Mountain South and Water North-Introduction to the Works

Han Shaogong (1953-), male, Han nationality, pen name Shaogong, Gonggong, etc. People from Changsha, Hunan. 1968 After graduating from junior high school, he was sent to the countryside of Miluo County, Hunan Province to jump the queue. From 65438 to 0974, he was transferred to the county cultural center and began to publish his works. Ren is a biography with rich historical materials (cooperating with Gan). 1978 was admitted to the Chinese Department of Hunan Normal University. 1979 joined the Chinese Writers Association and published the short story "Moon Orchid" (People's Literature 1979 in April), which made a name for itself in the literary world. 1982 After graduation, I worked as an editor in Master magazine of Hunan Provincial Federation of Trade Unions. 1984 Hunan Branch of Mediation Association is engaged in professional creation. After arriving in Hainan from 65438 to 0988, he began to edit Hainan Documentary magazine. 1990 Vice Chairman and Chairman of Hainan Writers Association. From 65438 to 0996, he planned the literati magazine Tianya with his colleagues and served as the magazine president. In the mid-1980s, he stirred up a banner in China's cultural root-seeking trend of thought and wrote the famous literary theory "The Root of Literature", which, together with "Daddy Daddy", was regarded as the masterpiece of root-seeking novels, and caused a sensation in the literary world in the 1990s because of the book "Maqiao Dictionary". He has published a collection of novels such as Moon Orchid, Flying over the Blue Sky, Temptation, Empty City and Murder. Some of his works have been translated into English, French and Italian. He won the National Excellent Short Story Award and the Best Book Award in Taiwan Province Province, and was awarded the "Knight Medal of French Literature and Art" by the French Ministry of Culture in 2002.

He has published a collection of short stories, such as Moon Orchid, Flying over the Blue Sky, Temptation and Literary Theory, which are geared to the mysterious and open world. 1996 published the novel Maqiao Dictionary (Writers Publishing House), which caused controversy among all parties. Reflection and criticism of traditional cultural psychology is a basic theme of his creation. His "Looking at the West Grass" and "Flying over the Blue Sky" won 1980 and 198 1 National Excellent Short Story Awards respectively. He is the main advocate of 1985 "root-seeking literature", published "the root of literature" (writer, No.4, 1985) and put forward the slogan of "root-seeking", and practiced this idea with his own creation. Well-known are father, father, daughter, daughter and so on. It shows the trend of drawing strength from the national history and culture, which is full of profound philosophical implications and has a great influence on the literary world.

In the view of a group of "root-seeking literature" advocates represented by Han Shaogong, China's traditional culture can be divided into "normative" and "non-normative". They think that what needs to be affirmed and carried forward in traditional culture is more "non-standardization", which exists in unofficial history, legends, border customs, Taoist thoughts and Zen philosophy, just as Acheng described in the series of Three Kings. However, the institutionalized "normative" culture with Confucianism as the core holds the attitude of rejection, negation and criticism. Compared with the Three Kings series' obsession with the essence of traditional culture, Daddy Daddy and Daughter Country, with a strong sense of "seeking roots", explored the restriction of cultural norms on free life, tortured the degenerate form of human life and human civilization from the origin to the end in the "normative" state, discovered the inertia and stubborn national inferiority in human nature, and also completed a criticism of traditional culture.

Han Shaogong's novella "Daddy Daddy" describes the historical changes of a primitive tribe-Jitouzhai by means of symbols and fables, showing a closed, stagnant, ignorant and backward national cultural form. The work takes the idiot Bingzai as the protagonist. Through his description, he outlined some abnormal and morbid ways of thinking about traditional culture, and expressed the writer's profound reflection and criticism on traditional culture. Bingzai is a little old man who "grows up before he gets old". He looks weird and wretched, and he can only say two words repeatedly: "dad" and "mother x" However, such a figure who is irrational, unclear in language and confused in thinking is worshipped by all the villagers in Jitouzhai, and is regarded as a divination of Yin and Yang, and is regarded as "xianggong", "xianggong" and "immortal". Therefore, soldiers who lack normal thinking show the morbid mental symptoms of villagers' ignorance and irrationality. After the war between Jitouzhai and Jiweizhai, most men died, but the soldiers survived stubbornly. This image, which will never grow up, symbolizes the stubbornness, ugliness and irrationality of life. His two prophetic phrases not only contain the most primitive and basic forms of the creation and continuation of human life, but also have the mysterious significance that individual life is closely related to traditional culture. At the same time, it implies the eternal "binary opposition" way of thinking that has long influenced and restricted the progress of human civilization in traditional culture.

Han Shaogong dissected the ancient, closed and almost primitive cultural inertia through Daddy Daddy, which obviously showed a negative and critical attitude towards traditional culture. Han Shaogong is basically a realistic writer. However, due to his admiration for the witch culture of Chu and the romantic tradition of Lisao, while examining the national inferiority with a strong sense of hardship, he revived the mysterious mythological meaning in Chu culture with artistic means such as fables and symbols, which painted the text with a romantic and mysterious color and left people with endless aftertaste and thinking. As we said, "root-seeking novels" mostly adopt a seemingly traditional and realistic narrative style, but "Daddy Daddy" adopts an absurd "fable style", which may be an exception. Dad He has shaved his head for decades and is a famous barber. Unfortunately, there are fewer and fewer people in the village, including many people who have gone to work, many people have moved to the mountains, and many people have been buried. After all, it's getting harder and harder to make a living-he said that at least 900 heads are enough to ensure his basic income. This is not the head with red hair or green hair. Dad He didn't want to follow the fashion, saying that young people should dye their hair in colorful colors. Dogs are not like dogs and cats are not like cats, but they are still individuals. It's not that he won't die, but that he won't. What the master didn't teach him, he will never do it. As a result, many young people came to the store and found that baking oil and dyeing hair here was not good, let alone negative ions and explosions, so they went to town. His father's business is getting colder every day. When I went to see him for a haircut, I searched several rooms and found him sleeping on a bamboo bed.

"Today is the eighth day, I guess you will come." He opened the oven door cheerfully, poured a pot of hot water cheerfully, and entered the first procedure with great fanfare: washing face and shampoo.

"My head is to be taken abroad, so you should pay attention to shaving." I reminded him.

"Rest assured, rest assured! Jane is going to the United Arab Emirates to cook, isn't she going abroad? I also shaved him. "

After washing my face, I found that the power was out. But it doesn't matter, his old scissors and razors don't use electricity-this reminds him of his dissatisfaction and disdain for the new hairdressing: do you think they shave their heads by people or electricity? I can only operate an electric scissors and a drum blower. I will leave school in two months, and then I will open a shop. Is that a haircut? What's even more funny is that women are also shaving workers now, pulling the male skull plate away. Play ball without playing ball, mix noodles without mixing noodles. What a scandal! A man's head and a woman's waist can only be seen, not scratched. Don't you remember the old saying?

I laughed at him as an old-fashioned boss and advised him not to be too defensive about men and women.

Ok, ok, even if a man's skull is not expensive, a woman can scratch it at will, but a haircut doesn't need a razor. What is it like? He plausibly said that the key to shaving is shaving, not a knife. Why did the barber worship Guan Di before? Just because the general's time was spent on a knife, he went through five levels, beheaded six generals, killed Yan Liang, fined Wen Chou, and took the head of the general in the army of hosts. If you don't have this knife in your hand, you have at least one. You can't shave your head, and 36 kinds of knives are useless.

I know about his miniature dragon crescent moon blade. One is "Guan Gong dragging a knife": the back of the knife is scraped behind the customer's neck for a long time, which makes people enjoy it. The second is "Zhang Fei drumming": the knife edge pops up a bunch of flowers on the back neck of the customer, which also makes the customer particularly comfortable. "Shuanglong coming out of the water" is also one of the knife methods, which means that the blade is lightly cut on both sides of the customer's nose. "stealing peaches in the middle of the month" is of course another knife method, which means that the blade is gently scraped on the customer's eyelids. As for "where to explore the sea", it is necessary: the tip of the knife carefully strokes in the customer's ear nest as if there is nothing. If you leave, you can not only clean your hair and remove dirt, but also make people feel itchy and refreshing. The whole ear is fresh and open, and the whole face and body are affected by it, attracting winds from all directions. When the qi pulse runs through and the essence and blood surge, the user sneezes and spits out turbid qi in the internal organs when the razor is calmly retracted.

Master He swallows the moon with a dragon in his hand, reading countless people's heads, operating, closing knives, qing dao and throwing knives, all of which are coordinated by two or three fingers of the wrist, and produce dazzling flowers. The knife can be turned outwards at any angle and can deal with any complicated parts. Invincible up and down, left and right, invincible inside and outside. Sometimes it can even go into battle with its eyes closed, regardless of the corner of its eye.

He only charges three yuan for a set of classical skills. Although cheap and classic, his customers are getting fewer and fewer. Sometimes, he can only sleep all day, and at the end of the day, he can't wait for his head, so he has to wave the smiling vagrant to come in and talk to him, or hand over his head to provide free service. But he would never bake oil and dye his hair. He would rather lose Maicheng than surrender to Wei.

Probably he slept too much during the day and couldn't sleep at night. He often takes Hanako to his neighbor's house to watch TV or visit his old friends. From Li Bai's "A gleam at the foot of the bed" to Bai Juyi's "There is no end to this sorrow", he can recite many ancient poems in the heyday of poetry.

Sanming's father has only one hairstyle in his life, that is, shaving his head. Master He shaved it every time, and it was white and shiny, so it was the most familiar, kind and loyal head that Master He had cut for many years. Although he doesn't know a few words, Sanming's father is also the best listener of his poems. For a while, Sanming's father didn't send his hair for a long time, so he let his father count the days and became suspicious. He climbed over two ridges to visit his old friend, and found him in bed for a long time, in poor health and dying.

He went home with tears in his eyes, took his clothes and shaved the other person's head, including all his unique skills. Sanming's father, lying half-lying, breathed a long sigh of comfort: "It's better to be a thief and a son of a bitch." Brother, I've been grasping at mud and holding soil all my life, suffering from my feet, my hands and my stomach. Accompany you, that is, the skull has not suffered. My skull, afterlife ... is still yours. "

He Dad said with tears, "Don't worry, don't worry."

With a smile on his bare face, he slowly closed his eyelids as if he were asleep.

Father He Zhangfei beat the drum again: the knife edge bounced on the bright scalp, and a string of flowers popped up, from strong to weak, and the lingering sound curled up, which was the last process. He saw Sanming's father's eyelids jump gently.

That must be the last happiness of life. Before reading this book, I thought of the English writer Thoreau. After all, his Walden is so famous. But when I finished reading this book, I knew that my estimate was biased. Compared with Thoreau's logging, building houses, planting crops, reading and writing in Walden Lake, Han Shaogong lacks Thoreau's complete simplicity and tranquility. After all, modernization has hardly allowed Thoreau's unique lifestyle. In my opinion, Shan Jutu by Han Shaogong is more like a writer finding a quiet villa in beautiful scenery. This mountain residence does not exclude all urban and modern lifestyles, so this mountain residence seems suspicious to me. Let's take a look at the modern life revealed by Han Shaogong's works: brick houses, refrigerators, cars, newspapers, internet, satellite TV … and what is the essential difference between this life and the city he hates. I don't hate our writers living such a life in the mountain village. I just want to ask a question first, that is, this lifestyle and attitude is a kind of enjoyment for every China writer and even China people, so there is no need to have a profound moral promotion in thought first, because writers are not like Thoreau and Tao Yuanming to change the countryside or go back to the countryside to be civilians and seek spiritual freedom in a simple life.

Besides, not everyone can have such a villa-style writer apartment in such a beautiful environment like a writer. It seems to me that Han Shaogong, in a sense, played the role of a retired scholar in China tradition, building a house, making friends, reading poetry and books, doing charity, building roads and bridges, writing inscriptions, and maintaining peace on one side.

Han Shaogong was an educated youth and a farmer for six years, so he had deep feelings for the countryside, but he never really became a farmer. When he became an educated youth, he longed to return to the embrace of the city. As he said in the "Back to the Past" section of this book, "We middle school students who are wet behind the ears are ashamed to complain about the hardships in the countryside and the depression of youth, but they are willing to exaggerate their historical responsibilities", so he finally "escaped"; Now when the hustle and bustle of city life makes him feel bored, returning to the quiet rural life naturally becomes a wonderful enjoyment.

I'm not criticizing a writer. In fact, Han Shaogong's choice only represents a person's choice when growing up in modern society. You yearn for the country but you can't live without the city. You are eager for a high-spirited and fast pace, but you are also full of longing for inner peace. Therefore, for writers, the countryside described by Han Shaogong can only be an other. His eyes are on the beauty, magic and nature of the rural landscape, the self-sufficiency of China's folk survival, and the simplicity, simplicity, humor and even some harmless cleverness and sophistication that rural people are born with. I especially noticed that writers used a lot of pen and ink to describe the philosophical and comfortable life of rural people, and the unique folk wisdom of farmers in China praised these writers.

Suddenly, I feel that the writer's pen seems to be China's modern pastoral, and it is the Peach Blossom Garden written by contemporary China. I feel surprised when I read a book. Do we really need to find a new civilization or culture in this life?

When I was reading this book, it happened that my father called me from my hometown. He told me that vegetables are very cheap this year. Broccoli, which is very expensive in hotels, is only a dime a catty in rural areas. Father sighed helplessly. This is a sigh peculiar to farmers in China. It was a half-year harvest. That day, my father sold 1000 Jin of vegetables a day, only one hundred yuan.

I am the son of a farmer and have lived in the countryside for nearly twenty years. I know what kind of mood this is. I still have a book, I am a farmer's son, edited by scholar Lin Xianzhi (Huacheng Press, June 5438+ 10). Most of these writers are writers, journalists or scholars of all sizes. They are all living in the city now, but their visit to the countryside and farmers in China is another kind of scenery. To tell the truth, this kind of scenery is the same as my real experience.

What impressed me the most was the article "Mourning" written by a writer named Chaoyang about rural funeral description. The extravagant scenes and false, festive and even numb peasant feelings make the author sigh the life of an ordinary peasant. The writer, who grew up in the rural area of Guanzhong in northern China, said in his article: "I despise all people who regard the countryside as an idyllic place. They can't understand the pain and pressure that labor brings to their bodies. The whole Guanzhong Plain, the whole land of China, I don't know how many farmers like my mother and grandmother live. They call life suffering and farmers suffering. Look carefully at those who suffer. Almost all their waists are bent down, and almost all their legs are bowlegged. They tell you that labor can make people disabled, they tell you that labor is a kind of suffering, and they tell you that labor is not beautiful. Labor has made my grandparents so ugly! " In fact, the living conditions of the whole farmers are deeply immersed in an environment. What kind of atmosphere can you feel in such an environment? If you don't really go to them, I think you might take their wry smile as humor and philosophy.

Not long ago, my mother told me on the phone that a canal built in the village a few years ago was buried. As far as I can remember, this canal, which has consumed a lot of manpower and material resources, has not played much role since its completion, because the failure of design and planning has made it barren. Even in this deep canal, he crushed one of my childhood partners to death with a brick. Now it's finally back on the ground. Mother hid a kind of excitement on the phone. And I can only say that this is also a way and a side of rural life.

I dare not criticize Mr. Han Shaogong's writing style. He writes well, but I feel there is a distance. Although he is a respected writer, I also read in this book many things he has done for farmers in Baxidong, such as building roads, helping lonely old people and trying to help the poor. But I always feel that reading these words is like listening to a person telling you about his achievements in the countryside, his planting, his breeding, his approachability and his local heart. Here, in fact, what I want to say most is that if a person who has never been to the countryside and has never really experienced rural life sees such words, what envy it must be. I have heard people in the city say to me more than once: Now that farmers have a good life, they can work whenever they want, and there is no need to worry about being laid off. The air in the country is very good. I thought at that time, if you were a farmer, you wouldn't say so.

As I read more and more such notes and prose novels about the countryside, what I want to say most is that you can only see the color of the countryside if you really blend in. I believe that the country in the country notes must be colorful and complicated, otherwise you have no right to tell. In his prose, Mr. Han Shaogong emphasized many times that the modernization in the city alienated people, so the countryside became their escape and cultivation. But I need to point out that China's rural areas have not yet entered the basic modernization, and to some extent, they have not got rid of the satisfaction of basic needs. So do we also appreciate this state with our eyes and style? The author has never doubted the farming civilization, let alone grandstanding to please and cater to readers. On the contrary, he used his own voice to see through the modern countryside and mercilessly exposed the hypocrisy of the city. He is worried that one day the countryside will no longer exist, and everyone will sit in the puzzled office and find no place to listen to nature. He once said, "If I ever protested, I only protested against a linearly progressive view of history and a superficial sense of superiority of modern people. They believe that the progress of technology is an upgrade of happiness, but the facts can never prove this ... If human beings are promising, they should carry forward the good things in various civilizations such as industrial civilization and agricultural civilization, and avoid the dross in various civilized heritages as much as possible. "

In terms of language, "Mountain South and Water North" reproduces the characteristics of "Wangxi Caotang" in those years, which is beautiful and simple, almost painting, and profoundly shows the author's ability to control words. As described in "Carnival under the Moon", "If at night, under the dim moonlight, the younger generation takes off their clothes and enjoys the cool naked, their legs are surprisingly comfortable and open, and a few pieces of white meat are looming, making unhappy people happy and those who don't wave are also waving, and the art of heaven is intoxicating."

In a word, Shannan Shuibei is the author's temperament work.