Chapter 3 Lin Shaohua: For Broken Eggs

"Between a high, solid wall and an egg that breaks against it ,I will always stand on the side of the egg." often ni egg no side ni stand ちます) "If there's a solid high wall and an egg that breaks against the wall, I'm always on the egg's side." This is a sentence in the speech given by Japanese writer Haruki Murakami in front of Israeli President Shimon Peres, Jerusalem Mayor Neil Barkat and more than 700 audience at the "Jerusalem Literary Prize" award ceremony on February 15 , the soul of his speech and the most important message to Israel.Needless to say, this is a metaphor for the struggle between Israel and Palestine, and the high wall alludes to Israel.But more than that, the high wall is another name for the system. "The system is supposed to protect us, and yet it sometimes kills us and makes us kill us on its own, ruthlessly, efficiently, and systematically," Murakami said.

So what does the system mean?Murakami recently accepted an exclusive interview with the well-known Japanese comprehensive magazine "Bungeishunju", talking about his trip to Jerusalem and his speech there under the title "Why I Went to Jerusalem" (see "Bunkishunju" April No).Both of these are mentioned as systems.First, "In Japan before the Second World War, the imperial system and militarism existed as a system. During that period, many people died, and many, many people were killed in some Asian countries. That is something that the Japanese must bear. I As a Japanese, the speech in Israel should start from there.” Murakami said that he never asked his father about his war experience, maybe he should have asked, but he failed to ask, and his father probably didn’t want to say it, but the war changed his life. Certainly. "Although I was born after the war, I have no direct responsibility for the war, but I have the responsibility as a person who inherits the memory. History is such a thing, and it cannot be simply erased. That is not to use the 'self-abuse historical view'" It is an irresponsible statement to deal with."

Second, Murakami believes that the system also includes fundamentalism and other factors. "When we think about the question of Palestine, the biggest problem there is the confrontation between fundamentalism and fundamentalism, Zionism and Islamic fundamentalism. ... Once people are involved in fundamentalism, they lose the softness of their souls. part, give up the effort to feel and think with their own strength, and blindly obey the principles and principles. Because it is easy to live in this way. It will not be confused or damaged. They have given their souls to the system."Murakami believes that the Aum Shinrikyo incident, that is, the Tokyo subway sarin gas case, is a typical example.During the trial, he went to the court to attend the trial, and felt that the criminals were also victims of heresy. "I feel outraged, more against the system than the individual."

It should be pointed out that the systems that Murakami regards as high walls are not limited to the two systems he mentioned in this interview.As we all know, Murakami is a thorough individualist who hates everything that restricts personal freedom - hates the uniform uniforms of Japanese primary and secondary schools, hates physical education classes that force students to do the same kind of sports, hates making employees have to pretend to be busy even if they are not busy I hate companies that look like me, I hate pretentious bureaucracies, and I hate the "everywhere Internet" capitalist system.In his view, Japan is a "closed organization" that strangles individuality and ignores freedom. Individuals can easily be "peacefully and quietly obliterated as nameless consumables" in this closed system.In a word, the wall remains.

Since the system as a high wall is still there, there must be eggs that hit the wall and break, so the novelist's duty or the reason for writing novels arises.In his speech, Murakami said: "There is only one reason why I write novels in the final analysis, which is to let the dignity of the individual soul emerge and cast light on it. Often cast light and sound the alarm, lest our soul be entangled by the system and Derogatory, that's the job of the story. I'm convinced of that." It reminded me of something he said to me in early 2003: "I've been writing for more than twenty years. I've always There is an idea that I want to be free... Even if the body is not free, I want the soul to be free—this is the idea that runs through my entire writing process."And when he had been writing for thirty years, the voice of "on the side of the egg" came from Jerusalem. "Set the soul free" and "side with the egg" are essentially the same thing.Because both are aimed at the high wall, the two arrows shoot at the high wall together.But there are also differences.The difference is that the latter has a clearer sense of social responsibility - the purpose of writing is to break eggs.To be precise, to knock down the high walls so that the eggs do not break. "If a novelist writes on the side of a high wall—for whatever reason—how much is that writer worth?"

Good question!This is probably also a problem that Murakami asked all of us, a problem that seems easy but is actually extremely difficult. Of course, the most ideal society is a society without high walls. Without high walls, there are no broken eggs.The whole society is like a huge incubator, which guarantees that every egg will have a new life hatched out of its shell - hatching freedom, hatching individuality, hatching dignity, hatching harmony.But as a practical issue, I am afraid that we still have to face this choice from time to time: which side to stand between the high wall and the egg?And the most shocking scene is undoubtedly that everyone stands on the side of the high wall, and finally everyone is reduced to broken eggs...