Xu Dianbo
What is Dongting Lake like in your heart? Is it the vast smoke and weather of the eight-hundred-mile Mother Lake, or the mission of worrying first and then enjoying it? A non-fiction work created with the theme of "Green Mountains and Clear Waters and New Hunan", "Great Lake News", may give people a special answer. In the words of the author Shen Nian, he is a deep love book to Dongting Lake and the Yangtze River wetland, a book to the survival of the children of the rivers and lakes, "carrying his trust and dependence on this lake, conveying his most sincere respect for the tenacious growth of the lake people."
"Great Lake News" records Shen Nian's observations and thoughts on many visits to the wetlands of East Dongting Lake and the integrated isolated island of the Yangtze River in recent years. In those days of walking along the shoreline and deep into the wetlands, he saw a lake that was different from his past cognition, and saw in people a broader temperament, heart, and the reality of the survival of people in the lake area than the lake. His language is flexible and sensitive, the narrative is long and expressive, as if he is immersed in the scene, telling people about the jumping and flying of elk, migratory birds, and porpoises, and also writing about the abundance and decline of European and American black poplars and various plants. In particular, the intersection of narrators and the fate of this land, a variety of different stories, reflect the joys and sorrows above the living, like a mirror, reflecting the twists and turns and advances of biological diversity conservation and sustainable development, showing the gradual changes and transmutations of ecology and the world in the changing times.
Undoubtedly, most of the excellent writers have the thinking of humanities scholars, the feelings of anthropologists, the vision of sociologists, and they have dreams to seek an unforgettable intersection between the pursuit of real-world objectivity and the expression of writers' personality characteristics. Shen Nian and his "Great Lakes News" have such characteristics. He believes that the changing era has a large number of vivid experiences, which are worth discovering and expressing, and paying close attention to reality can better reflect the writer's emotional attitude, spiritual temperament and value position. A series of stories related to the children of the rivers and lakes in the book present the time history of the ecological history and culture of Dongting Lake, including the humanistic spirit, geographical environment, customs and customs, living conditions and many other aspects, and have achieved a typical literary sample of the new era to record the changes of the mother Dongting Lake.
For thousands of years, Dongting Lake has nourished the splendid Huxiang culture and also bred generations of literati and inkers. Shen Nian was born and raised on the shore of Dongting Lake, and the water source has become a spiritual element in his life. He walked on the earth like water and wrote on the earth. We are fellow villagers, fellow windows, and close friends, and we had the privilege of visiting Dongting Lake together to explore the common habitat of life in the "walk of water". Talk about why write a water story? Shen Nian's original intention is still the same: "It is the times and the people that have inspired me." After visiting these places many times, the changes of the times, the struggles of people and the changes in fate have touched me and inspired me. He chose to put his walking pen and ink on many ordinary and unusual people in the lake area, trying to save the time belonging to rivers and lakes when salvaging their life events, learning to endure hardships, obstacles and death, and trying to write the understanding of life, life and nature of "I" who rushed from the city to the remote place from a single human perspective.
The Great Lakes Message has resonated with many writers and readers. The famous writer Han Shaogong believes that Shen Nian loves all things in the cave garden and wrote down this dream, dictionary, and time history about the old garden. Shi Zhanjun, editor-in-chief of "People's Literature" and a well-known critic, said that the "Great Lakes News" is "quiet, the still water is deep, tolerant of tolerance, warm old and poor, protect life and grow together... In the creation of a manic and non-impetuous text, a natural school; The Great Lakes News is also moving, moving with excitement, the time of heaven and earth, the changes of ancient and modern times, the fate of man and bird, the intersection of water and soil, and all the spirits will communicate on the pages of the article with no barriers." The famous critic Wang Yao praised, "Shen Nian returned nature to nature, and then gave birth to nature into humanities, this is a Chinese version of Walden Lake."
The water went very slowly, and we walked very slowly. Slow is fast, and slow can go far. But no matter how far he goes, the great lake of his hometown has always haunted Shen Nian's soul and become an inexhaustible source of creation, and has also created the characteristics of his works. This trait is not only in the literary sense, those that record the history of time and the history of all things, leaving readers with not only a picture of life, but also a spiritual and emotional pursuit. These words do their best to collect the memories of the jianghu, which is the highest respect that Shen Nian has given to the children of the jianghu. We respect its literary value, and we will also study the social changes hidden in the works, as well as the reflections and inspirations behind the words.
("Great Lake News" by Shen Nian published by Beiyue Literature and Art Publishing House)
Shen Thoughts
He is a member of the Chinese Writers Association, the vice chairman of the Hunan Writers Association, and a master of arts degree from Chinese Min University. He has won the October Literature Award, the Chinese Young Writers Award, the Sanmao Prose Award, and the Wansongpu Literature Award. He is the author of the short and medium story collection "Lights at Night", "Night Duck Stop Calling", essay collection "The World is Deep as the Sea", "Things in Time" and so on.