Guo Xiaochuan
Guo Xiaochuan's legacy
——Speech at the symposium commemorating the centenary of Guo Xiaochuan's birth
Wang Jiuxin
Life is bitter and short, and the classics will last forever. Poet Guo Xiaochuan is happy, he is completely different from those who write poems with an increase in price and people who are thankful for their decline, he is dead and famous, and today, more than 40 years after his death, there are still thousands of poets who remember him, love him, continue to recite his poems, and forward his works on WeChat and the Internet, which shows that his poetry has won a lasting heart, and those who enter the hearts of the people, there will be echoes, which seems to be the best sign of all successful poets.
On the morning of November 7, the symposium to commemorate the centenary of Guo Xiaochuan's birth was held at the China Museum of Modern Literature (Photo: China Writers Network)
On the morning of November 7, the symposium to commemorate the centenary of Guo Xiaochuan's birth was held at the China Museum of Modern Literature. The picture shows Wang Jiuxin speaking at the symposium (Photo: China Writers Network)
Mention Guo Xiaochuan, we will naturally think of Guo Moruo, Wen Yiduo, Guang Weiran, Tian Jian, Think of He Jingzhi, Ai Qing, Bai Hua, Gong Liu, think of their generation of poets shining names and their immortal classic poetry. It can be said that the 70-year history of the People's Republic of China and the glorious course of the Communist Party of China in the past 98 years have always been accompanied by the surging of their blood and passion, and it can be said that they have always been at the forefront of the spirit. With their immortal poems, they aroused millions of workers and peasants, and together with the roaring Yellow River, they defeated the Japanese invaders, and with the simplest, most authentic, and most selfless emotions and talents of the people's children and soldiers, they sacrificed their desperate hand-to-hand fighting and hot blood and pride to overthrow the Chiang family dynasty and establish a new China. After the founding of New China, whether it was building the motherland, or defending the motherland in the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, whether in the vast rural areas or in the industrial and mining checkpoints, Guo Xiaochuan and the poets of his generation always shared the fate with the masses of the people in action and creation, always praised the people and praised the motherland with their own poetry, and always maintained a strong passion, always firmly walked in the forefront of the times, always took the people's nature as the bottom line, and advanced in a broader and farther direction. It can be said that they have always been the pioneers of the times in the pursuit of light and dreams, and are a shining example and model for future generations.
Guo Xiaochuan's manuscript "Gift to a Friend" (Source: Collection of Treasures of the Museum of Modern Chinese Literature: Manuscript Volumes)
Guo Xiaochuan's manuscript "Vientiane Update" (Source: Collection of Treasures of the Museum of Modern Chinese Literature: Manuscript Volumes)
The white colt crossed the gap, and in the blink of an eye it was a hundred years. As far as the development of contemporary literary creation is concerned, in the past four decades of China's reform and opening up, people have faced the wind from all sides, studied hard, emancipated their minds, and taken on a new spiritual outlook; for the world, for society, for life, and for life, people are no longer superstitious and no longer rigid, and everyone has their own opinions, ideas and pursuits that are different from others, and they can pick up a pen to freely write about the different poetic feelings they have experienced in their hearts. It is worth mentioning that in the more than 40 years since the resumption of the college entrance examination, people's appreciation of literature and art and poetry has also been increasingly improved. In fact, there are many people who have picked up the pen and written it like it. Especially in the theoretical world of new poetry, it is even more diverse and noisy. What I want to say is that it is precisely in the context or premise of such a huge amount of information and screams that how should we revisit the works of Guo Xiaochuan and Guo Xiaochuan's generation of poets? Do you think they're not fresh enough, not unique enough, not thick enough? Are they eliminated, or are they obscured? Has their dedication to the aesthetic creation of the Chinese revolution and the history of the Chinese revolution gained the attention of the theoretical and ideological and artistic circles? How much inheritance and innovation did the later poets have? This is indeed a problem that needs to be pondered for a long time.
"Into the Fiery Struggle" (cover of works in the collection of the Museum of Modern Chinese Literature)
On the occasion of the centenary of Mr. Ogawa's birth, it is also a good time for us to revisit the classics and rediscover and understand the spiritual values of past classics and poetry. Because diversification is not nihilization, from a philosophical level, diversity at the same time, is not to give up the proposition and adhere to, in a sense, the more diverse the need to know their own way and direction, the middle of history and the future is reality, history, reality and the future between the logic is a progressive rise, to understand history, is not to forget the original intention. We carry on the blood of the previous generation and are not ready to go into the future in a state of nothingness. On the contrary, it is indeed time for us to seriously review and examine history; it is indeed time to count the treasures of the family in order to know what is in our hearts; it is indeed the time to carry forward the glorious traditions of our predecessors. Yesterday, today and the future will always have a spiritual bloodline that runs through ancient and modern times, which cannot be interrupted, and in fact cannot be interrupted. This requires us to remove the garbage of bubbles and shoddy in the connection between history, reality and the future, and find those poetic classics that contain the inevitable logic of the development of the times and have the essential driving force. Because these classics constitute our way, through our hometown, and are the genealogy of our new poetry. We must not forget our ancestors, but on the contrary, we must remember our ancestors and devote ourselves to new creations with the attitude of successors. And the poet Guo Xiaochuan and his new poetry works, I think it is one of the most important classics.
"To Young Citizens" (cover of works in the collection of the Museum of Modern Chinese Literature)
The 20th century, which has just passed less than 20 years ago, is a great era of upsurge, magnificent waves, and earth-shaking, and a hundred years from the beginning of the Chinese revolution to the founding of New China and the great victories and great achievements of reform and opening up. Both from a vertical historical point of view and from a horizontal perspective of reality, his works constitute the vanguard of the times. The height of its spirit, together with the poetry of Guo Moruo, Guang Weiran, Ai Qing, He Jingzhi and other poets, jointly supported the firmament of new Chinese poetry in the 20th century. Looking up at the starry sky, we say that the creation of contemporary new poems has completed the superficial lyricism, thus entering the inner world of the soul. The aesthetics of history should not only take the depth of human nature, but also take the revelation of the inevitable logic and inevitable trend of history as the basis for excellence, and also establish the expression of reality and the breadth and subtlety of people's emotional world as excellent signs. So, today let me use these two standards as a balance of literature and jade rulers for the past classics, and look at the poet Guo Xiaochuan. I thought he belonged not only yesterday, but also today, and his experience is still of great significance to our descendants. Especially for the exploration of history, further revealing the depth, breadth and subtlety of human nature in history, in order to highlight the inevitable logic of historical trends and the depth, breadth and expression of his experience of real life, it has the spiritual value and significance of reference and guidance for the future development of new poetry, and the successful experience and flashing wisdom of many of his works in artistic expression have always had important enlightenment for our descendants.
Snow and Valley (Cover of Works from the Collection of the Museum of Modern Chinese Literature)
In a series of long poems by the poet Guo Xiaochuan expressing the history of the Chinese revolution and the Chinese revolution, we can see the poet's extremely unusual and superb qualities, and he seems to have a very good intuition and consciousness in the darkness, that is, only by clinging to the torrents of history, daring to face difficulties, daring to face the pain, and daring to challenge strangers, can we create a new realm of poetry that conforms to human nature and shows the inevitable logic of history. Just as Guo Xiaochuan wrote in "The Hymn of White Snow" that the wife of a county party secretary could not go to the front line with her husband because she was in labor, and could only give birth to children in the rear, as a result, soon after her husband left, the news came that her husband was first injured, then captured, and then disappeared, a series of unfortunate events occurred, each of which was like a knife cutting into people's hearts, especially the layers of heavy psychological lyricism, which was extremely humane. After the child was born, it was also the time when the heroine's husband disappeared, she met a comrade-in-arms who was also very popular with her, that is, the doctor's love - this is another stirring situation creation, it can be said that Guo Xiaochuan has never simply praised the purity and loyalty of human nature, he is particularly good at showing the noble quality and moving power of people's inextricable aspirations in the burning of human flesh.
SugarCane Forest - Green Yarn Tent (Cover of Works collected by the Museum of Modern Chinese Literature)
Another example is the long poem "Deep Valley", in which he writes that two women in the revolutionary ranks recall together the object of one of the women's hot love, and the male protagonist "he" is insane because of his timidity, fear, and inescapable in the war, which leads to the final suicide by jumping off a cliff... In the face of such extreme individual cases, the poet not only did not ignore, but paid more attention to the flow of his emotions and the strange realm of human nature. Following the poet's brushstrokes, we can then enter a completely unfamiliar situation, into the spiritual world of man, on the one hand, the iron warrior, on the other hand, the cowardly scholar, their different manifestations in the war, both the praise of the bravery and fearlessness of the revolutionary fighters, and the mental pressure and spiritual harm brought by the cruelty and terror of the war. Mr. Guo Xiaochuan's writing cannot but make people think deeply about the human nature of war; and Mr. Guo Xiaochuan's creation of going straight into the wilderness as if entering no man's land is unique to this day. Here, we can clearly see the poet Guo Xiaochuan's different insight, the ability to discover and create, his creative psychology and creative thinking of seeking differences and seeking new ideas that are not the same as others, his ability to expound and grasp the details of history, etc. In my opinion, it is the noble temperament of a great poet who cannot be copied, which provides an important example for our descendants to inherit and carry forward the aesthetic creation of the Chinese revolution and the history of the Chinese revolution.
There is also Guo Xiaochuan's famous long poem "One and Eight", which was adapted into a movie, which is also a rare creation of the Chinese revolution and the history of the Chinese revolution. It shows a completely different revolutionary contingent and revolutionaries, and the depth and breadth of human nature touched upon by its scenes and long poems are 30 years earlier than the so-called "vanguard" works that depict bandits resisting Japan in the 1980s, and even more boldly write the stories of "criminals" and "traitors" in the revolutionary contingent to resist Japan. It can be said that our understanding and research on Mr. Guo Xiaochuan's creative achievements is still in a superficial state, and many works created under the impetus of his huge creative ambitions have hardly been truly interpreted and interpreted. This is both the shallowness of our poets and the absence of poetics researchers, which has led to the fact that the creation of the Chinese revolution and the history of the Chinese revolution is still at a low level of writing, which is greatly surprising and disappointing.
The General Trilogy (Cover of Works from the Collection of the Museum of Modern Chinese Literature)
In my opinion, the poet Guo Xiaochuan is a "rare bird" who has insight and mastered the aesthetic creation of history and the secrets of creating history among the poets of their generation. Another of his poems, the General Trilogy, can be said to have been fully recognized and understood for its value. Why did the author write directly about "generals" instead of grassroots officers and soldiers? In the context of "the masses are the real heroes" at that time, he boldly chose the "general" as the object of aesthetic creation, and the book was a "trilogy", which had good intentions. Before the poet Mr. Guo Xiaochuan was born, that is, 60 years ago, in 1960, he once said with great thought: "I have begun to make a lot of preparations, and I intend to continue to write the sequel to the "General Trilogy" from next year, and continue to write, perhaps to write more than a dozen things like "Under the Moon". He added, "In this life, I don't want to think about anything, write this thing well, and dedicate it to our people." Why did he vow to write this long poem for the rest of his life? I have experienced through repeated recitation: Judging from the "General Trilogy" that has been written, he has the determination to express the two great wars in China's modern history, the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the War of Liberation, and has set his sights on the "general," a key figure who has inherited from the top to the bottom, that is, he can directly receive the strategic intentions of the leader and lead the grass-roots officers and men into battle. In fact, it is precisely because the poet artistically chose the position of "general" that the essential power of historical development is better revealed.
In the first song of "Under the Moon", he wrote about the general's arrogance of four days and four nights to deploy the great battle and the walk under the moon by the river, his mental state before the decisive battle and the emotional exchange between the soul under the moon and the heavens and the earth, and his scene, reading it today, can still strongly feel the blood, intellect, texture, and romantic soul of the senior generals of the people's army, and the "general" in his lyrics is full of flesh and blood soul, and the spiritual style can be felt, and the greed and selfishness of the Kuomintang generals form a contrast between heaven and man and dwarf. It's still impressive to think about.
In the second song, "In the Mist", the front writes about the battle and the sudden change of the situation and the sacrifice of the guards, and the dots and lines are readily available. The poem jumps and jumps freely. In particular, the silent remembrance of the sacrifice of the guards and the subsequent mourning more deeply expresses the touching and profound details of the big history, showing the pain of the bloody sacrifice at the lowest level in the heart of the general...
The third song of "Before the Wind", written at the critical moment of the great war, the general was ordered to be transferred, and the troops marched according to the established goals and completed the combat tasks excellently without the command of the "marshal". We know that this kind of temporary mobilization is commonplace in war, but the poet has begun to create from it, which can be seen that the poet's ingenious creation also shows that the poet's profound understanding of the people's army has completely coincided with the truth of history, and the poet's expression has realized the objective expression of the historical logic of the victory of the two people's wars. The creation of such a grandiose work requires an understanding of history, an understanding of the revolution, and a skillful mastery of the art of poetry creation.
In my opinion, this legacy left to us by Mr. Guo Xiaochuan, looking at today's poetry world, I think we have inherited too little and too little, and it can even be said that it is "pitifully small". We are ashamed of 20th century China, the blood boiling a hundred years have passed, to the 21st century Chinese poets have not written an epic that can be matched, and the old Ba looked at the Western countries to give you this award and that award, don't you feel ashamed?
In my opinion, contemporary poetry is empty and lofty. In the aesthetic creation of the most important content of the Chinese spiritual civilization, such as the Chinese revolution and the history of the Chinese revolution, there have been few achievements and no achievements, and it can be said that the poet is seriously absent. This is a major dereliction of duty in guiding and expounding the poetry theory, a serious disrespect and failure of Guo Xiaochuan and other great poets, and even more a disregard for the pioneering, promoting and creators of the revolution of China's century-old historical changes! Chinese, starting from the generation of our grandparents, we entered the Xinhai Revolution, the May Fourth Movement, the First and Second Civil Revolutionary Wars, and the subsequent War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the War of Liberation of the Whole China... The expression of historical inevitability and the rich content of human nature in the middle seem to me that time and space are magnificent, the heavens and the earth are infinite, and the virgin land that needs to be developed everywhere is urgently needed. This is the tough earth, the earth that the epic contains. We learn the most advanced forms of artistic expression in the world, not for the sake of learning, but for a broader and deeper understanding of the expression of our nation and the spiritual world of our nation, if we lose this ability to understand and express, blindly follow the back of other people's butts, perhaps with the talent of root birth, we can write something inexplicable, but that does not belong to China, does not belong to the Chinese nation. Of course, according to the "four unlikes", it is impossible to write something that belongs to the world. I would like to take this opportunity to state that Guo Xiaochuan's legacy, the legacy of Guo Moruo, Wen Yiduo, Guang Weiran, Ai Qing, He Jingzhi, Gong Liu, Bai Hua, Tian Jian, Ruan Zhangjing, Li Ji, Wen Jie and other predecessors, has not yet been truly inherited by us, and the aesthetic creation of the Chinese revolution and the history of the Chinese revolution is still scarce. Talented poets, Chinese is the world's richest, most fluent, most beautiful language, she has three thousand years of ancient Chinese classics and fifty-six different national language resources, colorful, enchanting, with the ability to express all the broad and profound content, and the history of the Chinese nation, which is suffering deeply, is looking forward to a new generation of responsible poets to create, epic in front, let us open up and struggle together.