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Read Mao Dun's "Poplar Praise"
"Poplar Praise"
Poplar trees are really extraordinary, and I praise poplar trees!
When the car gallops on the unseen plateau, what comes into your field of vision is a large felt intricate yellow and green; Yellow, that is the soil, the uncultivated virgin soil, the shell of the loess plateau that was successfully piled up by the great forces of nature hundreds of thousands of years ago; Green is the fruit of the triumph of human labor over nature, the wheat field, and the wind blows, turning up round after round of green waves - at this time you will truly admire the two words "wheat wave" created by the past, if it is not a clever hand, it is indeed the essence of the tempered language; Yellow and green dominate, boundless, open as a stone, then if it is not the distant mountains that seem to be side by side remind you (these peaks are judged by your naked eye, you know under your feet), you will forget that the car is driving on the plateau, and the feelings that you gush up may be "majestic", perhaps "great", and so on, but at the same time your eyes may feel a little tired, and you close your eyes to the current "majestic" or "great". And another flavor has grown in your mind - "monotony"!
But all of a sudden, if you look up and see a row in the distance in front of you—no, or even just three or five trees, one, proudly towering, sentinel-like trees, what about your sleepy mood? I cried out in amazement!
That is the poplar tree, an ordinary tree in the west arctic, but it is not an ordinary tree! It was a tree that struggled to go upstream, straight stems, straight branches. Its stem is usually high, as if it is artificial, within one inch, there is no side branch; All its branches are always upward, and they are close together, as if they were artificial, becoming a bunch, and there is no horizontal escape; Its wide leaves are also flaky upwards, barely oblique, let alone upside down; Its skin, smooth and silvery halo, glows slightly pale cyan. This is a tree that stands stubbornly under the pressure of the wind and snow in the north! Even if only the bowl is thick and thin, it strives to develop upwards, as high as Zhangxu, two Zhangzhang, towering in the sky, indomitable, against the northwest wind.
This is the poplar tree, a common tree in the West arctic, but it is by no means an ordinary tree! It has no swaying posture, no flexing and circling branches, and perhaps you would say that it is not beautiful- if beauty refers specifically to "psychic" or "horizontal escape", then the poplar tree is not a good woman in the tree; But it is majestic, upright, simple, serious, and does not lack gentleness, not to mention its strong indomitability and uprightness, it is a great husband in the tree! When you walk on the plateau where the snow is first melting and see such a poplar tree or a row of poplar trees standing proudly on the flat ground, do you only think that the tree is just a tree, don't you think of its simplicity, seriousness, strength and indomitability, at least it symbolizes the peasants in the north; Don't you even think that in the vast land behind the enemy lines, there are strong and indomitable sentries standing proudly like this poplar tree guarding their hometowns! Don't you think of such a poplar tree with its branches and leaves close to unity and striving for progress, as if it symbolizes the spirit and will to write the history of New China with blood in the North China Plain today?
Poplar is not an ordinary tree. It is prevalent in the Arctic and is not taken seriously, similar to northern farmers; It has a very strong vitality, can not be abrasive, oppressive, and similar to the peasants in the north. I praise the poplar tree because it symbolizes not only the peasants in the north, but especially the simple, strong, and enterprising spirit that is indispensable in our national liberation struggle today.
Let those who despise the people, despise the people, and stubbornly regressively praise the aristocratic nanmu (which is also straight and beautiful), despise this very common, very easy to grow poplar, but I will praise the poplar tree loudly!
(Literary and Art Front, Vol. 6, No. 3, 1941)
Writer Profile
Mao dun
Mao Dun (1896-1981), formerly known as Shen Dehong, was a famous modern Chinese writer, literary critic, cultural activist and social activist. Mao Dun was born in a family with quite novel ideas and received a new type of education from an early age. After graduation, he entered the Preparatory Department of Peking University, and after graduation, he worked in the Commercial Press, and since then embarked on the road of reforming Chinese literature and art. He was a pioneer of the New Culture Movement and one of the founders of Chinese revolutionary literature and art, and his representative works include the novels "Midnight", "Spring Silkworm" and the literary criticism "Night Reading Doll".