red Guards (who were among them at the time) to a certain courtyard (now demolished) in the south of Dongkou Road in Dongchang Hutong. When he entered the courtyard, he saw that Mr. Chen was indeed in the home of a middle-aged woman in the east wing of the courtyard, and the head of the Red Guards immediately drank and ordered him to come out! After Mr. Chen and I came out of the Dongchang Hutong family, he pushed on the bicycle that he had brought back from the United States, and the Red Guards escorted them out of the east entrance of the hutong...
The two versions seem to be similar, but are actually two narratives of completely different intensities. In Gao Tianlin's version, these four or five Red Guards just drank in the courtyard to make Chen Mengjia come out, did not "break into the house", "dragged up", "pointed at me and asked" a series of thrilling actions, nor did they mention "it is difficult to hear" and "unclean words", but cleverly used a meaningful ellipsis to pass by, "The owner of the family is a widow..." The "slight" in this paragraph does not affect the "details" that follow. He specifically mentioned that after leaving the yard, Chen Mengjia could also push his bicycle that the United States had brought back. It was as if under the circumstances at that time, Mr. Chen had received some respect and had a certain freedom in his actions.
Let's move on. Chen Fang went on to say:
After Mr. Chen was escorted away, I was very unhappy in my heart, and I always felt that Mr. Chen had not said anything about me. What was even more uneasy was that the Red Guards would tell Mr. Chen what to do, so I went to the archaeological institute to ask my compatriot Qi Guangxiu. Qi Guangxiu walked out of the archaeological institute and quietly told me that Mr. Chen was escorted by the Red Guards to the door of the technical room of the archaeological institute, forcibly put on a "rogue poet" paper hat, and stood on a stool to show the public. It was noon, under the scorching sun, Mr. Chen was sweating profusely, and when someone passed by, the Red Guards spread out how Mr. Chen and a widow were doing.
Gao Tianlin wrote:
Take him to the open space on the north side of the entrance to the technical room in the northwest corner of the archaeological institute, and make him stand on a stool wearing a paper hat with the words "Rogue Poet" written on his head, and criticize him. At this time, it was noon time for lunch, because there were two canteens in the courtyard at that time, the Institute of Archaeology and the Library of the Academy of Sciences, so there were many people passing by, but the number of onlookers was not very large, mainly Hu Junming and Feng Puren (the latter two were transferred out of the Archaeological Institute, Feng was deceased) to speak "criticism" and blame. In this way, under the scorching sun at noon, Mr. Chen Mengjia was indeed sweating profusely, with a look of humiliation and unbearableness, because everyone was going to the canteen for lunch, and the criticism of Mr. Chen did not last long, less than half an hour before and after. Finally, the Red Guards escorted him back to the "cowshed" of the Archaeological Institute (a room where the "bourgeoisie" and "rightists" concentrated on studying), opened the door and pushed him into the house. I was present during the whole fight, and there was no spitting or dirty stuff thrown at Mr. Chen Mengjia, let alone falling off a stool and collapsing to the ground.
From the text, the wording "the number of onlookers is not very large", "the duration is not long, less than half an hour before and after" "It did not happen... Moreover," the intention of "Gaowen" is well known to us.
I have no intention of continuing to lay out this kind of "comparison" here, wasting everyone's time, so I stopped here. But still mention the end of Gao Tianlin's article. In the last sentence he writes:
According to reports, some celebrities and scholars in society may have been more persecuted than Mr. Chen during the "Anti-Rightist" and "Cultural Revolution," but those gentlemen were able to bear the burden of humiliation and turn a corner, because after the political abuses were corrected at that time, there were many people who came out of the mountains to take up important positions, rejuvenated politically and academically, and made important contributions to the people's cause.
It seems that chen Mengjia was accused of being too weak and failing to "turn" like other celebrities, thus rejuvenating the meaning of the second spring.
Looking at the "Gao Wen" as a whole, the whole article is intended to exonerate and defend oneself. For example, after Mr. Chen's first suicide attempt, the institute sent people to the Chen family on duty in Qianliang Hutong, calling it "protection" and "care." I don't know if Mr. Chen in the Spirit of Heaven can agree that the Red Guards of the Institute of Archaeology live in their homes as a kind of "protection". Of course, Mr. Gao has the right to defend himself, but in the face of the deceased, in addition to his long sentence like a dragonfly, "I mistakenly participated in the fight on August 24, and in retrospect, I feel deeply guilty", should I solemnly apologize, such as: "Mr. Chen, I hurt you." I was wrong, sorry. ”
Back to Fang Jixiao's new book. I can't forget the words that Ms. Chen Fang said to Ji Xiao several times, "As soon as I close my eyes, I will have the look of humiliation and despair that Chen Mengjia had when he left my house for the last time." This is the eye collision that happened again between Ms. Chen Fang and Chen Mengjia after fifty years of separation.
In addition, the desperate letter written by Chen Mengjia to her must be reproduced in full here:
Chen Fang:
Over the past ten years, I have been very grateful for the care of things in my family, and I will continue to look forward to the past. Although there is gossip, please don't mind. I am open-minded and carefree. Take good care of Ting and Pei. Don't bother.
Chen Mengjia
On the evening of August 24, 1966
New bike to send Fang Pei.
Fang Jixiao's new book allows Ms. Chen Fang to take the microphone and tell the public before the end of her life, and it also makes words like "Gao Wen" not become the final summary statement of those who have witnessed it. That's what it means in my eyes.