In "Blossoming Flowers", Master Fan said to XiaoMao, "To do life is to be a man" | Chu Bannong

The second season of the stage play "Blossoms" was staged at the Majestic Theater last year

"Flowers" (by Jin Yucheng, Shanghai Literature and Art Publishing House, March 2013 edition). The master of Xiao Mao was a fat man, who had been a student with foreign coppersmiths since childhood, and later became an "eight-level fitter in a watch factory", and his skills were of course very good. In "Picking up Wu Zhang, The Second", the author wrote about one thing: One day, Master Fan took out a square piece of steel the size of a foreign fire box, which could slide out a steel mortise, and the two were tightly sewn and pumped freely. Master Fan told Xiao Mao that this was called "Yin Yang Mortise" and that he had done "manual life" when he was seventeen years old. He said proudly that the present workers, even at the age of thirty-seven or forty-seven, could not do so (p. 194). Listening to this, "Xiao Mao does not make a sound", it is estimated that I am very impressed with the "life" done by the master. In the Shanghai factory in the 1970s, homemade stainless steel soda wrenches were privately popular, and various patterns such as beautiful women and Sun Wukong were engraved, which were very popular. Master Fan is keen on this matter, "the car tongs are proficient in grinding and milling", and the wrench he makes is naturally the best. Master Fan also said to Xiao Mao: "To do life is to be a person, if the waist is hard, you must do it first, and the shot should be beautiful, and others have nothing to talk about, there is nothing to talk about." (p. 194)

The "life" that Master Fan said is work, work, and craftsmanship, and "yin and yang mortise" is the "life" made by Master Fan. And "doing life" is to do things, work, Master Fan processes soda wrenches, this is what he is "doing life". During the "Cultural Revolution," he criticized him for "coveting personal welfare," and he took out his yin and yang mortise and put it on the stage to retort with them, saying that his critics "had nothing to talk about, and the criticism meeting could not continue. The "life" he came up with made him die, and he was qualified to say the above passage. There are other people in the book who have also said "doing life", such as "Picking Up The Chapter of Seven, One" Xiao Mao said, "Don't be serious about doing life, push three blocks four, engage in seven twists and three twists, that is, play tai chi." (p. 222) Xiao Mao's mother led him to meet Chun Xiang on a blind date, and Chun Xiang also said that she was "living" as a barge on the Suzhou River, and often saw Xiao Mao "practicing her fists" on the banks of the Suzhou River (贰拾一章贰, p. 274). In this context, "life" and "doing life" are two typical Shanghai (Wu) dialect words, which are commonly used today, that is, the "Wutong District" where the dialect situation has changed greatly, and these two words are still in use. The example sentence of "Flowers" is their survival record.

Look up my dialect database again, wow! Great "life" and "do life"! These two words actually existed during the Song Dynasty, and they are from the novel "Nian Yu Guanyin". Researcher Cheng Yizhong said in the preface: "Most scholars regard it (referring to the 3 articles such as "Nian Yu Guanyin" and other 3 articles) as a representative work of the Song Dynasty. ("Five Kinds of Popular Novels of the Great Series of Dialects, Jingben", Jiangsu Ancient Books Publishing House, December 1991 edition, page 3) Please see the example sentence:

"Suddenly, [Cui Ning] Fang opened the door early in the morning, and saw two people in soap shirts, dressed like Yu Houfu, sitting on the ground in the bunk, and asked: 'This official heard that there was a line in Cui Waiting for the Commandment, and he asked him to come and do his life.'" Cui Ning ordered the family to follow the two men to the road to Xiangtan County. So he took Cui Ning to the house, met with the officials, contracted the life of Yuzuo, and returned home. ("Nian Yu Guanyin", in "Five Kinds of Popular Novels such as the Great Series of Dialects, Jingben", Jiangsu Ancient Books Publishing House, December 1991 edition, page 8)

In just a few hundred words, "do life" and "life" are used respectively, and if you calculate the eleventh year (1141) of shaoxing in the Southern Song Dynasty mentioned in the story, these two words in the "Nian Yu Guanyin" have been used for more than 800 years. In addition, many other Wu novels in the Ming Dynasty, such as "Ancient and Modern Novels", "Type World Dialect", etc., in the same context, without exception, will use "life" and "do life", there are many example sentences, and even "Jin Ping Mei Zi Zhi" has used the synonym "life" and "doing life" more than once.

In The Ming Dynasty novels, "doing life" also has a metaphorical meaning, used to refer to male and female sexual affairs, Feng Menglong's "Awakening to the World Hengyan", volume 16, "Lu Wu Pairs of Hard-left Colored Shoes" (Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, July 1998, 1st Edition), there is an example sentence of the old couple "doing something wrong and not having a serious life". The example sentence in "Chapter 2 · II" is: "Miss Wang said that she did not learn a good look, and wanted to learn to settle in this group of wildlings, to live in the wilderness, and to play 'open-air card nine'." (p. 33) At least nine times in the book, "doing life" is used instead of sex. That is to say, the phrases of daily life and multiple meanings from more than 800 years ago are clearly recorded and circulated in an orderly manner.

Although the earliest "date of birth" in the current daily language is not known, it has been recorded in the late Qing dynasty novel "The Tale of flowers on the sea" (written by Qing Han Bangqing, People's Literature Publishing House, February 1982 edition) written by Hu Shi and known as "the first masterpiece of Wu literature". There are also in "Flowers", or the "Fan Big Fat Man" thing: "One day in the meeting, everyone talked halfway, I didn't make a sound, took out this life sutra, and gently swung it on the stage." I say... This is called true life, and this is called the qualification of the Shanghai working class. (Shiwu Zhang, p. 194) The "Life Sutra" refers to the yin and yang mortise he made. The meaning of "true life" in the Shanghai dialect is "real, genuine, referring to the heavy work done, difficult or technical requirements" ("Xinzhuang Dialect", Chu Bannong, Xuelin Publishing House, 2013 edition, p. 74). Fan Da Fatzi called his 17-year-old "masterpiece" and his ability to do "masterpiece" "real life", the same reason, in the rational, in harmony, is the contemporary "real life". Shanghai Television has grasped the characteristics of dialect words, and in previous years, it has also opened a "real life" column, which is very popular.

Author: Chu Bannong

Editor: Xie Juan

Editor-in-Charge: Shu Ming

*Wenhui exclusive manuscript, please indicate the source when reprinting.