I try to restore the warriors to living "people" with vivid details, so that readers can find resonance in their stories and destinies, so as to shine the glory of red history into reality.
Fifteen years ago, in order to create a long novel that reflected the history of the Red Army in the Central Soviet Region, "Red Turning the Sky", Wen Yanxia went to Shicheng for an interview. When she stood at the old site of the headquarters of the International Division of the Young Communist Party, the idea of writing a book for the International Division of the Young Communist Party flashed by.
This idea was not put into action until six years later, because as a writer who came out of the red land, Wen Yanxia always felt that she had a sense of responsibility and mission, and wanted to use literary forms to publicize the International Teacher of the Young Communist Party. The International Division of the Young Communists, established in August 1933 in the Boshengsu District of Jiangxi Province, was a new Red Army unit formed by teenagers with an average age of less than 18 years old. Soon after its establishment, he rushed to the battlefield, experienced more than a dozen fierce battles, and withstood the test of blood and fire. Although due to the harshness of the war, the Red Army unit structure was constantly reorganized, and the International Division of the Young Communist Party only existed for 532 days, the story of this heroic Red Army unit has been passed down to this day and has become a heroic legend in the epic of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army.
Although he wrote a long novel "Phosphorus Fire" that reflected the theme of the expeditionary force, due to the lack of life experience of the troops, the strategy and tactics, the formation of the troops, and the weapons and equipment were relatively unfamiliar, the creation of "Tiger Calf" still had many challenges for Wen Yanxia. She repeatedly observed war films, read works on related themes, and finally wrote a series of red theme works with "profound research, subtle observation and wonderful discovery". (Critic Wang Shou German)
China Reading Daily: You once said that the creation of "Tiger Calf" is "empathetic and immersive creation". I guess it must be because I have a deep understanding of that history?
Wen Yanxia: Every novel I write will be deeply immersed in it, when my heart will be divided into two petals, one in real life and one in my world. This kind of empathic immersion can exhaust people's emotions, and every time I finish writing a book, I feel like a serious illness, and it takes a while to adjust my mood.
Since "Tiger Calf" is mainly aimed at young readers, I try to avoid bloody and cruel descriptions when writing this book, and I will not make up some bizarre and vulgar plots in pursuit of effect. In short, I hope that this book is written vividly and beautifully, cleanly and upliftingly, so that people can feel the power of truth, goodness and beauty after reading it.
China Reading News: The writing of the works pays great attention to close to history, and at the same time has a superb imagination. What principles do you have in grasping the virtual and the real, the history and the reality?
Wen Yanxia: In the writing of literary works on the theme of revolutionary history, I have always followed the creative principle of "big things are not vain, small things are informal", that is, the historical background of the novel is real, the story in the novel is the tree that the writer uses his imagination to plant in the folds of this real soil, and the characters are the flowers that bloom on the tree. They support and echo each other, so that the "truth" of history and the "virtuality" of art are intertwined into a fascinating literary space. In the book "Tiger Calves", the history of the War of the International Division of the Young Communist Party is historical and well documented. Although Du Hongyun, Cao Banxia, and Cao Yuanzhi are fictional characters, they all have the commonality of the soldiers of the International Division of the Young Communist Party, that is, they have firm revolutionary beliefs and the spirit of sacrificing their lives to dare to throw their heads and blood for the revolutionary cause. In order to make the characters and history in the book more closely integrated, I try to use real details to construct the best combination of the fate of the characters and the background of the times, so that the characters have their own physical appearance, character and destiny, live naturally, not blunt, not pretentious, so that they are amiable, credible and respectable.
China Reading Daily: "Tiger Calf" is cleverly conceived, with two threads to organize the storyline. One is the growth story of Du Hongyun and the generation of the Young Communist International Division, and the other is the experience of today's young Du Sihong. Why the architecture? The structure is deliberately unbalanced, right?
Wen Yanxia: In order to determine the structure and direction of this book, the publishing house held a special seminar, hoping that this book will open up the history of the Battle of the Xiangjiang River and the revolutionary history of the former Central Soviet Region, not only to write the history of the International Division of the Young Communist Party, but also to write about the remembrance and pursuit of that period of history by today's young people; how to inherit the red gene for future generations; in the subsequent communication, specific and valuable revision suggestions have been put forward many times, and finally this book has decided to use a dual-time and spatial structure to narrate the story. The first part, "Hot Blood", tells the story of Du Hongyun and his comrades-in-arms living and fighting side by side in the International Division of the Young Communist Party, and eventually becoming a qualified revolutionary; the next part, "Pursuit", tells the story of how I and my father and I traced the footsteps of my grandfather Du Hongyun and grandma Cao Banxia from the first-person perspective of Du Hongyun's grandson "I", and got emotional sublimation from them. This kind of compound narrative makes the "past" and "present" have a certain part of the overlap and interlacing, which strengthens the tension of the story, and the layout of the long part and the short part of the next part seems to be unbalanced, but this is intentional, because the history of the International Division of the Young Communist Party is relatively unfamiliar to everyone, so I want to use a little more space to show it.
Zhonghua Shushu Bao: There must be a historical basis for writing scenes of arduous combat training and scenes of fierce battles between the Red Army and the Kuomintang army, right?
Wen Yanxia: The depiction of the war must have a historical basis. I consulted and purchased a lot of materials, and also used the holidays to visit the combat sites of the International Division of the Young Communist Party in the Gannan area. At the former site of the International Division of the Young Communist Party in Danxi Village, Xiaosong Town, Shicheng County, I saw that the slogan of the Red Army of that year was left on the wall, and the ink peeling handwriting revealed the perseverance of the writer. The local old man told me a lot of stories about the Red Army. On that day, I stood in the ruins of a trench deep in the dense forest on the shore, the cattle drizzle wet my whole body, the roaring north wind sent the breath and waves of the Xiang River, and the comrade of the local party history department pointed to the forest opposite and said: On that winter day more than 80 years ago, the enemy copied bread from the opposite side, and the place where you stood was the individual bunker of the Red Army soldiers. At that moment, I seemed to see the tragic and magnificent picture of the young soldiers of the International Division of the Young Communist Party fighting with the enemy, and my blood was churning and tears were in my eyes. In order to write as much as possible about the "truth of the trenches", I interviewed several veterans who had participated in the self-defense counterattack. Their depictions of war scenes expanded my imagination, while reading historical materials and field interviews gave me the ability to show war scenes in detail, as well as the inspiration for my creation, which kept me passionate during my creative life, and stories and characters gushed out of the tip of the pen like tap water.
China Reading Daily: The young warriors you write about are not face-like young heroes, but very personalized, young and crazy, homesick, and afraid of war... How did you grasp the image of these young warriors?
Wen Yanxia: In order to make the book "Tiger Calf" close to the lives of current teenagers and make the characters more real, credible and vivid, in writing, I pay attention to portraying the differences in the personalities of the characters, and try to make the storyline close to the age, personality and psychology of the characters. For example, Du Hongyun used the hanging stone method to practice wrist strength during the competition; Cao Yuanzhi hid Du Hongyun's clothes and let him be late for criticism when he practiced; Du Hongyun, Ouyang Can, and Ouyang Huan were frightened to pee their pants when they first went to the battlefield, and when they later wrote the party application, they felt that they were greedy for life and afraid of death, and they were not qualified to join the party, so they put half of the application into their pockets... These details are more vivid and vivid, and also fit the character of the character. I hope that readers will feel like their protagonists when they read the book, which is a goal that I strive to achieve when writing the book.
China Reading Daily: The works are particularly touching, and they also write the personalities of the little warriors.
Wen Yanxia: I often imagine myself as a member of the International Division of the Young Communist Party, marching, training, and fighting with my characters, and receiving the baptism of war. Unconsciously, the "young me" and "young me" who lived in the depths of my soul woke up. They turned my pen into sharp blades, carved the faces of the characters in the books wantonly, and like the Creator, generously gave them unique souls. Whenever I wrote "this one", the little warrior who was written jumped out to talk to me, and I immediately transformed into his peers, sharing happiness and fate with him.
China Reading Daily: The war tragedy written by "Tiger Calf" makes people move to tears, and the love described also makes people sigh. The story of Cao Banxia is very touching, and she has been watching for love all her life. I think you must have touched yourself first when you were writing.
Wen Yanxia: The archetypal character of Cao Banxia is Chi Yuhua, who has been watching her husband in Xingguo County for 70 years. When I went to interview Chi Yuhua in 2004, she was 94 years old. At that time, her husband Li Cailian had already been rated as a martyr, but Grandma Chi refused to accept this conclusion, believing that her husband was still alive in the world. I was deeply touched by her steadfastness in love. Cao Banxia in "Tiger Calf", Tangerine Zibo in my other novel "PipaWei", and Du Zhuyin in the novella "Du Zhuyin and the Old Mirror" all have her moving shadow.
China Reading Daily: The work has made a useful exploration of how to let revolutionary history enter young people, so that young people can correctly recognize, understand and comprehend the red spirit and revolutionary history.
Wen Yanxia: When writing, I pay more attention to pouring pen and ink into the emotional performance and character shaping of the characters, and strive to use vivid details and language and behavior that only belong to "this one" to restore the warriors to a living "person" with unique faces and unique emotions, write out their lofty character in their choices and the warm brilliance of human nature, so that modern readers can find resonance and empathy from their stories and destinies, so as to shine the glory of red history into reality. Let the reader feel the excitement and tragedy of that period of revolutionary history in the reading.
This article is excerpted from:
China Reading News (March 2, 2022)
Edit | Li Rui, Du Yu
Proofreading | Xin Lifang, Huang Xuemei
Final Review | Zhang Qian, Liang Zhi
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