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As a world-renowned literary artist, Lu Xun has created many well-known works such as "Diary of a Madman", "Kong Yiji", "The Scream" and so on.
Among all of Lu Xun's works, many people have heard little about his early short story "Casting the Sword".
Some people who have read this novel take it out of context and only pay attention to the kiss of the two male protagonists in the novel, and thus classify this novel as a same-sex novel along with Lao She's "Rabbit" and Shen Congwen's "Wo".
There are also many people who believe that the novel is not famous because it is a same-sex love story and is not suitable for being widely publicized.
This view can be said to be very wrong, Lu Xun's "Casting the Sword" is by no means a beautiful novel, it is a true portrayal of the dark society at that time, and it is written with bone-deep sadness.
The story of the ruler between the eyebrows
Lu Xun's novel was originally called "Ruler Between the Eyebrows", which is the name of the protagonist in the novel, and was later renamed "Sword Casting" when it was compiled into the "Lu Xun Self-Selected Collection" in 1932.
Regarding the creation of "Casting the Sword", Lu Xun once mentioned in a letter to Xu Maoyong and Masuda that "Casting the Sword" is based on a book he read when he was a child, which may be "Wu Yue Spring and Autumn" or "Yue Jue Book", and he only made another arrangement without changes.
According to legend, the general and Mo Xie forged swords for the king of Chu together, and three years later, they finally forged two swords.
When the sword was completed, the general already had a premonition that as long as he gave the sword to the king of Chu, the king of Chu would unload the grind and kill the donkey to kill him.
Therefore, before entering the palace, the general gave one of the male swords to his wife, and told her that if he was killed by the king of Chu, let them let their son, who was about to be born, grow up and kill the king of Chu with the sword to avenge him.
Later, the king of Chu really dreamed that someone wanted to kill him in revenge one day, so he ordered to hunt down and kill the son of the general, and finally the son of the general was helped by a warrior and successfully avenged his father.
The entire structure of "Sword Casting" is actually a continuation of this storyline, the ruler between the eyebrows in the novel is the character of the son of the general, and the black man, the banquet of the Ao, is the knight.
The father of the ruler between the eyebrows was originally a famous worker with the world's first sword casting technique, and more than 20 years ago, the princess in the palace suddenly gave birth to a piece of pure blue transparent iron.
The king immediately concluded that this iron was a strange treasure, so he decided to let his father use this iron to forge a sword for him.
The father took the iron home and polished it day and night, and finally spent three years refining two Excaliburs.
After the joy, the father between his eyebrows told his wife worriedly: "Tomorrow to offer the sword to the king may be the day of my life." ”
Because the king has always been suspicious and cruel, in order to have this unique sword in the world, he will definitely kill the father of the ruler between the eyebrows if he does not let the father of the ruler between the eyebrows refine the sword for others.
Therefore, before entering the palace, the father of the ruler between the eyebrows gave one of the male swords to his wife with the mentality of dying, telling her that if he did not return, he would be killed by the king, and let their son take this male sword and cut it on the neck of the king in the future to avenge him.
That day, his father did not return after entering the palace, and after the king killed him, he buried his head in the front door and back garden.
Sixteen years later, the ruler between the eyebrows finally grows up, but the mother is not very confident that her son will avenge his father in the future.
One night, he found a large mouse at home, and when he thought of the rat biting something in the house night and night, he couldn't sleep peacefully, and he felt hatred in his heart, and pressed the rat to the bottom of the water to drown it.
But when the mouse was really about to drown, the ruler between the eyebrows felt that the mouse was a little pitiful, so he wanted to pull the mouse up with a reed pole, and after the mouse came out of the water, the ruler between the eyebrows once again felt that the mouse was hateful and hateful, so he pressed it into the water urn.
This time back and forth, it can be seen that the ruler between the eyebrows is sluggish, and finally when he accidentally stepped on the mouse, the ruler between the eyebrows seemed to have done a great evil and was very uncomfortable, and he squatted and couldn't stand up.
This shows the cowardice of the teenager's eyebrow ruler, and also makes the mother who sees the whole process on the side very worried that such a gentle eyebrow ruler will not be able to fulfill his father's dying instructions.
Then his mother told his father about his tragic death, saying: "You are sixteen years old, but your temperament is still so lukewarm, it seems that your father's revenge cannot be revenged." ”
After listening to his father's encounter, his eyebrows were like burning fire, and his temperament gradually changed.
After digging out the sword left to him by his father from the soil, the ruler between his eyebrows finally said: "I will change my gentle temperament and use this sword to avenge it." ”
Since then, the ruler between his eyebrows has put on a blue coat, put on a sword on his back and embarked on the road of avenging his father.
Mr. Lu Xun only wrote the story between his eyebrows in this paragraph, but in fact, it also reflected his own situation and some psychological changes at that time.
Dark society
When he started writing "Casting Swords", Mr. Lu Xun had just personally experienced the "Female Teacher Incident" and the "March 18 Tragedy".
In the tide of female teachers, Yang Yinyu, the principal who was attached to the forces of the Beiyang warlords, constantly persecuted progressive students and suppressed various student movements, causing dissatisfaction among students.
When the school trend first rose, Lu Xun as a lecturer just adopted a silent attitude of watching from the sidelines, and later Xu Guangping, a student who was expelled by Yang Yinyu, wrote a letter to Lu Xun, asking him not to "clean his body and become a Buddha".
At this time, Lu Xun gradually actively intervened in this trend, and jointly issued a declaration in the Beijing News with professors Shen Yinmo and Qian Xuan, expressing his firm support for female college students.
The occurrence of the March 18 tragedy gave Mr. Lu Xun a strong impact.
At that time, after the Tianjin Dagukou Incident in March 1926, Japan, together with Britain, the United States and other countries, issued an ultimatum to the Duan Qirui government to make China withdraw five demands, including the sea and land blockade.
In the face of this unreasonable demand, Duan Qirui's government was ready to compromise, which caused great indignation among the Chinese people, and a large-scale student movement broke out.
As a result, the petition team was shot at by guards when they reached the gate of Duan Qirui's government, and 47 people were eventually killed, including Liu Hezhen of Women's Normal University.
This bloody lesson greatly shocked Mr. Lu Xun, and he immediately wrote "In Memory of Liu and Zhenjun", "Death", "In the Faint Bloodstain", "Rose Without Flowers" and called March 18 the darkest day since the Republic of China.
Before the March 18 massacre and the upsurge of female teachers, Mr. Lu Xun actually always had a contradictory mentality towards the revolution, opposing the fearless sacrifice of street demonstrations on the one hand, and feeling that the pen in his hand was somewhat powerless in the face of warlord rule.
Therefore, Mr. Lu Xun's description of the ruler between the eyebrows may also reflect his cautious hesitation at that time, which is a more complex psychological state.
However, with the tragic incident and the upsurge of the popular revolutionary situation, Mr. Lu Xun took active action and began to openly criticize the murderous government rule.
When writing "Casting the Sword", Lu Xun more or less substituted his understanding of the society at that time into this novel, just like the image of the king he described, fierce and cunning, violent and cruel, this kind of ruler's arbitrariness and brutality may reflect the warlord government.
When the ruler between the eyebrows went to the city to find Wang to take revenge, Mr. Lu Xun described this picture: Most of the women in the street market have swollen eyes and unkempt heads, and the men are standing in rows.
After seeing the king's frame, they quickly knelt on the ground, showing some ignorant and wild, weak and numb masses, which was of great practical significance.
How did that ruler between the eyebrows take revenge, and did his revenge succeed?
The ending of revenge
When the ruler between the eyebrows was waiting outside the south gate for the opportunity to assassinate the king, the black man Yan Zhiao appeared in front of him and told the ruler between the eyebrows: "Someone has already reported today that your enemy has already entered the palace from the east gate and ordered to arrest you. ”
Later, Yan Zhiao also claimed that he could avenge the ruler between the eyebrows, as long as the ruler between the eyebrows handed over his sword and his head.
When asked by the eyebrow ruler why he wanted to help him avenge him and whether he knew his father, Yan Zhiao replied: "I have always known your father as I know you." ”
This shows that Yan Zhiao is well aware of the tyranny suffered by the people, and he is not only for revenge, but also for thousands of people, which also represents the awakening of the people's sense of revenge and resistance.
As soon as Yan Zhiao's voice fell, the ruler between his eyebrows decisively drew the sword on his shoulder and slashed it from behind, and his head fell to the ground.
The ruler between the eyebrows then handed the sword to Yan Zhiao, and the ruler between the eyebrows simply and neatly sent his head and sword, which also shows his desire for revenge.
At this time, Yan Zhiao caught the sword with one hand, raised the head of the ruler between his eyebrows with the other, and kissed the hot dead lips twice.
These two kisses can be regarded as a kind of contract agreement, and because Yan Zhiao is a pen name used by Mr. Lu Xun, the kiss can also be regarded as Mr. Lu Xun's farewell to his immature self in the past.
Of course, there are many people who think that the resolute and witty Yan Zhiao is Mr. Lu Xun's ideal personality, and what is kissed here is actually the soul of the avenger, which is a kind of respect.
As Mr. Lu Xun wrote in "In Memory of Liu and Zhenjun": "She is a Chinese youth who died for China, and I should dedicate my sorrow and respect to her." ”
These understandings are more reasonable explanations for the two kisses here, but they are by no means some people speculating that Yan Zhiao has a habit of breaking sleeves.
After getting the head and sword between the eyebrows, Yan Zhiao was brought into the palace with a magic technique that could relieve the king's boredom.
Seeing the great queen, Yan Zhiao said that the trick he wanted to play must be in front of the golden dragon, set up a golden ding filled with clear water, and then put the child's head into it after frying it with animal charcoal, and in the boiling water, the head would go up and down with the waves, singing joyfully, which could relieve the worries and relieve the boredom.
But after a while, the king prepared everything, and Yan Zhiao followed and threw the head of the ruler between his eyebrows into boiling water.
After a while after the splash of water, Yan Zhiao suddenly sang to Jin Ding, and with his song, water surged from the mouth, and the head of the ruler between his eyebrows also floated and sang.
Just as the king was watching, the head of the ruler between the eyebrows sank to the bottom of the water and no longer floated, and Yan Zhiao immediately explained to the king that the head was making the most magical reunion dance under the water, and it was invisible if it did not come closer.
Listening to Yan Zhiao's words, the king couldn't help but be curious and stepped down the golden step and stood on the steaming edge to look at it.
As soon as he saw the head of the ruler between his eyebrows, Yan Zhiao drew out the green sword he was carrying and slashed the head of the king into the ding.
When the king and the two heads of the ruler between the eyebrows fought in the water, Yan Zhiao then cut his own head into the water, and together with the ruler between the eyebrows, he tore the king until he broke his breath, and they finished their revenge and sank to the bottom.
In the end, because it was impossible to tell which of the three heads belonged to the king, the ministers could only bury the three heads together with the king's body in a golden coffin.
On the day of the burial, seeing the king's hearse, the people fell to their knees one after another, and a few faithful righteous people choked tears and cursed the souls of the two rebel thieves who enjoyed the sacrifice with the king.
The ruler between the eyebrows and the banquet of the rulers killed the tyrannical and cruel rulers, but they were regarded as rebels by some people, thinking that they were not worthy of being buried with the king, and this outcome inevitably made people feel deeply sad.
This shows that there were still many people in the society at that time who did not know to resist and did not want to awaken, which may be the helpless slave written by Mr. Lu Xun.
epilogue
Regarding Mr. Lu Xun's "Casting Swords", Mo Yan once commented: "I still think that "Casting Swords" is Lu Xun's best novel and the best novel in China. ”
If someone defines "Casting the Sword" as a same-sex love story, it is not only a blasphemy of Mr. Lu Xun's work, but also shows that he did not really understand this novel.
"Sword Casting" uses a thrilling revenge story to show the people's uncompromising and rebellious spirit against the darkness of society at that time, and is an ideological enlightenment for social criticism.
The sentences in the novel are basically puns, not only a simple legend, but also very corresponding to the current social situation at that time.
There is also the understanding of Peking University professor Qian Liqun that Yan Zhiao may be the spiritual symbol of Lu Xun, the embodiment of Lu Xun's thoughts, personality and emotions.
In addition to "Forging the Sword", many of Lu Xun's literary writings are actually closely linked to the Chinese Revolution, including his "Diary of a Madman", "Blessing", "Medicine" and so on.
These novels are full of Mr. Lu Xun's grief and dissatisfaction with the dark society and the people of feudal thinking, or lamenting their misfortune, in short, Mr. Lu Xun's worries about the fate of the country at that time.
Bibliography:
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[2] Wang Haiyan. Psychoanalysis of Lu Xun's "Sword Casting"[J]. Journal of Hubei University for Nationalities(Philosophy and Social Sciences Edition),2015,33(06):93-96.
[3] YAN Chunhui. On the new meaning of "revenge" in Lu Xun's "Sword Casting"[J]. Journal of Mudanjiang University,2015,24(04):63-64+69.
[4] SUN Shaozhen. Realistic and absurd lonely heroes——Interpretation of Lu Xun's "Casting Swords" [J]. Journal of Language Learning,2007,No.337(05):49-52.]
[5] Zhang Bing. Cultural interpretation of "Forging the Sword"[J]. Fudan Journal (Social Science Edition), 2005,(02):104-112+120.