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· Guo Jilan | Wen Follow Qin Shuo Circle of Friends ID: qspyq2015·
A long-standing English country pastoral drama
Only the British can make such a boring subject into a TV series, and also make the rural scenery so beautiful.
What is it like to be a village veterinarian?
Veterinarian Jimmy tells you: there are tears and laughter, bittersweet, both to treat cats and dogs, but also to deliver cows and horses. But these big little guys can't talk. The horse was angry and kicked him over in the mud pit; the dog treating indigestion, the condition was repeated, did not get better, and when he asked the owner, it turned out that the dog ate cow's hoof jelly, Wellington steak, cod liver oil... Oh my God, eat better than he does!
These interesting stories take place in the 2020 British drama "All Creatures", which is known as the "Immortal Healing British Drama", which has charming British rural scenery, cute animals, simple and warm people and stories. After the drama was broadcast, it occupied 20.4% of the viewership share of British TV Five, which was the highest-rated program in the past five years, and also gained a super high reputation in the mainland, with a douban rating of 9.4 points in two seasons.
During the epidemic, there is also a British agricultural documentary "Clarkson's Farm" that is also very popular, ranking first in the ratings as soon as amazon was broadcast, with a rating of 9.2 on IMDb and a Douban score of 9.6.
People who love to watch British and American dramas will find that British dramas have a very distinctive theme - rural pastoral dramas, which are beyond the reach of American dramas. This kind of theme is mostly to express the daily life of rural residents, trivial and warm. Some people say that only the British can make such a boring subject into a TV series, and also make the rural scenery so beautiful.
Taking the BBC as an example, many of its rural pastoral plays are based on classical masterpieces, taking the 19th century British rural theme as an example: the gentry and aristocratic class as the protagonists, such as Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice", "Sense and Emotion", "Mansfield Manor", "Emma", and brontë sisters' "Jane Eyre", "Wuthering Heights", etc.; with the middle and lower classes as the protagonists, there are Elizabeth Gaskell's "Cranford", "Splendid Lady", and Flora Thompson's "Sparrow To Candle Town". and Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles.
Many of these pastoral dramas are phenomenal "blockbusters". When "Cranford" premiered in 2007, it set a new record with a 29.2% viewership; when "Bird's Town to Candle Town" aired in 2008-2011, the number of viewers never fell below 6 million, reaching a maximum of 7.68 million. Both of these plays show the daily life of victorian rural and rural areas, and there are two things that impressed me the most when I watched the play:
First, the beauty of the British countryside scenery, people's activities are castle villas, stone huts, church taverns, hedge paths, rivers and lakes, golden wheat fields, green meadows, each frame of the picture is like an oil painting, pleasing to the eye;
Second, the spiritual life of township residents is rich and colorful, and people, rich or poor, have cultural activities such as reading, poetry recitation, singing, and dancing.
In addition, the BBC has produced a number of documentaries and programmes about rural life. For example, the documentary series recreating the farm in history: "Tales from the Green Valley" (2 million viewers when it aired), "Victorian Farm" (3.04 million viewers when it aired), "Edwardian Farm" and so on. The shows followed a "reality show" model, with guests sent to live and work on farms from a specific historical period for a year, and to use or approximately use contemporary tools. BBC-1's Countryfile regularly has 7 to 8 million viewers and is one of the BBC-1's most popular shows.
Rural pastoral drama has become the most distinctive theme in British dramas and has formed a strong influence.
Why does country pastoral drama have such a strong influence in the UK? Why do the British have a special penchant for pastoral dramas? In a word, the British love the countryside and love the countryside, so they love to watch rural pastoral dramas. We can't help but ask the bottom line, why do the British love the countryside and the countryside so much?
The rural complex created by the gentry cultural tradition
The British have a special rural complex, which is the embodiment of Britain's unique development history and social and cultural traditions.
Since the Industrial Revolution, the center of human economic life has gradually shifted from the countryside to the city. But it is precisely the English who first entered the industrial age who had a deep affection for the countryside and loved the affairs of farming and the pleasures of the country. The British writer Jeremy Parksman wrote in his masterpiece The Englishman: "In the minds of the English people, the soul of England is in the countryside. The leader of britain's Conservative Party, Baldwin, who has been prime minister three times, said it more bluntly: "Britain is the countryside, and the countryside is Britain." ”
The development of British history has rarely been fiercely revolutionary, maintaining the characteristics of continuity and gradualness, originating from the aristocracy of the feudal era and continuing to the present. The aristocratic gentry dominated the country's politics and economy for centuries, and in modern times, the nobility, despite losing its political privileges and economic status, still has social and cultural influence.
Britain's elite class, the aristocratic and gentry class, has long been rooted in the countryside and formed a gentry culture, which has created a deep rural complex among the British. At the beginning of the 19th century, the famous American writer Washington Owen, after traveling to Europe, observed the difference between Britain and other countries, and he wrote in the article "English Village": "In some countries, the city is the prosperous and rich place of the country, and it is the place where the literary style and style of people gather, while the countryside is a relatively crude place." In England, the opposite is true, where the metropolises are only temporary gathering places or regular meeting places of high society; and after a few months, they return to their idyllic and comfortable country life. "The aristocratic squires of England are happy to be countrymen. In the countryside, the gentry and nobles and the hut farmers live together, nestled in the gentle embrace of history and nature.
Land was the main wealth of the English aristocratic squires, and the estate was the residence of the noble squire family in the countryside. The manor is not only a place of residence and social activities, but also a symbol of status, a symbol of status and a display of family strength. The British aristocracy has lived in the countryside for a long time, and is keen on manor construction and building mansions. This has resulted in villages all over England full of manor houses that are old, mysterious, tranquil, or or magnificent, or majestic.
The exquisite large villa is located in the middle of the manor, surrounded by lawn gardens, lakes and streams, pasture woods, coupled with the surrounding stately churches, rustic cottages, and large wheat fields. Rural architecture is synonymous with history and culture, and these are well preserved in Britain today. Tranquil scenery and rich history are the charms of the English countryside.
The love of the aristocratic gentry for village life had a major impact on the nation as a whole. In British society, there is a trend of "looking up to the upper class", and many successful entrepreneurs and politicians, in order to pursue social status and imitate the lifestyle of the aristocratic class, do not hesitate to spend a lot of money to buy real estate and build mansions in the countryside. For example, Marcus Samuel, who came from a poor family in London's East End, founded the well-known Shell Oil Company, and he used the success of the business elite to help gain high social status, so he bought a large piece of rural property in 1895 and became mayor of London in 1902. Wilson and Callaghan, two civilian-born Labour leaders, went to the countryside to buy land and become veritable squires.
Even the middle and lower classes of the people have followed the example of the aristocratic squires in carefully beautifying their dwellings and imitating the words and deeds of the gentlemen. The middle and lower-class British shown in the country pastoral drama are polite and gentlemanly, and the women are long skirts and full of lady-making. The rural pastoral drama also fully demonstrates the British people's love for the beauty of nature and garden landscape, whether it is a noble squire or a peasant citizen, flowers and trees are part of the living space.
Of course, pastoral drama is a "dream space", which not only meets the needs of the people in the country, but also exports British culture to the outside world, and the real life scene may not be so beautiful. However, the social and cultural traditions of the British people who stay in the countryside and stop in the countryside are deeply rooted in the soul and have created a strong rural complex for the British. The countryside is a spiritual need and a material desire, which is the historical root of the long-term prosperity of British rural pastoral dramas.
Critique and reflection on industrialization
The British yearning for the countryside is closely related to the "destruction" brought about by the Industrial Revolution.
As the world's first industrialized country, the Industrial Revolution on the one hand brought rapid economic development and huge material wealth to Britain, making Britain a world hegemon; on the other hand, it also brought many evil consequences, such as environmental pollution, the division between rich and poor, urban chaos, and urban expansion destroyed the natural and traditional cultural landscape of the countryside. The British were the first to suffer the negative effects of industrialization, and they were also the first to criticize and reflect on industrialization.
Criticism and reflection are embodied in literary creation, that is, the creation of rural pastoral themes has become a trend. A large number of writers appeared in the British literary world, praising the leisurely beauty of the countryside and criticizing the city. With the rise of the Romantic movement in Britain, the "Poets of the Lakeside School" represented by Wordsworth, Coleridge and Saussy attracted much attention as one of the genres.
Under the pen of Jane Austen and the Brontë sisters, rural life is simple and idyllic; in the eyes of Elizabeth Gaskell and Flora Thompson, the rural world is warm; George Eliot, Thomas Hardy and Dickens, among others, advocate a return to nature, condemning criticism of industrial civilization and opposing the values of industrial capital.
Since the wave of industrialization is unstoppable, how can cities return to nature? How can the countryside be protected from the negative effects of industrial development? The British also began theoretical and practical exploration earlier.
In 1898, the British social activist Howard proposed the urban planning idea of a "pastoral city". Howard believed that an ideal city with both urban and rural advantages should be built, that is, a "pastoral city", which is essentially a combination of city and countryside. In 1903, Howard personally created the world's first idyllic city, Letchworth.
In 1926, Sir Patrick Aberkrobi, Chairman of the British Town Planning Commission, published the book "Conservation of britain's countryside". At his call, in October of the same year, the British Rural Conservation Movement (CPRE) was formed in The United Kingdom, with the original intention of protecting the traditional scenery of the English countryside and curbing the unrestricted expansion of the city. As one of the first environmental organisations, its activities and efforts led to the promulgation of many environmental laws in the UK, such as the Urban and Rural Planning Act of 1947 and the Green Belt Construction Act of 1955.
After World War II, under the influence of technological progress and communist ideas in the West, the French architect Le Corbusier and the Spanish architect Ricardo Porfier designed many working-class collective houses, among which Corbusier's "glorious city" even represented the post-war urban planning template of the European continent. Britain did the opposite, practicing the "idyllic city" concept to counter radical industrialization. Especially in the small and medium-sized towns of the United Kingdom, there is a very strong pastoral style, and even a metropolis such as London has an "urban farm".
The UK is the only country in the world that has no urban planning, but town and village planning. Peter Rees, former chief planner of the City of London, said: "The aim of our planning system is to protect the countryside from the growth and character of the town, not to benefit the development of towns or large cities. In other parts of the world, people want to build beautiful cities, so they have urban planning. But we only wanted to protect the countryside from that terrible urban development, so we only had town and village planning. ”
The British idea of returning to nature and the countryside is also often shown at large fairs. At the 2010 Shanghai World Expo, the British designed a huge "seed temple"; at the 2015 Milan World Expo, the British built a beautiful garden and orchard, and built a simulated large beehive.
Industrialization inspired the pastoral dreams of the British, and the rural pastoral drama was the projection of the pastoral dream.
Farming is an attractive way of life
If a country's elite does not leave the countryside, the countryside will be full of vitality and hope.
The farming lifestyle is also admired by many contemporary Britons, and many people truly love farm life. The documentary "Victorian Farms" concludes with "Farming is a lifestyle and it is totally engaging."
Today's British aristocracy still maintains contact with the countryside. The most typical celebrity who loves country life is probably Prince Charles, crown prince, who, in addition to performing some of the daily duties of the royal family, loves to return to the countryside to do gardening, to be a farmer and to study plants.
For the average person, according to a 2012 survey by the British Bureau of Statistics, farmers are one of the most satisfied jobs in the UK, and people engaged in agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishing tend to have the highest happiness, and most people are willing to take agriculture as their career choice. Data released by the UK Villages Authority show that the UK's rural population has grown by 13.7% over the past 20 years. The agency estimates that around 115,000 Britons move from the cities to the countryside each year.
Farmers in contemporary Britain are happy because they are able to work easily and happily using modern agricultural techniques. In Clarkson's Farm, British multimillionaire Jeremy Clarkson has both money and spare time, buys a piece of land of about 1,000 acres (about 6,000 acres), runs it himself, cultivates sheep, opens an organic food store, and protects the ecology. Clarkson was a farmer, but with the help of others, plus government financial subsidies, his farm did not lose money or make money in the first year, earning only £144.
Despite the dismal operation, Clarkson chose the latter between "returning to London" and "staying on the farm". Farming is hard work, but it is also a joy. We love a job because it brings us joy. The willingness of elites like Clarkson to stay in the countryside is an important factor in the vitality of the countryside. Whether it is history or reality, if a country's elite does not leave the countryside, the countryside will be full of vitality and hope.
Who doesn't love idyllic country life? In the past two years, Li Ziqi of Sichuan has filmed a series of traditional Chinese pastoral life short videos, which have fascinated countless Chinese and foreign fans. "Picking chrysanthemums under the eastern fence, leisurely seeing the South Mountain" "Dogs bark in the deep alleys, chickens singing mulberry trees upside down", this kind of life picture of harmonious coexistence between man and nature is fascinating.
Many urban people have such a "peach blossom source" complex, and the pastoral, as the beautiful fantasy of urban people, represents the possibility of poetic perching, which is an irresistible call, and it is also an escape from noise and glitz. Because of this, rural pastoral drama not only attracts the British, but also impresses us in the process of industrialization and modernization.
We know very well that China's 400 million peasants, especially those in the Midwest, are not idle and peaceful, and they can neither wear fairy-like thorough manual labor like Li Ziqi; nor can they have thousands of acres of land like Clarkson in Britain, relying on mechanization to cultivate; most peasants do not have high incomes. The infrastructure of the countryside still needs to be further built; the spiritual and cultural life of the peasants needs to be further enriched. Consolidating the achievements in poverty alleviation, comprehensively promoting the revitalization of rural areas, and accelerating the modernization of agriculture and rural areas still have a long way to go.
I hope that one day, our countryside is also like the British pastoral drama, between the green water and green mountains are full of elegant courtyards, there are gardens and vegetable gardens behind the houses, you can appreciate the beauty of nature, you can enjoy the convenience of industry, the majority of farmers are also in their leisure time, reading, chanting, singing, dancing, poetically inhabiting the land of China.
The author, Guo Jilan, Ph.D. in History, is a lecturer at the School of Humanities of Huzhou Normal University.
" Picture | Visual China"