Twentieth Century Chinese Poet Critique No. 30: Mu Dan

I remember that when Wang Yichuan, a professor of the Department of Chinese of Beijing Normal University, edited the selection of Chinese literary works in the twentieth century, he thought that "Chinese contemporary poets first recommend Mu Dan." "I have read mutan's poems written in the 1970s, such as "Song of Wisdom", "Autumn", "Winter" and other works, which is surprising. In those days, he actually wrote such a modern style of poetry. Later, reading Mudan's modern poems written in the 1940s, I felt that the poems he wrote in the 1970s were logical, after all, the skills had not completely faded.

As a representative poet of the Jiuye school, Mu Dan (Cha Liangzheng) accepted the realist tradition of new poetry in the 1940s, adopting the expressive techniques of European and American modernists to portray the social phenomena after the great turmoil of war. Mudan was deeply influenced by great English poets such as Eliot and Auden, but he had his own characteristics. "May", for example, obviously has auden's shadow, but incorporates Mu Dan's own style and writes about the reality of China.

Each section of the poem "May" is preceded and followed by a poem of parody in the classical Chinese style, and the parody and the modern poem itself form an interesting and subtle contrast: two poetic styles, two realms, two eras. In contrast to Mudan's ingenuity, there is a strange effect, showing the poet's ironic hesitation and hesitation about the established values.

The new Chinese poems change from Guo Moruo's empty shouts and self-venting to Mu Dan's deep introspection and modern consciousness. Mudan's modernist poetry is no longer an explosion or praise of the self, but emphasizes the fragmentation and transformation of the self, showing the introspection and exploration of Necha. As the Irish poet Yeats wrote: "Everything is scattered and can no longer keep the center / There is chaos everywhere in the world." ”

Mudan's "Spring", unlike the sentimentality or joy in traditional poetry, "Oh, light, shadow, sound, color, are all naked/painful, waiting to reach into a new combination." "This is sensualization and carnalization in the modern sense, rediscovering the secrets of spring." The difference between words and classical poetry is only the surface and the form, and its inner sense of modernity lies in the fact that the meaning of poetry is no longer the sentiment of sad spring and sad spring, but the psychological shock caused by a person facing modernity.

Among Mu Dan's longer poetic works, "The Charm of the Forest: Sacrifice of White Bones on the Hukang River" and "The Battle of the Gods and Demons: Gifts to Dong Shu" deserve attention. The former is a very harmonious, clear little epic, where primitive forests, natural life, hometown charm, and deep love are fused together, "quietly, on that forgotten hillside / It is still raining, and there is a breeze / No one knows that history has ever walked here again / Leaving a heroic spirit to breed in the trunk." ”

The latter's "Battle of the Gods and Demons" is complex and multi-meaning, and the timbre is agitated. "What you desire/is far from coming. You only have death/my children, you only have death. This reminds me of Haizi's "Autumn" written that "autumn has arrived." / Without the slightest forgiveness or tenderness: autumn has come /". The two poets invariably wrote about the cruelty and coldness of the last days, the wasteland-like landscape.

However, the poet also has love, and wrote "the best love poem in modern China" in the "Eight Poems" - "You see this fire with your bottom eyes / You can't see me, although I lit it for you / Alas, what burns is only the mature age / Your bottom, my bottom." We are separated by mountains. It can be said that Mudan's "Eight Poems" is the best love poem written by a poet who understands how complex and changeable the modern "I" is.

It is also worth mentioning that the poet Mudan was also a great translator, and his translation name "Cha liangzheng", with the translation of Pushkin's "The Bronze Knight" and "Eugen Onegin", as well as Shelley, Keats, Byron (don Juan's two volumes), Yeats, Auden, Eliot ("Alfred Prufrolock's Love Song" and "Wasteland") and other works, have reached the best state of the poet's translation of poetry.