On August 8, 1921, Wu Mi, who was already engaged to her good friend's sister, met Mao Yanwen for the first time at her father-in-law's house in Hangzhou.
I saw Mao Yanwen wearing a red forged embroidered cheongsam, and a black hair lined with a goose egg face that was white and red. She looked at Wu Mi with a smile and said generously:
"I came from my home in Jiangshan County to go to school in Beijing. I thought that Mr. Wu had returned to China, but I didn't know if it was there? Who would have thought such a coincidence? ”
The sociable and beautiful Mao Yanwen gave Wu Mi a good first impression, in fact, in order to inquire about the situation of his fiancée Chen Xinyi, Wu Mi had already corresponded with Mao Yanwen as early as during his study abroad (Mao and Chen were classmates) and was impressed by Mao's talent.
At this meeting, Mao Yanwen was like a delicate rose, taking root in Wu Mi's heart, making her dream haunt her all her life.
Wu Mi (left), Mao Yanwen (right)
Wu Mi was a famous master of traditional Chinese studies during the Republic of China period, and many friends may not be familiar with him. But if you say that he is Qian Zhongshu's most beloved teacher and Chen Yinke's close friend, you should know that he is not simple.
Wu Mi studied at Tsinghua University in her early years, and later stayed in the United States to study under irving babbitt, a master of new humanism at Harvard University. Neo-humanism advocated moral temperance of emotions and targeted romantic ideas.
After returning to China, Wu Mi and his fiancée Chen Xinyi hurriedly married in Shanghai, and only 10 days later, they went to Nanjing National Southeast University to teach, leaving Chen Xinyi alone in Shanghai.
Wu Mi and his wife Chen Xinyi
At that time, Mao Yanwen was already engaged to Zhu Junyi, the Ruyi Langjun of his own green plum bamboo horse. However, what happened after that was very bloody.
Zhu Junyi interviewed Mao Yanwen one day and personally presented a letter of renunciation, in which he said that his aesthetics for women had changed and he did not like Mao Yanwen's thin type of women, so he decided to break off the marriage contract with Mao Yanwen.
Zhu Junyi is a friend of Wu Mi
During that time, the devastated Mao Yanwen often wrote letters to Wu Mi to pour out his heart, and Wu Mi fell more and more in love with this single-minded woman, in his heart, Chen Xinyi was just an old-fashioned woman who taught her husband and son, which was far from his ideal type.
On August 4, 1928, Wu Mi finally couldn't hold back, ran to Hangzhou alone to meet Mao Yanwen privately, and the two of them went on a sightseeing trip together for almost a month, and Wu Mi reluctantly returned to Beijing (at that time, he had transferred to Tsinghua to teach).
Wu Mi thought that she had frankly shown Chen Xin all the diary of the southern journey and the contents of the poem about Mao Yanwen, and told her friends about the ambiguity between herself and Mao Yanwen, so rumors about "Mao Yanwen's third party" flew everywhere.
Mao Yanwen was very angry when he learned of this, so he asked his friend to hand over the "letter of no friendship" to Wu Mi, and he did not contact Wu Mi at all.
Old photos of Hangzhou
What absurd thing did the impatient Wu Mi do? Burdened with great moral pressure, he divorced his wife Chen Xinyi in September 1929 and published it in the press.
In fact, at that time, divorce was not unusual, Lu Xun ignored Zhu An and was with the student Xu Guangping; Xu Zhimo also abandoned his wife Zhang Youyi and married Lu Xiaoman.
Wu Mi and Chen Xinyi
But when it came to Wu Mi, how could it not be the right taste?
Because he studied under Bai Bide's new humanism, after returning to China, he hosted the magazine "Xueheng", which adhered to traditional etiquette and confronted the new culture, and the propaganda in it was contrary to what he had done, and he was labeled as "words and deeds", so he was "encircled and suppressed" by a vote of friends.
But at this time, Wu Mi has been overwhelmed by love, and he only thinks that Mao Yanwen is pretending to cut off contact with himself because he is attacked as a "third party", as long as he is divorced, Mao Yanwen will return to his side.
As for Mao Yanwen, since he wrote a letter of renunciation, he went to the United States to study.
Wu Mi continued to write to her letters one after another until March 22, 1930, when Mao Yanwen finally replied, and in the letter, Mao Yanwen expressed his love for Wu Mi. Wu Mi almost jumped up in excitement!
So he planned his own plan to travel to Europe, the main purpose of which was to ask Mao Yanwen to go to Europe to talk about marriage with himself.
But things were far less simple than Wu Mi expected, Wu Mi wrote a letter to Mao Yanwen, wanting her to come to England to get married, and Mao Yanwen was also stubborn and wanted Wu Mi to go to the United States to get married.
Later, the two kept writing letters to engage in a tug-of-war, which lasted for more than half a year, making both sides physically and mentally exhausted, and finally met in France a month before returning home, and after a month there, the two returned to China together with a heart of love and hate.
Old photos of France
The plot of dog blood is still developing, Wu Mi and Mao Yanwen did not marry after returning to China, and three years later, in 1934, Mao Yanwen married Xiong Xiling, the former premier of the State Council, who was more than forty years older than himself, who was Mao Yanwen's titular "righteous father".
At this time, the lost Wu Mi pinned her hopes on Mao Yanwen's "stand-in", the student Gao Dihua, who was somewhat similar to Mao Yanwen in her youth.
With the outbreak of the War of Resistance, Wu Mi took care of Gao Dihua, fled all the way to Changsha, and arranged her to his leader, Yuan Tongli, director of the Beiping Library, but he did not expect that later the two talked about the love of "superior subordinates".
Disheartened, Wu Mi saw the news of the death of Mao Yanwen's husband Xiong Xiling in the Ta Kung Pao at this time, so his love was revived.
But Mao Yanwen has made it clear that he will no longer associate with all his friends and is determined to devote himself to the cause of charity and education. For Wu Mi's letter after letter, she never replied.
Mao Yanwen and Xiong Xiling
During this period, Wu Mi's love life was not blank. After Gao Dihua, there are also talented female writers Lu Baohua and Southwest United University assistant professor Zhang Erqiong have appeared in Wu Mi's life.
However, Wu Mi still has illusions about Mao Yanwen, and writes her love letters of 10,000 words at night, and Mao Yanwen will often break into Wu Mi's dreams and meet with them...
Wu Mi finally looked forward to Mao Yanwen's reply in 1940, but the contents of the letter made Wu Mi lose sleep that day, saying:
What makes Wu Mi even more sad is that none of these words were written by Mao Yanwen himself, and they were all cut and pasted from Wu Mi's previous letters, and their determination was obvious.
Xiong Xiling's family
The lonely Wu Mi tossed and turned most of her life on the road of feelings, but found nothing.
In 1953, at the age of 60, Wu Mi married zou Lanfang, a 20-year-old student. Zou's pursuit of the famous professor Wu Mi was premeditated, and in the end he finally succeeded in becoming Wu's wife.
After ignoring the doctor's persuasion, he insisted on dragging the sick body of tuberculosis for Wu Mi to give birth to a daughter, and as a result, her daughter died prematurely, and Zou Lanfang was seriously ill because of this, and she died only two years after marriage, and Wu Mi was alone again...
Later, in the tragic decade after liberation, Wu Mi suffered a heavy blow both physically and mentally - her legs fell disabled, her eyes suffered from cataracts, she had no money and no power, and her spirit collapsed, becoming a bad old man who everyone hated, and could only live on her sister's monthly support of 20 yuan.
Later, his sister took Wu Mi back to her hometown in Shaanxi, and only two years later, he died, still shouting when he died:
It was January 17, 1978.
Throughout Wu Mi's bumpy and tragic life, there seems to be an inextricable relationship with his obsessive "Dream of the Red Chamber". He saw the philosophical meaning in "Dream of the Red Chamber" and even used it to give his life a tribute.
His pursuit of love is true and pure, he always creates an imaginary object, and then pursues tirelessly, for the experience of love that can not be, he is almost obsessively intoxicated in it, in order to appear his bitterness and infatuation...
Mr. Chen Yinke's evaluation of him is accurate:
This is the legendary master of traditional Chinese studies, Wu Mi, who is virtuous and lustful, full of contradictions, but is a living, flesh-and-blood person.
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