Wang Meng once said, "I like language, and I like words. In the middle of language and words, I am like a fish in the water. This kind of "management" and "profligacy" like "fish in the water" has made Wang Meng always in a state of "same frequency" and "isomorphism" with the times. In his novel "Monkeys and Teenagers", he uses a lot of modern vocabulary and even Internet terms, such as "Carnival Carnival Opening Party", "Source Code of the Past", "QQ Pinyin and Sogou Five Strokes", "Lost Group Lonely", "How did he get to the great ravine, is it 666?" ”...... The injection of these "new generation" languages makes the whole novel depart from the old-school tone of "nostalgic style" and "local style", but has a strange fashionable color, which makes people feel that the novelist Wang Mengbao is not old, and is still the "tide maker" and "vanguard" of language and writing. A work like Monkey and Boy is bound to meet its young readers now or in the future. Wang Meng skillfully uses these languages that are steaming with the times, indicating that he does not want to be complacent and is constantly updating his life experience and literary experience.
Nineteen-year-old lyrical youth and nostalgic youth of the year of the back
When I first read Wang Meng's long new work "Monkeys and Teenagers", I can't help but think of the Qinghai folk song "Flowers and Youth" in the 1950s, which is fresh and romantic, has a sense of youthful nostalgia, and also integrates the melody of the Northwest folk song "Flowers". Such a melody must have resounded in the Xinjiang area where Wang Meng once lived, and he loved this land and continued to crown this hot land with writing. He once said, "You can't simply say that I went to Xinjiang as being exiled." Going to Xinjiang is a good thing, I volunteered, and it has greatly enriched my life experience, my observations, and my understanding of China, the Han nationality, the hinterland and the frontiers, so that I may learn and understand something from a series of comparisons between the inland-frontier, the urban-rural areas, and the Han-fraternal nationalities. Apparently, these things that were "learned and realized" are still burning and rejuvenating in his heart.
In the prime of his life (twenty-nine to forty-five years old), a writer accepted a "gift" from fate; in more than ten years of frontier life, Wang Meng's life was renewed, he heard "flowers" and also saw "monkeys and teenagers". The poet Rilke once said in The Essays of Marte Raulede Brig, "Poetry is not, as the average person says, emotions (emotions have long been enough) ,—— poetry is experience." "The novel is more about the understanding, refinement and reconstruction of experience, the richness and saturation of experience will directly determine the texture of a novel, without saturation experience, the novel will be pale fiction." From "Long Live Youth", Wang Meng has sung with the surging emotions and hot vitality of a poet, but what really makes his novel writing is his unique and complex life experience that has a life radius that is far larger than ordinary people. The opportunity of politics, the encounters of the times, the complexity of the world, and the heavy load of culture made many unique experiences converge on him, and he later responded to these experiences with his sensitive, complex, prolific, and widely controversial series of works.
"Come all the days, let me weave you, with the golden thread of youth, and the radiance of happiness, weave you." Nineteen-year-old youth enthusiastically expresses youth, which is naturally different from the nostalgia of young people who are old and old. At the beginning of "Monkeys and Teenagers", the grand propositions of age, time, memory, and life and death are discussed in a large monologue of the mind, and this eloquent, cross-examination, and philosophical discourse can also be regarded as a continuation of Wang Meng's "stream of consciousness" writing. The structure of the first and last arguments, not only appears in "Monkeys and Teenagers", this way of telling that breaks through the limitations of characters and plots and allows thoughts and consciousness to be independent into a chapter is one of the aesthetic characteristics of Wang Meng's novels, and it is very recognizable.
Shi Bingyan, the narrator of "Monkeys and Youths" and an expert in foreign literature in his nineties, went to the countryside in his youth (1958) to "change a living method and another body". In the cracks of the great changes of the times, he met Hou Changyou and other teenagers in the village of Big Walnut Shuyu and formed a wonderful fate for decades. In those years of labor, Shi Bingyan's deepest memories were his physical labor and interaction with the villagers of Da walnut Shuyu Village: learning to carry baskets, learning to ride horses, the warmth of a rotten egg, the amiable monkey "Three Young Masters", a handful of fresh dates left by colleague Lao Du, and the care and encouragement he received in the labor of accumulating fat... In the retrospection of "strange and distant", the "golden thread of youth and the bright light of happiness" have been transformed into dots of light under the shade of large walnut trees over the long years, which are confused, dazzling, illusory and real, making people feel mixed feelings.
The novelist Wang Meng is a faithful listener and narrator of stories
"Monkeys and Teenagers" has a strong "dialogue" in the narrative. "I", the novelist Wang Meng, is a faithful listener and relayer of the story. The protagonists Shi Bingyan, Wang Meng, Hou Changyou, and even the monkey "Three Young Masters" seem to overlap in the strange trajectory of fate, you have me, I have you, and I can't tell who the teenager in the big walnut tree yu village really is. This kind of dialogue that flows between the characters creates an artistic effect of jagged years and virtual reality, so that the fate of the characters is no longer just a personal experience, but a kind of existence with the times and universality. The novel writes about the immortal death of Wu Suqiu, a drama master and a female talent, the middle-aged Hou Changyou who had more than one mental illness, and the monkey "Three Young Masters" who were sent back to the mountains unfortunately died... The young Shi Bingyan had felt warmth from them, learned and comforted, but in the end time had passed through different paths. In this way, through the dialogue through time and space, the fate of the lamentable characters is no longer to watch and hear the voice of the "other", but to have an "intertextual" echo with the inner self.
Wang Meng is a rare writer who has tolerance and compassion for any group. He understood officials, peasants, intellectuals, workers, and people from all walks of life, and could discover the meaning of their existence. This not only stems from his broad and profound life experience and life wisdom, but also from the fact that he has always lived in his heart the teenager who has never stopped "singing to himself". Just like Shi Bingyan in the year of the back, even if he "changed his body" in the big walnut tree Yu Village, his spiritual passion has never been indelible. The misfortunes, sorrows, and pains of life have been comforted in the land of "simplicity and inability to compete with beauty"; those who are puzzled, difficult and expectant have accepted the reconciliation from time. "Creation is a kind of burning", Wang Meng, who still works tirelessly, is fully qualified to say such a declaration out loud.
The language of "Wang's style" in "Monkeys and Teenagers" is still striking. "The old man has dry goods, and the young man is passionate. Fifteen yuan a gram of dry goods, a dollar a cube of passion" "The old bird fell on the pig, there is no need to explain the coat color and luck"... These humorous words, colloquial slang and slang emerge from large segments of discussion, and with folk songs and poems flowing through them, there is a dizzying and complex atmosphere. Language is a portrayal of the mode of life, but also a representation of how the mental space works, choosing a language is choosing a way of thinking. The humor, ridicule, and ridicule in the language of Wang Meng's novels correspond to his deep concern and distress about life and human nature. Just as in "Monkeys and Teenagers", Shi Bingyan "cut the ribbon for his new journey in life, and fired the gun to start the race", at the heavy turning point of life, "obedience and rebellion, obscurity and luck, stoicism and open-mindedness" all the mountains shouted tsunami and swept across the face, and a person who wanted to "stand and stand firm" not only relied on a strong personal will, but also needed a weightless intellect and self-explanatory. This is the path and language that Wang Meng chose, full of humor and irony that is difficult to interject, but also full of adolescent heat and lingering bright atmosphere - this atmosphere may be called healthy, cheerful "youthfulness".
Wang Meng's writing has been maintaining and exerting this "youthful spirit". In the novel, Wang Meng used a word when telling the story of his youth through shi Bingyan's mouth - "relish and taste", which means that no matter what age, what kind of situation you encounter, and what kind of state of mind you have in the long years, you must live "with relish". I think this is also the meaning of Wang Meng's novel, whether it is the early years of "A Young Man Came to the Organization Department", or the later "Activities Change into Human Form", to today's "Monkeys and Teenagers", the life sentiment and spiritual purpose he wants to express is "relish". Therefore, the ups and downs of fate, the separation of life and death, and the gathering and dispersion of love are all the love taste of life, how to chew, how to regurgitate, how to end up "relishing", is the cultivation of life. Wang Meng is still working feverishly in his literary world, he loves labor, and he never forgets the nourishment of land, personnel, and years for him. "The winner is often frustrated, the strong are often sick", this is the echo of long live of youth, and it is really a thing that monkeys and teenagers envy to have such a relishy of youth and the year of the back.
Author: Xie Youshun (Professor of Chinese Department of Sun Yat-sen University, Vice Chairman of Guangdong Writers Association)
Edit: Jiang Fang