February 3, 2019 is the 120th anniversary of Lao She’s birth. Lao She's life can be summarized in a few fragments: a declining nobleman, studying hard to become famous, a literary fighter, entering the temple, and committing suicide by jumping into the lake. Since the founding of New China, Lao She has been respected as a master-level modern writer. In the popular textbooks of modern Chinese literature history, he and Lu Xun, Guo Moruo, Mao Dun , Ba Jin , and Cao Yu were commonly known as "Lu, Guo, Mao, Ba, Lao, and Cao", and had achieved the "classic" ranking in the cultural order very early.
There are countless researches on Lao She nowadays, with a lot of information and rich angles. In addition to the charm of his literature and language itself, through Lao She's writing care and life evolution, we can also see the entangled relationship between literary and artistic figures and great history in the last century. Lao She's death became one of the mythological narratives of the fate of intellectuals in the 1980s.
In the dazzling research of Lao She, there is a very "sensible" book called "Lao She and His Works". This book is very willful. The author says that regardless of analysis or comments, "is completely my personal subjective view", "ignoring other people's opinions", "making arguments based on personal likes and dislikes, and ignoring the 'ideology' nature'." However, the talent of the book is indifferent and has a lot of charm.
"Lao She and His Works", author: Hu Jinquan, version: Houlang丨Beijing United Publishing Company, October 2018
"Search Madness" fans wrote Lao She: "Beijing Coward"
Anyone who is familiar with Hu Jinquan knows that he is known as the "literary martial arts master". When making movies, he is very particular about the scenes and historical details, and is known as "Search Madness". In 1949, Hu Jinquan went to Hong Kong and accidentally worked as an actor, screenwriter and assistant director at Shaw Brothers. In the 1970s, he saw that the articles about Lao She in Hong Kong newspapers and magazines were full of mistakes and was unable to complain, so he started writing Lao She at the instigation of his friends.
Hu Jinquan, director and screenwriter of Hong Kong film in China. He is known as a master of literati and martial arts films. He studied very hard throughout his life and loved studying "History of Ming Dynasty". Most of the films are set in the Ming Dynasty.
Hu Jinquan, born in Peking in 1930s, is Lao She’s fellow villager and a little fan of Lao She. This "textual research madman" collected materials from all over the world and went to the London Oriental Library, the Modern China Library of Stanford University, and the Harvard Yanjing Library. The final nine articles were written and serialized in the "Ming Pao Monthly". In 1977, the single version of "Lao She and His Works" was published in Hong Kong. However, the simplified version of this old book was not reprinted by Houlang and Beijing United Publishing House until 2018.
Old version of "Lao She and His Works"
Hong Kong "Ming Pao Monthly"
Hu Jinquan's "Lao She and His Works" can be read soon, but after reading it, I feel like I can't put it down. Fans write about Lao She, full of love, but they are very unpolite. It is very interesting to be sarcastic when sarcastic, accurate, ruthless and fun - he wrote Lao She in Lao She's tone and told the truth.
As soon as Hu Jinquan came up, he first damaged the soul of Lao She researchers and revealed his guy:
Lao She's works are closest to the hard-working masses in Beijing, and bean juice is the food of the hard-working masses in Beijing (many rich Beijingers don't drink it). According to my theory: Only by being able to drink soy sauce can you appreciate the fun in Lao She's works. This can only be understood, but not expressed in words. Those who are interested in studying Lao She might as well practice drinking "bean juice" first.
I have read a lot of articles about Lao She. I always feel like I'm scratching my head, and there are few that "sight to the point". Of course, some people have indeed put in a lot of effort... The information is quite rich, but they are too focused on "doing research" and do not describe the spirit of Lao She's works. Just like criticizing an ink painting, it only analyzes its paper quality, pen use, ink use, teacher, and school, without experiencing its charm.
From novels to crosstalk, I have read more than 400 articles about Lao She's Hu Jinquan is true love and the natural "old Beijing qualification". He and Lao She have a "common language": "This does not mean that I can speak 'Beijing dialect', but that I can understand the charm of Beijing dialect, understand its humor, and understand its 'mouse'."Yang Zao commented on "Lao She and His Works" and said, "For a great writer like Lao She, it is actually not difficult to write him in complexity, but the difficulty lies in writing him in simplicity." He valued the most the "difference in position" and "synchronism" between Hu Jinquan and Lao She - they were 33 years apart, and the younger generation Hu Jinquan also experienced the era of the Republic of China, so while commenting on Lao She's career, he cited current affairs as a comparison.
Lao She, original name Shu Qingchun , is a modern Chinese novelist, writer, language master, people's artist, the first writer in New China to win the title of "People's Artist". His representative works include "Camel Xiangzi", "Four Generations in the Family", and the script "Teahouse".
Hu Jinquan "black" Lao She is a "Beijing coward". What is the "Beijing Coward"? Duty, cowardly, and have a sense of justice, but are good at being petty, selfish and face-saving; work hard and complacent, but have no enterprising spirit; have no amazing achievements, but they don’t do much evil. Hu Jinquan said that rebellion and revolution in history have no share as Beijingers. To be honest, it is actually "cultivated" but in fact it is a lack of prospects - this is simply "the character ceiling of Beijingers." In Hu Jinquan's words, Lao She is outstanding among the "cowards".
Lao She likes to cry and is poor. His letter to his friend wrote his experience working in the "Writing Association": "I am poor and busy, and I have no salary to say...", but he also said, "I am so poor that I am energetic." When Hu Jinquan was doing research, he found that Lao She's self-reported information was not very reliable (for example, he was not that poor). There were memory errors and negligence, as well as intentional exaggeration, excessive humility and insincere words. He also pointed out mercilessly about his creative flaws, such as "no poetic talent"; he said that he mixed crosstalk, drum lyrics and Peking opera into his novels, which was fun; but once he created crosstalk, drum lyrics and Peking opera, he failed; he also said that the letter of manifesto he initiated to Liang Shiqiu was too long to drag and complained that "the combative articles must be the master of Shaoxing, and the Beijing cowards cannot do it."
Hu Jinquan knew that Lao She's "literary talent" was the process of seeking knowledge that determined his later writing skills and form. Lao She learned from private schools, primary schools, middle schools and normal schools, and received about seven and a half years of formal education. Since then, he has gained knowledge entirely by self-study. He worked hard on old learning, which laid the foundation for him to become a Chinese teacher in the future and had a great influence on his later writing. Old novels and popular reading materials are the sources of knowledge that Lao She drew, such as "Tang Dynasty Novels", "Scholars", " Water Margin ", "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", "Dream of the Red Chamber", "Jin Ping Mei", "Crying and Laughtering", "Three Swordsman", etc., and some public case novels. In addition, Lao She, the "standard Beijing Little Citizen", is familiar with Peking Opera, drums, crosstalk, storytelling, single strings, etc. These local folk arts also had a great influence on his writing style. Lao She's works skillfully use writing skills, half-text and half-white genre, and playful and clever arrangements between the words and sentences were all the foundations they built at that time.
The history of a writer's cultivation has to live some ridiculous days
Lao She wrote an article called "Habits", which narrates no ideology or theory that can never make him believe it. Sometimes an article, a movie, or a conversation with a friend can change his entire mind. However, living habits are not easy to change: such as smoking, drinking and planting flowers. The elegant and fondness of intellectuals are all included in Lao She's experience of being born, studying, writing, traveling abroad, returning to China to teach, and presiding over the "Literary Association" during the War of Resistance Against Japan. There are many interesting things here. For example, when he was a "half-year-old child" at the age of 17, he became the principal of the primary school. Later, he was promoted to "little education official". At the age of 27, he went to the UK to "drift" for a few years. He also went to Nanyang for inspection. He once wanted to write stories like "the history of the struggle of overseas Chinese". Hu Jinquan maintained an interesting observation distance and looked at the history of a writer's cultivation.
21 years old, when Lao She was a "little education official" in the Beiyang government, he became a student of the Beijiao School Affairs Bureau of Beijing, and his monthly "regular salary" was 200. This is considered a "nova" compared to when he was the principal of an elementary school. Although his position is low, he is an "official" and has seen many bizarre phenomena.
The Academic Affairs Bureau is idle in "business" and the decadent young old she drank all day long, played cards all night long, listened to operas, learned operas, sniffed his voice, and went to a juggling garden... Sometimes she got drunk and "returned after drinking", and gave the wallet and handkerchief to the coachman. As usual, I participated in boring social engagements and learned to smoke, drink, and play mahjong. Although he doesn't prostitute, he also "tasizes forbidden fruit" as he said - "contacts" women. But a year later, I quit this job. This experience later became the material for writing " Lao Zhang's Philosophy ", and it was "Lao Zhang" that made Lao She famous.
Later, Lao She stayed in the UK for five years. He worked as a Chinese lecturer at the Oriental College of London, and also took the opportunity to learn English and see the world. At that time, going abroad was a trend, and his old acquaintance, Xu Dishan, was also studying in Oxford at that time. His circle of friends includes old overseas Chinese, international students, scholars, businessmen, and staff from the Chinese Embassy in the UK. In addition to the origin of the Beijing-level bannerman, Lao She's humor is also inspired by the British humor tradition.
When I first arrived in London, Lao She lived at the house of two old girls. One of the two old girls was sick, and the other supported and cared for the sick for several years. Lao She admired their "independence spirit" and wrote that this was "forced by the capitalist social system." When Hu Jinquan wrote this, he quickly corrected the bias of Lao She, a Chinese from the agricultural society, about the understanding of people in industrial society: "In fact, he does not understand that the so-called 'independent spirit' is an inevitable product of industrial society. Only in agricultural society can we take care of each other and rely on each other due to blood ties; among the clans, promotion and involvement often lead to 'one person's enlightenment, and chickens and dogs ascend to heaven'."
Hu Jinquan has a lot of comments on Lao She's thinking. For example, when encountering young workers who claim to be socialists often unemployed, as well as old doctors who are semi-unemployed in studying in China and the West, Lao She felt that this reflects how serious the situation of unemployment and non-studying are under the capitalist system. Hu Jinquan commented: Actually, he doesn’t know that this problem is difficult to solve in any "political" society. The UK is fine.
Lao She was "drifting" in a foreign country and missed home. The so-called "home" is everything in the country. Later, he went to Qilu University to teach. When he was a professor in Jinan, he spent a comfortable and productive life. He became a "star professor" on the campus and later had a passionate relationship with Feng Yuxiang for "Tashan Lecture".
Qilu University is a university run by an American church. It is said that once the Ministry of Education sent someone to inspect and Lao She was giving a lecture. The special envoy was impressed and sat in the back of the classroom to teach a class with the students. However, Lao She's super performative nature also caused him to lose his teaching position as "Qilu". In the summer of 1934, he talked about folk music in class, and became more and more excited as he talked. To give an example, he climbed onto the table to perform a "big drum". The foreign principal happened to pass by and was shocked. He felt that this "acromatism teaching method" was too unconventional, and he was criticized. Lao She felt embarrassed, so he handed out his resignation. However, although Lao She is very "funny", he teaches very seriously. The middleman with a position of about
, the scattered and sincere patriot
1931 to 1937, was the most prosperous period for Lao She's life. He has published more than 150 articles in six years. At that time, the turbulent current situation, complex literary and artistic thoughts and living environment all affected his writing mood.
After the separation of the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, the "left and right" geniuses also fought. In the literary and artistic circles, Left League, Lin Group ( Lin Yutang ), nationalist literary and artistic publications, centrists, crescents, and retro schools each have their own opinions, but the actual situation is more complicated than these categories and cannot be explained clearly in just a few words.
Lao She was a "who was well-known and popular" writer at that time, but she did not belong to any faction. Instead, it has become the target of all forces. He had no position, so his articles were recorded in the publications on both sides. Speaking of which, although Lao She did not participate in the literary and artistic debate at that time, the "literary and artistic thoughts in the 1930s" had a great influence on him, and they were later reflected in his works.
From the Northern Expedition to the War of Resistance Against Japan was a turbulent era and a climax of literature and art. The number of literary and artistic publications in the country suddenly increased a lot.Due to the need for "supply and demand", Lao She's writing "vigorously increases production", and the "quality" is worse, which is equivalent to starting from retail quality and wholesale "licensed goods". Good people have their own last resort: due to feelings, socializing with friends and increasing income. At that time, Lao She wrote many "perfunctory errands" articles, "I feel very sorry for literature and art." And being a teacher’s “chalk” career also made him tired because education and writing conflicted in time. In 1933, he also suffered from back disease. Although he resigned for a while, he could not make a living because he sold his articles, so he returned to his chalk career.
Lao She, who was in high-mass production period, published a statement on "Cosmic Wind", titled "Kowtow". The content of the article is to beg the editor not to make an appointment again. It is very funny:
"During the War of Resistance Against Japan, I wrote many unsatisfactory things. So, last year I decided to write a very large novel to redeem the crime of shoddy production.
Friends, let me finish the badly long article in the torment of illness! A badly long article is more interesting in my opinion than writing short articles all the time! Here, I kowtow to my friend who is willing to help me thank you!"
Although the "Beijing coward" Lao She had no position, he was a well-deserved patriot, especially at that most romantic moment of nationalism. After the establishment of the "China Literary and Art Circles Anti-Enemy Association", the leadership fell on Lao She, a "scattered person". From his friendly exchanges with different camps in the literary world in the 1930s, to his rear-end war in the 1940s, Lao She was unable to fight with the left, middle and right forces, Lao She, who was both good at writing and communication, became a leader calling for unity and unity. He made two major contributions to the Arts Association, one is to promote the unity of writers, and the other is to promote popular reading materials, "Articles go to the countryside and articles join the army." This is well deserved.
The most boring writing is probably the propositional articles such as "General Affairs Report" and "Conference Report". However, Lao She can write vividly and interestingly when writing, unlike a book that is written, and it also has a lot of precious historical materials. When a group of patriotic literary youth formed the "Writer's Position Visiting Team" and the "Frontline Comfort Team" set out north and south, Lao She became the most popular figure in the "Comfort Team". Every time he went to a place, everyone shouted, "Where is Lao She, please stand up!" So he went on stage to tell everyone a joke or sing a paragraph to promote the significance of the War of Resistance. His novels and folk art are also very popular in the army.
"Lao She and His Century", author: Sun Jie, version: Shanghai Literature and Art Publishing House, January 2019
Sun Jie pointed out Lao She's own contradiction in his book "Lao She and His Century". He is a national supremacist , but he is fundamentally a "writer". He cannot tolerate literature becoming more narrow and narrow under "theoretical criticism" or being called back and forth by "policy guidance". But at the same time, for the ideal of national supremacist, he can even sacrifice literature that has a metaphor for himself for his life, and he cannot tolerate his own national supremacist being unreasonable mockery. The "Eight 23" fight is probably such a situation that pushes Lao She into the boundless abyss of despair. However, Hu Jinquan's account in the book "Lao She and His Works" does not yet involve the 1960s when Lao She died, and the reason is unknown today.
Author: Dong Muzi
Editor: Xu Yuedong Proofreader: Liu Baoqing
