Literary works are all derived from life and higher than life.
In the early days after the founding of New China, Qu Bo wrote the famous novel "Lin Hai Xueyuan" based on his experience of leading a team to suppress bandits; and Liu Zhixia wrote the popular novel "Railway Guerrillas" based on his familiar guerrilla life. Another military writer, Li Yingru, who served as the commander of the Eighth Route Army, wrote a very influential novel "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" based on his arduous practice of secretly working in enemy-occupied areas.
These three red classics have been put on the screen one after another and have become treasures of national history and culture.
After the publication of the novel "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City", it was recorded by storytelling artist Yuan Kuocheng as a commentary and broadcast on the Central People's Radio, which became a household name and became famous. In 1963, Bayi Film Studio completed the shooting of the film of the same name.
Reading novels and watching movies makes people know that "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" tells the tortuous story of Yang Xiaodong, Jinhuan, Yinhuan and other underground workers of the party who lived in the ancient city during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, fearless of hardships and dangers, and fought within the enemy.
Some viewers and readers mistakenly thought that the "ancient city" mentioned in the novel and movie should refer to Beijing (Beiping), but in fact they were all wrong.
The story described in "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" takes place in the winter of 1943, and the location of the story is Baoding City, the capital of Hebei Province under the occupation of ---- enemy and puppet occupation at that time.
According to insiders, when filming this movie, the crew preferred to go to Baoding to shoot exterior locations. However, due to the demolition of the city gate and city wall of Baoding, only the pictures of the ancient lotus pond and the old hospital were taken. Some shots of the ancient city gate and old streets were selected for shooting in Tongzhou, Beijing.
Writer Li Yingru is also one of the screenwriters of the film, and Baoding City is undoubtedly the "ancient city" where the spring breeze and wildfire fought bloodily.
Those who know history know that Baoding, Hebei Province has an extremely long history and is indeed an authentic ancient city.
Since ancient times, it has the reputation of "controlling three passes in the north, nine provinces in the south, connecting four parts, and crowning Zhongzhou", and it is also the "southern gate of the imperial capital" in Gyeonggi City.
In 1275 in the late Yuan Dynasty, the imperial court changed Shuntian Road to Baoding Road, taking the meaning of eternal security, and the name of "Baoding" began from then.
In September of the first year of Zhu Yuanzhang's Ming Hongwu (1368), the Ming Taizu announced the abolition of Baoding Road and the change of Baoding Mansion, alias Baoyang County.
In the first year of Yongle (1403), Zhu Di, the ancestor of the Ming Dynasty, killed his nephew, changed Beiping Mansion to Shuntian Mansion, built Beijing City and moved the capital, and renamed the Northern Parallel Capital Division to move to Baoding. In the tenth year of Zhengde (1515), the Ming Dynasty set up the Baoding Governor's Office. In the eleventh year of Chongzhen, the governor of Baoding was established.
After the Qing Dynasty entered the customs, along the old system of the Ming Dynasty, Baoding Mansion was still set up. In the eighth year of Kangxi (1669), the Zhili Governor's Mansion was moved from Zhengding to Baoding, and Baoding became the provincial capital of Zhili. When Emperor Yongzheng was in power, he made the governor of Zhili the governor of Zhili.
In June 1946, after the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, the Hebei Provincial Government of the Republic of China moved from Beiping to Baoding. In November 1948, Baoding was liberated, Baoding City was established, and it became the administrative office of Jizhong Administrative Office. On August 1, 1949, the Hebei Provincial People's Government was established and Baoding was set as the provincial capital. During this period, after several changes, in February 1968, the capital of Hebei Province moved out of Baoding.
Today's Baoding City is a prefecture-level city established after the merger of Baoding District and Baoding City.
(Old photos of Baoding City)
Writer Li Yingru is a native of Qingyuan County, Baoding, born in 1914. He graduated from high school in 1937 and joined the Eighth Route Army in 1938. He has successively served as an instructor and propaganda captain, edited the army's "Iskra News", and served as the commander of a combat unit.
In addition to fighting horses, Li Yingru insisted on literary creation, wrote articles on some combat experiences of the Eighth Route Army and guerrillas, and actively publicized the anti-Japanese stories in the communist guerrilla areas. He participated in the creation and editing of "One Day in Jizhong", and contributed his talents to the anti-Japanese propaganda work in Jizhong.
Beginning in 1940, Li Yingru successively wrote the short stories "Touching the City at Night", "The New Captain", and "Su Jinzhong", the reportage "Night Attack on Anping City", the prose "The Soldiers Entered Wen'an City", and the lyrics "Children Are Inseparable from Their Mother" and "The Anti-Japanese Camp Is Like Iron and Steel", which were published in local publications in the border areas.
In 1942, after the Japanese invaders launched the "May Day Sweep" in central Hebei, the superiors decided to let Li Yingru, who was familiar with the local situation, go deep into Baoding City, where the enemy was entrenched, to engage in underground work.
Li Yingru's task was to divide and disintegrate the puppet army and organize the workers, students, and citizens to wage a struggle against the enemy and the puppet.
After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, Li Yingru returned to the army and served as the chief of the Political Department of the North China Military Region, and later the director of the Liaison Department of the North China Bureau of the Communist Party of China. After the liberation of the country, he was first transferred to the political commissar and secretary of the party committee of a hospital in Tianjin, and then served as deputy director of the Cultural Department and deputy director of the Propaganda Department of the Political Department of the General Logistics Department of the People's Liberation Army.
Following the publication of his excellent novel "Fighting on the Hutuo River" in 1954, Li Yingru began to write a novel "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting the Ancient City" based on his revolutionary experience, which was published in 1958.
This novel was widely popular because it vividly described the fighting life of our party's underground workers in the Baoding area during the Anti-Japanese War, and was later translated into more than 10 languages such as English, Japanese, Russian, Bulgarian, and Korean. In addition to being adapted into films, it has also been adapted into plays and staged in various local plays.
It is said that Chairman Mao said after watching the movie "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City": "This movie is very well written, both revolutionary and romantic. ”
The protagonist of the novel "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City", the prototype of underground worker Yang Xiaodong, is recognized as the author of the novel Li Yingru.
Li Yingru once wrote in the preface to "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City": "Comrades who were sent by the party to do underground work in enemy-occupied areas...... For the cause of the Party and for the victory of the revolution, they did not care about personal gains and losses, and were ready to give everything they had. There is no smoke of gunpowder, there is a contest of wisdom, there is another way of life and death test, and this is the underground struggle. ”
It can be seen that the story described in the novel is actually the underground work experience of Li Yingru himself, his family and comrades-in-arms.
During the underground work in the ancient city of Baoding, Li Yingru served as the head of the underground workstation in Baoding and the secretary of the general party branch. He and his comrades tried to gather intelligence within the enemy.
In the wolf's den, in order to gain a firm foothold, Li Yingru first found a clerical job in the puppet provincial government, with a low salary that could not make ends meet, and he was shamelessly exploited by the section chief. In the book "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City", the prototype of Li Crooked, the section chief of the puppet provincial government, is actually the opponent Li Yingru encountered in his life and work.
Also because of his work in the puppet government, Li Yingru had an in-depth understanding of the attitude and position of the puppet governor Wu Zanzhou towards the enemy at that time, and successfully portrayed the face of the puppet governor Wu Zandong in "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City".
Working in a puppet government is in a dangerous situation, which is not conducive to long-term lurking. After arranging the relationship for intelligence gathering, Li Yingru found another job as a teacher and entered Baoding No. 2 Normal School.
At that time, the special committee of the Communist Party of China and the Baoding Municipal Party Committee were set up in the school to lead the masses in Baoding City and the surrounding counties to carry out revolutionary struggles. It's just that Li Yingru didn't know about these situations at the time, because all the underground work was a "one-line connection", and organizations at all levels did not communicate with each other. Secrecy is done very nuancedly.
At that time, Li Yingru was the head of the Baoding Intelligence Station of the Jizhong Military Region, and his wife Zhang Shuwen served as a traffic officer responsible for picking up and dropping off intelligence. The husband and wife do not have any organizational funds, and they have to raise all expenses by themselves. The cost of their promotional materials, mimeographing machines, and reception and escorts is also paid for by the salaries of the teachers. Although the funds for these activities squeezed out of their teeth are a drop in the bucket, their mind to contribute everything to the great cause of national liberation can be seen from this.
The only little white noodles every month, his wife Zhang Shuwen kept them to make some noodle soup for Li Yingru when he finished his important work, and she ate the "Sanhe noodles" that were supplied to the citizens during the enemy and puppet period for a long time.
The intelligence station was set up in a remote and inconspicuous compound in the ancient city, in a small ear room hidden by the west room. The location of this small house is called Ju'er Hutong.
Before evacuating from here, Li Yingru happened to go to the mountain to report work, and only his wife Zhang Shuwen and her children were left behind. When a traffic officer came running to inform her that there was a traitor and that she was going to be transferred immediately. Zhang Shuwen immediately gathered all the papers (documents) and burned them in the ground in front of the door. The comrades who came to inform him eagerly said: "You go quickly, I'll burn it!" Zhang Shuwen said calmly: "No!" The organizational principle is that my business cannot be handled by others.
Until the documents had been burned to ashes and buried, Zhang Shuwen ran through seven or eight streets in one breath without stopping.
Looking back on this incident in her later years, she said that she can still clearly remember the feeling of almost vomiting blood when she ran.
Zhang Shuwen became the head of the children's group at the age of 13 and joined the Communist Party of China at the age of 16. At that time, she was fighting for a base area to study, but in order to cover Li Yingru and obey the organization's assignment, she went to the city to become an underground traffic officer. She is mainly engaged in military intelligence, and has carried information in and out of the city gate guarded by the Japanese again and again, and has experienced risks, so she is called the real "silver ring" by people in the circle.
Of course, the "Golden Ring" in the novel also has the shadow of Zhang Shuwen. She was a young Communist Party member who persuaded her husband to join the army a few months after her marriage. After her husband died, she left her hometown with her daughter and went to the provincial capital to become a revolutionary traffic officer.
When commemorating the 60th anniversary of the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, Zhang Shuwen was honored to receive the medal for the 60th anniversary of the victory of the Anti-Japanese War issued by the Party Central Committee, the State Council and the Central Military Commission.
There was also an uprising against a regiment of the puppet army, and Li Yingru went deep into the tiger's den many times, and finally prompted this rebel army to enter Beiping. Until Li Yingru's later years, the officer of the uprising maintained friendly relations with Li Yingru.
It is also through this experience that Li Yingru created the artistic image of Guan Jingtao, the head of the puppet army uprising in "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City".
Yang Xiaodong, the protagonist portrayed by Li Yingru in his works, is full of love for the people, infinite contempt and hatred for the enemy, full of firm confidence in the victory of the revolution, and loyal to the party and the party's cause.
After he was unfortunately arrested, the enemy used both soft and hard measures, but he calmly faced the enemy, was righteous and awe-inspiring, and would rather die than give in.
In the face of Yinhuan's love and selfless maternal love, he put public affairs before private interests, put revolution first, fully demonstrated the noble character of a Communist Party member, and established a glorious image of a Communist Party member.
According to the writer's book "Words on the Ancient City of Wildfire and Spring Breeze", after the "Great Sweep" of the Japanese invaders in 1942, "the area of activity in the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei base area was relatively reduced like other base areas behind enemy lines. In order to tide over the arduous stage and usher in new victories, the party called for marching behind enemy lines; while organizing a large number of armed engineering teams, it also sent a number of outstanding cadres to Ping, Tianjin, Bao, Shi, and other large and medium-sized cities and major transportation roads to carry out underground work. ”
It was during this urgent mission that Li Yingru was sent to work in the Baoding area.
He has experienced the thrilling, tense and bizarre and life-and-death trials of inside work. "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" may be his affectionate look back on that unforgettable life and struggle experience.
(Li Yingru has an indissoluble bond with his hometown of Baoding)
In September 2019, Li Yingru's novel "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" was selected into the "70 Novels Collection of 70 Years in New China".
Some experts commented on Li Yingru: His own experience is truly restored, and people in his hometown write about his hometown... All of this makes the work more authentic and believable, as if you are there.
After this novel was put on the screen, some street scenes of the ancient city of Baoding from the 40s to the 60s of the last century were truly recorded, so that future generations were fortunate to see some of the features of the ancient city of Baoding at that time.
In the novel, there are many Baoding dialects with a strong sense of life. For example, "the price is called all day long, and there is no accurate head", "how to respond to other sentinels", "you don't eat for three days to try the ba", etc., the tone is very "authentic".
In the book, Yang Xiaodong's mother, Aunt Yang, faced the threat of the enemy, and sternly reprimanded: "Don't take three minutes, I won't wait for a minute!
This kind of language style of expression, a sound is unique to Baoding people.
In October 1947, Nie Rongzhen, commander of the Shanxi-Chahar-Hebei Military Region, in accordance with the deployment of the Party Central Committee, sent troops of the North China Field Army to besiege the Kuomintang army in Xushuicheng, and annihilated the Kuomintang Third Army, reinforced by Shijiazhuang from the north, at Qingfengdian in Baonan.
In this fierce battle of reinforcements, Li Yingru was mainly responsible for intelligence work. At the end of November 1948, after the start of the Pingjin Campaign, Liu Ren, then deputy director of the Organization Department of the North China Bureau of the Communist Party of China and director of the Urban Industry Department, urgently transferred Li Yingru to Shidu, a suburb of Beijing, to study and cooperate with the instigation of the uprising of Fu Zuoyi's army. Subsequently, Li Yingru was ordered to infiltrate Beiping City and organize and arrange several underground liaison work with General Fu Zuoyi and others.
In the fifties and sixties of the last century, after "Railway Guerrilla", "Song of Youth", "Red Flag Spectrum" and "Lin Hai Xueyuan" were successively adapted into movies, the novel "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" also became the subject of attention of the film studio.
So, Li Yingru took matters into his own hands and cooperated with Li Tian of the Propaganda Department of the Political Department of the General Logistics Department to adapt the novel into a film literary script in May 1959. When the Beijing Film Studio learned of this, it quickly published the literary script in the "Film Creation" run by the studio, and prepared to make it into a film.
At the same time, the novel "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" was also photographed by Bayi Film Studio, which specializes in military themes.
Yan Jizhou, who later became one of the screenwriters and directors of the film, recalled: "This best-selling book, which is loved by readers at home and abroad, was also serialized in the Beijing Evening News before it was published. The master who pulls the rickshaw in Wangfujing, sometimes he doesn't do business, so he waits for the newsstand to come and wait for the newspaper to come, for a sneak peek. In small restaurants, on the streets, everywhere you go, you can hear people talking about this novel. Although I have a copy of the Beijing Evening News at home, in order to get a sneak peek, I still have to buy one when I go to the city to run errands, and read it as I walk. A newspaper with four pages, two cents, and I don't let go of every word in the serialization. ”
Yan Jizhou said, "The plot of 'Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City' is thrilling and twisty, and the language is the local language of Hebei, which is really beautiful! I immediately bought a copy of the book after it was published, and read it again from beginning to end, and I decided to make it into a movie." ”
The official decision of Bayi Factory to adapt the novel and shoot "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" was an important speech delivered by Premier Zhou Enlai at the National Literary and Art Symposium and Feature Film Creation Conference in June 1961. Premier Zhou stressed the need to respect the laws of literary and artistic creation and encourage the creation of works that are more popular with the people, which has stimulated an upsurge of exploration and innovation in film creation.
After the coordination of the General Political Department of the People's Liberation Army, it was more appropriate for the writers of the army to write the works of the army and shoot them by themselves, and the Beijing Film Studio also agreed that the film would be shot by Bayi Factory.
A year later, Yan Jizhou, who finished filming the film "Good Brothers", began to prepare for the filming of "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City".
He accompanied Li Yingru and Li Tian to Baoding, which was still the capital of Hebei Province at that time, and visited various places where the story took place, such as the hospital where the underground staff had hidden, the streets that were frequented, and the shops where the steamed buns were eaten, so as to increase their perceptual understanding and passion for re-creation, and then improve the film script.
When he accepted the task of choreographing and directing, a colleague once suggested Yan Jizhou: "It can be made into a thrilling film that surpasses "Heroes and Tiger Courage", and the box office rate must be very high."
After careful consideration, Director Yan felt that it was inappropriate. He believes that this movie is not known for its thrilling and bizarre, not for thrilling and thrilling, but mainly about "people" and people's encounters and fates. It should be "a drama with intense conflict, clear love and hate, tense plot, and thrilling tendencies".
Therefore, in the later filming, the choreographer did not render the bizarre or exaggerate the thrill, but used real and simple narrative techniques, with thick lines and fine strokes and other art forms, vividly reproducing the scenes of the underground struggle of that year.
The cast that participated in the filming of the film is quite strong. The actor Yang Xiaodong is played by idol actor Wang Xingang. At that time, he had already successfully played the vigorous, wise and brave speedboat captain Zhang Min in "Sea Eagle", and the broad-minded and unyielding party representative Hong Changqing in "Red Detachment of Women"; in the play, the young movie star Wang Xiaotang played two roles with very different personalities, Jinhuan and Yinhuan; in the film, Guan Jingtao, the head of the puppet security regiment, selected the local powerhouse who had just appeared in "Lin Hai Xueyuan" according to the director's requirements that he should not be made to be the kind of foreign head that seems to be from the Whampoa Military Academy, but should be a native and have a bit of temperament Yang Xiaodong's mother is played by Chen Lizhong, who is good at playing a rural lady, she not only looks simple and strong in appearance and temperament, but also speaks with a Baoding regional accent, which is very suitable for the character. In addition, Zhao Ruping plays the underground party member Han Yanlai, Li Renlin plays the puppet security army commander Gao Dacheng, Wang Xiaozhong plays the Japanese army adviser Tada, and Zhang Henry plays the traitor Gao Ziping.
The film was released in November 1963 and caused a great sensation. A wide audience rushed to watch, and the critics were full of praise. It is rumored in the society that this movie "men watch Wang Xingang, women watch Wang Xiaotang".
In 1964, when the Best Actress Award of the 3rd Hundred Flowers Awards was selected, the 100,000 valid votes cast by the audience of the army were all filled in with Wang Xiaotang's name.
In the movie, Wang Xiaotang played the two sisters of Jinhuan and Yinhuan, who conquered a large number of audiences because of their mastery, contrasts and insimilarities.
Not long after the release of "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City", with the advent of turbulent years, the film was completely denied by the "standard-bearer". She accused the film of "fighting for the uprising of Guan Tuanchang, not connecting with the struggle environment at the time, not seeing the necessity of fighting, and beautifying Guan Jingtao", "writing the traitor as righteous and patriotic", "Yang Xiaodong is weak at the critical moment, Jinhuan is like a shrew, and it is unreasonable to pull a hairpin and stab the enemy; Yinhuan is a middle character, repeatedly makes mistakes, falls in love with Yang Xiaodong at first sight, and writes this love excessively. Yang's mother appeared three times, twice to her son as a daughter-in-law, distorting the image of a revolutionary mother" and so on.
can imagine the fate of the following, this movie was naturally branded as a "poisonous weed" and the film was banned.
After the "Gang of Four" was crushed, all the charges imposed by the film were overturned. After the re-screening, it not only became a screen hit, but also was remade twice as a feature-length TV series.
These re-creations are all based on old films, showing the strong vitality of the film shot back then.
Li Yingru once said that the name "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" is to compare the wildfire to the enemy's fierce flames, and the spring breeze to the party's vital force. Yang Xiaodong, the political commissar of the regiment, the sisters of Jinhuan and Yinhuan, underground traffic officers, and Xiaoyan'er, who are smart and clever, are fighting tenaciously to defend the country and fight for national liberation. They erected a monument to heroes, sounded the trumpet of national hatred, and played an ode to love and love.
In February 1989, Li Yingru died of illness in Beijing at the age of 75.
(Lee Young-ru and his family)
In April 2021, Bruce Lee, the daughter of Li Yingru and director of the Beijing TV Drama Art Center, led a team to Baoding City to collect style, and soon after, the Beijing Academy of Performing Arts adapted "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City" into a drama and put it on the stage.
Bruce Lee has his own interpretation and understanding of the war that his fathers experienced. She said: "In 1995, I re-adapted the TV series of "Wildfire Spring Breeze Fighting Ancient City". When it comes to motivation, the most important thing is that my father's fighting spirit inspired me, and the patriotic spirit in that national war inspired me. The figure of his father shines on Yang Xiaodong's body, and his mother and Yinhuan are fused together. Although my parents never admitted that they were the protagonists of the novel, people in this circle have long been accustomed to calling my parents that. ”
Bruce Lee said: "The prototype of Yang's mother in the novel is actually my grandmother, which my father recognizes." Before his death, he recalled that my grandmother grew up in fear for her son, and for the sake of her son and her homeland, she began to cover the underground workers and began to work underground, which is the same as Yang's mother in the novel. And my father has always had a sense of gratitude and guilt for my grandmother. So my father used my grandmother as a model and successfully wrote a flesh-and-blood anti-Japanese old mother. ”
Every time he talked about his grandmother, Bruce Lee had tears in his eyes.
Li Yingru's daughter grew up in the army compound, first as a worker, and then admitted to university. After graduating from the Department of Chinese Opera Directing, he was assigned to work in the General Political Drama Troupe, and after changing careers, he came to the Beijing Television Art Center to engage in film and television creation.
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