Tear off the label and talk about creation - Cai Zhihai's recent novel review

Soochow University Tang Shengqin

As one of the main forces of the "Xiangjiang River of Literature", Cai Zhihai became famous in the 1980s for works such as "The Sound of Logging in the Distance". In that era of "the masses competing for the first", when most writers were floating in various doctrines and trends such as avant-garde literature, stream of consciousness, and magic realism, a group of Xiangxi writers guarded their garden, known as cultural "neoconservatism". But in Cai's view, there is no narrow definition of the work, magic realism, Xiangxi writers, and local writers should not be labeled as shackled creators. Writing for him is a state that connects the writer and the reader, the writer appeals to the pen for what he wants to express, and the reader completes the creation by filling in the blanks of the work. From the early "The Sound of Logging in the Distance", "Mother Ship", "Today's Sun" to the classic long masterpieces "Three Worlds" and "Set of Wolves", and then to the recent "Three Rivers and a Half" trilogy "Very Good People Chen Cibao", "Long Live the Homeland" and "Place", Cai Zhihai has always adhered to his own heart to create, born in the Longshan Tujia family in Xiangxi Province, he has always been committed to describing his ideal homeland. The creation is full of primitive poetry, and it blossoms into the flower of imagination on the closed, lonely soil. During this period, he was constantly labeled with various labels, and constantly used his own creations to tear off the layers of labels.

"You will definitely stay there"

In the 1980s and 1990s, many local writers were deeply influenced by Western literary and artistic thought, and the words inevitably carried the atmosphere of "avant-garde literature", but a group of writers in Hunan were not too affected. Compared with many mainstream writers, Cai Zhihai has his own garden, and when most writers are vigorously pursuing literary innovation, he still adheres to his original intention. He is very clear that his works are deeply rooted in the land of western Hunan and that his blood is a fusion of Han and Tujia genes. Growing up in the folk, growing up in nature, born with a posture outside the world. The environment determined his thinking, and in the relatively closed Xiangxi, all of Cai Zhihai's meditative reverie reached its extreme, becoming another kind of broadness, and this imagination led him into another world, that is, the spiritual home in his works.

"You will definitely stay there", this is the first sentence of the opening chapter of Cai Zhihai's novel "Place". His last novel, "Long Live the Homeland", and the previous "Very Good People Chen Cibao", together formed the "Sanchuan And a Half" trilogy. This epic "local chronicle" contains all the imaginations of the writer about his ideal homeland, Mikawa and a half. This imagination is accompanied by simplicity and poetry, and it enriches the land as much as his early series of works. He combines history and legend, reality and fantasy to create a world shared by man and God. There is no place in human history called "Sanchuan and a Half", and this Sanchuan and a Half is the spiritual hometown of the writer. With the help of this habitat, Cai Zhihai placed everything he wanted to express in it. Sanchuan and a half of things make up everything here, it is folk, natural, but also lonely, closed, such an environment also nurtures the people of Sanchuan and a half, they have a character that is only here, this character is also part of the Chinese national culture. They are slowly eliminated into a narrower gap in the course of history, and the development of politics, economy and culture mercilessly washes away at this land, and this land and the people living in this land are still insisting on themselves.

Rooted in the primitive impulses of the Xiangxi people's personality, "searching" has become a consistent theme in Cai Zhihai's novels, and in his pen, many protagonists still chase hopelessly, although they do not know what awaits them in front of them. They pursue their lost spiritual homeland, want to break free from their own destiny, and walk towards the lofty mountains without hesitation, as if life is a wandering without purpose. For example, in "Like the Wind", "I" and Yang Changshui went to find the source of the unitary water, and they followed their instinctive impulses to go up the river, with the courage of a teenager. Doesn't this search mean the life process itself?" Seeking "there is no end, only experience, this feeling allows people born in this land to pursue freedom, and eventually become passers-by in life and return to their hometown."

In Cai's novels, it is rare to find that kind of writing with a strong purpose. His brushstrokes are often full of poetic romance, and sometimes even with a kind of original barbarism. His expression seems to only present the imaginary homeland to us, and the specific expression is very restrained, which may be related to his advocacy of literary "enlightenment". The writer pursues the aesthetic beauty of the meta-song style, creating a number of "idle pens" for the reader, similar to the "blank space" we are talking about now, and the creation of the scene is intended to bring us into his world but can not lose his own feelings, in order to achieve a harmonious blend. Such a "blank space" appears many times, which will cause the novel to be out of chapter in the overall structure, and naturally appear mysterious and hazy in the overall style, but after unveiling its mystery, the real appearance is still the word "homeland". In this regard, "Like the Wind" is an example, the writer will be the protagonist's childhood perspective and the current perspective constitute a binary opposition, the traces of time are everywhere, but the writer did not abandon his once simple and "reckless" temperament.

A metaphor for Xiangxi

The use of the southwest dialect and the writing of the Xiangxi style make Cai Zhihai's creation no longer a feedback of reality but more like a discovery of the true face of life. History and the trauma of individual life often overlap, in the world of Xiangxi, Cai Zhihai is like a fatalistic seeker, while the Xiangxi in his texts is more with the nostalgia and imagination of the writer himself. As Cai Zhihai himself said, "Doesn't Lu Xun have Zhao Zhuang?" What about Xiangxi? The spiritual map of each person is different. Shen Congwen is a border city, I am Sanchuan and a half. [[1]] What Xiangxi represents is "somewhere" in Cai Zhihai's heart, which is both a refuge of the soul and a hometown in reality. No matter how the subject matter and characters of his works change, most of his creations are set in Xiangxi. Xiangxi not only has geographical significance, but also has profound historical and cultural connotations. In Lu Xun's pen, Zhao Zhuang is the foothold where the writer returns as a departed person to witness a scene in which the scene is not a person and then leaves; in Shen Congwen's pen, the border city is a world of love and beauty that he has constructed after he changed from a "countryman" to a "city person"; and here in Cai Zhihai, the Xiangxi world dominated by "Three Rivers and a Half" is his true portrayal of the past years, leaving the backward and closed Xiangxi, the writer then goes back to write the real and dreamy Xiangxi in his memory, nostalgic for himself, which is both a gift from God. It is also the inheritance of genes.

Cai Zhihai's early novel works were deeply influenced by Shen Congwen, focusing on creating an artistic conception and composing folk customs, with fresh language and long rhyme, conveying the unique simple charm of Xiangxi. For example, the short story "The Sound of Logging in the Distance", which won the National Outstanding Novel Award in 1982, has such characteristics. In the past, Jiangxi was surrounded by lofty mountains and mountains, but today's Xiangxi is slowly unveiling its mystery in a rapidly developing society, and Cai Zhihai's "Three Rivers and a Half" is like a bridge connecting Xiangxi and the outside world. The beautiful imagination of the Xiangxi people for the future and the infinite yearning for the outside world are written out, which also represents that the culture of a nation must have the strength to forge ahead on the basis of innovation.

If a large number of Cai Zhihai's early works focused on the expression of poetic Xiangxi in the empirical vision, then in his recent works we can find that his works gradually tend to show the metaphysical imaginary level. Many people label some of his works as "magical realism", such as mystical novels such as "Long Live the Homeland". But this statement is undoubtedly one-sided and divorced from the core essence of the writer's creation. Ignoring the unique life experience and local consciousness in Cai Zhihai's works, nostalgia is a slow look back and gaze under Cai Zhihai's pen, and time and forgetting disappear in his novels. The life in the countryside of Xiangxi brings Cai Zhihai an endless source of creation, the closed and backward life is reflected in the bits and pieces of the lives of his characters, the bow in "Carriage" and his house father, me and Yang Changshui in "Like the Wind" looking for the source of the unitary water, "Mother Boat" also tells the story of several female boatmen in Xiangxi, they will be raised in the windy days of Xiangxi, in essence, the bravery, strength, freedom and simplicity of these people are the symbols of the tenacity and bold character of the sons and daughters of Xiangxi, and also the symbol of the national soul. And this symbol is a silent occurrence of moisturizing objects, it is the expression of symbols and emotions in the overall sense rather than stereotypical type descriptions.

How to balance the real hometown in history and the hometown in the beautiful imagination, this is a problem that should be considered when dealing with novels, Cai Zhihai does not dispose of it at will, but is restrained and strict, often including truth and history in fiction. In the long and recent work "Long Live the Homeland", he concatenates the story of "Sanchuan and a Half" with small short stories, but this is not a collection of short stories, he breaks the narrative of the traditional novel to the end, taking Xiangxi as the geographical horizontal coordinate and the history of the "Three Rivers and a Half" in the second half of the previous century as the vertical axis, forming a dense and elegant network, which weaves together the customs, customs, and strange things of the three rivers and a half. The novel does not shy away from telling history, seemingly loose and relaxed narration, but it shows the tortuous fate of Xiangxi in those special eras, such as the absurd past of the rightists who were regarded as village talents in "The Villagers", and the suffering and grievances of Song Jiang, a middle school teacher in "Who Took Care of You", during the "Cultural Revolution". At first glance, these chapters look vivid and realistic, but in fact they are far-reaching and have profound metaphors.

Unveil the mystery of Xiangxi: the consciousness of life is spreading

In recent years, Cai Zhihai's creation has moved from the poetic narrative in the early stage to a more mysterious and hidden space, which is closely related to his description of Xiangxi after he leaves Xiangxi. Since childhood living in the countryside of western Hunan Province, most of the things I have come into contact with come from the people, the closed environment, simple communication, so that the former Xiangxi in Cai Zhihai's pen is "Mother Ship", "The Sound of Logging in the Distance", "Today's Sun" and so on. After leaving Xiangxi for many years, the once lonely and closed meditation has become more open, and the old and timeless pictures in the memory have begun to go to the outside world, and the tough and bold character of the children of Xiangxi has been condensed into a national soul and displayed in front of the eyes of the world. Corresponding to this is Cai Zhihai's characters, who retain the most natural and authentic personality, and also have a yearning for the world outside of Xiangxi. This yearning may be the unremitting pursuit of ideals, or it may be an escape from the uneasy status quo, but either way, it is essentially due to the resistance to the closed and sluggish environment and the attraction of open and emerging civilizations. As far as spiritual temperament is concerned, this kind of wandering, which is almost self-exiled, is the original human consciousness of life that is spreading.

For outsiders, the past Xiangxi itself is mysterious, as Cai Zhihai said in an interview: "Now, our Xiangxi has changed a lot, traffic is increasingly developed, and in the Internet age, information is also very smooth. But in the past, Western Hunan, which was besieged by lofty mountains, was closed. From this perspective, the mother ship is actually more symbolic of a bridge between Xiangxi and the outside world. All along, going to the outside world is the strongest impulse of life rooted in the hearts of our People in Xiangxi. [[2]] Therefore, the mystery of Xiangxi originally came from the closure of the geographical environment and the stagnation of culture, and later under the pen of Shen Congwen, Cai Zhihai and other writers, Xiangxi appeared so clear and beautiful, and now when we look at Xiangxi from the perspective of history and reality, we find that it has never been absent from any major events. In Cai Zhihai's pen, the people of Xiangxi live a cyclical life, they are born in the original state, restlessly chasing freedom and ideals in wandering, and finally returning to calm nature and realizing the highest value of life. Faith is his most devout self-expression, and it is precisely because he attaches great importance to his inner desire that his works can appear unrestrained when reflecting reality, both simple and witty.

Perhaps it is the long-term closed environment that makes Xiangxi not have too many crises of homogenization, compared with the so-called "inner volume" of modern society, the current Xiangxi is facing another cultural anxiety - the loss of civilization. Independent national culture and regional culture are difficult to stand alone in the current impetuous society, and it is the trend of the times for advanced civilization to replace backward civilization. After Cai Zhihai walked out of Xiangxi, he had been thinking about the difference between the two living states. He is entangled in the contradictions between the two cultures, which is manifested in the novel, that is, criticizing reality and nostalgic for the past, pursuing ideals and sticking to the homeland. The search for life consciousness is essentially a process of breaking and rebuilding the mysterious and sacred imagination of Xiangxi. This kind of thinking is strongly conveyed in his early work "Three Worlds", which is strongly conveyed through the protagonist Ah Yan leaving Lotta Rock to go to Peking University and finally going around in a circle and returning to the historical cycle of the forked wooden frame house, revealing the embarrassing dilemma of human life that people face in their lives.

The consciousness of life in Cai Zhihai's novels is not only reflected in the meaning of thought, but also in his philosophical and poetic language expression. As a Tujia writer, his language is a fusion and regeneration of two sets of stylistic logic. The vitality of language and writing lies in "making great efforts in Chinese writing, constantly thinking about how to provide new elements for the Chinese language, writing the folk language, making the written language folk, and integrating the two language forms into each other." [[3]] When we first read about the description of "Mikawa and a Half", we may feel that it is no different from other regions, probably because no one knows where this place is, so a curious mentality leads us to the mysterious land of the writer. In the recent work "Very Good People Chen Cibao", his words are even somewhat obscure, not as poetic and light as his previous works, and with the help of the implicit metaphors of words, he depicts the sentient beings of "Three Rivers and a Half". Writers use folk language to express the living conditions of their own people, and use poetic narratives to deconstruct serious content. The protagonists of the novel are marginalized small people, who use jokes to rebel against authority, words and actions flash the light of wisdom, and the writers reproduce the social and people's livelihood of "Sanchuan and a Half" through their life experience, showing the tension of language.

Subsumed by the nationality and sacredness of the subject matter, Cai Zhihai's language is also correspondingly soothing and speculative. When we often linger in the poetic lightness of his words, the consciousness of life hidden under the words is also constantly surging, which may be the heartfelt embodiment of the ambiguity of his works. There is a description of the protagonist's dream in "Like the Wind": "I pushed him and said that you occupy so many places alone and squeeze the dreams narrow, how to set the table?" I can't eat it. This sentence seems so light and lovely when writing about the teenager's yearning for a hazy and beautiful ideal future, but the backward and poor situation of the real world contained in it is infinitely regrettable. This may be what the writer really wants to express, about Xiangxi, it has never been mysterious, it is secular and almost primitive, it is true and natural, it looks sacred and beautiful on the outside, and it is also full of all kinds of trauma and helplessness on the inside, it is backward, but it unexpectedly retains a humble and poetic.

Looking at Cai Zhihai's entire creative process, you will find that what he insists on in his works has never changed, and Xiangxi is the eternal background of his novels. The society is developing day by day, and Xiangxi is also rejuvenated with new vitality in his pen. He uses poetic and intelligent language to describe the Xiangxi world in his memory and imagination, upholding a patriotic heart, basing on the land under his feet, turning the nation into the world, full cultural self-confidence and cultural self-consciousness make the writer poetically imagine with Xiangxi as the background when creating. Therefore, his novels have not become more and more obscure and mysterious, but have become more and more abundant. For Cai, the novel is not a certain type of creation, but a long journey about language and writing, so he is not only a novelist, but also an essayist and poet.

[[1]] Xiaoxiang Morning Post, 2020-03-14.

[[2]] [Interview with Famous Artists] Cai Zhihai: Writers should establish a high degree of cultural self-confidence Unity Daily2019-06-28.

[[3]] Ibid.