Chapter 86 Section 4 The Space of Deep Personality Psychology: "Birth of Despair"

Zhu Sujin is different from some other military writers in that his creation has a strong tendency of personalization: since the novella "The Third Eye", he rarely writes that kind of orthodox theme theme (that is, he focuses on expressing mainstream ideology Idealism and heroism in the regulations), but try to put personal and unique feelings and emotions into military themes.In a nutshell, he developed a creative tendency to deeply explore the psychological space of personality in highly ideological military themes. The novella "Birth of Despair"[6] published in 1989 best embodies the above-mentioned creative tendency. It does not have a particularly complicated story. The basic plot line is the exploration of a soldier's spiritual world, but it contains Shocking strength, especially in the portrayal of the character's personality, it presents a magical and charming color.The main character, Meng Zhongtian, is a genius with extraordinary aspirations, as described in the work: "He has a rare fanatical desire and extremely calm wisdom. The more desperate things are, the more excited he is. He will be like Survivors are so persistently preparing for a blow, they will tear apart difficulties like a hungry animal tearing flesh and bones. Yes, he has double the wildness and double wisdom. He will never tolerate failure..." He said in the professional field The talents in Li are astonishing, and the novel repeatedly emphasizes this, such as his excellent geodesic ability and military quality when he was tested by Song Yu, the commander of the military region; and the mystery set at the beginning of the novel. In the desperate situation with few tools, he completely relied on extraordinary thinking and observation to determine his foothold on the earth.This kind of talent and behavior will never make people satisfied with the general utilitarian purpose. Meng Zhongtian has developed personal ambitions that match his superhuman talent and mental character, so he is accurate on the map. After marking his own foothold, he wrote down the following sentence: "All discoveries and conjectures begin here." It is this kind of self-confidence that is almost above everything and the passion that dares to challenge everything that makes Meng Zhong God is destined not to be satisfied with just being a mediocre professional technician, but whenever he has the opportunity, he will be in the power field of political struggle, so that his talents overflowing in life can be expanded and more practical. The place where sex is displayed.He was favored by Song Yu, who had no good intentions, and was transferred to the military region as a confidential secretary. Afterwards, he rose to the top and was about to achieve an all-powerful political career.It's a pity that he was in the Cultural Revolution. Although he was brilliant for a while, those political actions were quickly wiped out. He was reduced to a prisoner, and he could only look forward to another rise in desperation.

The content of the positive description of the work starts from here: a few years later, the narrator accidentally found out the miraculous method Meng Zhongtian used to measure his foothold before, and then the two of them got to know each other and are still in prison Meng Zhongtian then disclosed to the narrator the content of his life during the eight years of solitude.It turns out that after feeling hopeless about his own destiny, he revived his enthusiasm for geology research. He illuminated many ancient mysteries in the earth's tectonics with a rare spark of inspiration, and with his crazy imagination and incredible assumptions A "perfect" and impeccable theory of earth motion is proposed. The core driving force of the theory is exactly the despair in Meng Zhongtian's life experience and his strong will to challenge despair.The earth we live in, has become a living body with a strong will after his description. At the end of the boundless ancient time, it also experienced the painful moments of birth in despair, and gradually formed today with a huge and mysterious miraculous power. The landforms... The long statement of this scientific theory takes up one-third of the entire work, but this kind of violation of writing conventions does not make people feel uncomfortable, on the contrary it creates the most exciting part of the whole work. Paragraphs of the human heart: Facing the mysterious shape on the surface of the earth, Meng Zhongtian’s theory seems to tear off all its curtains, exposing its long-term imprisoned desires and its terrifying strength, thus What it shows is the kind of magnificent realm that embraces everything in the world and is full of infinite mystery, which is rare in contemporary Chinese literature. From this point alone, "Birth of Despair" can also be regarded as creating a unique and unique novel. artistic conception.But in the works, this theoretical statement mainly appears as a plot construction factor. Meng Zhongtian's personal desires are satisfied in the study of geosciences. With his eyesight he conquered the whole world in which he lived with his thoughts.On the one hand, it deepens the description of Meng Zhongtian's spiritual world, and at the same time clearly puts forward the spiritual value concept of "born in despair".Undoubtedly, the latter is Zhu Sujin's most exciting achievement in exploring Meng Zhongtian's deep personality psychology: People like Meng Zhongtian have such extraordinary desires and talents that they often cannot stand in the mediocre reality. That will cause them to have a destructive conflict with reality, and finally fall into a desperate situation. However, this seemingly dead end pole will not make them go to spiritual disillusionment, but will even make their vitality and creativity burst out amazingly (although probably in another aspect), so they are more able to produce behaviors that cannot be seen normally in this extraordinary state.

On the one hand, this personalized value concept shows the author's spiritual dimension that is different from ordinary people. He obviously cannot trust the quality of humanity in the state of daily existence, or in the public living space, but must seek the best of individual existence. In addition, it must be noted that the so-called "birth of despair" still communicates with the inherent spiritual brilliance of military literature to some extent.The main source of the charm of military literature lies in the necessary state of polar opposites. No matter which side the characters are in, they must face the cruel choice of life and death. The impasse formed by political constraints, the strength of human spirituality can only be truly penetrated and flashed when it conflicts with this inevitable situation.However, military literature in peacetime has gradually lacked the inevitable factor of this tragedy, and obviously lost its original spiritual brilliance in the transformation to the daily plain narrative, while "Birth of Despair" brilliantly expresses that ideology. The polar opposites of sex have been transformed into the opposition of desire and purpose at the level of individual life, and the battlefield filled with gunpowder has been transformed into a painful struggle in the heart of human beings, which makes the works release the powerful life energy inherent in military literature for a long time At the same time, it also makes the description of this kind of inner state go beyond the purely political level. It is full of deep concern for human nature and human situation, and what it provides is rooted in the personal spiritual world but has universal significance. life perception.

At the end of "Birth of Despair", Song Yu, who was reinstated as an official, once again recruited Meng Zhongtian to work beside him. Meng Zhongtian immediately gave up the study of geosciences and prepared to join the power field again with great enthusiasm. And the ruthless political ambition made the narrator feel unspeakable astonishment and regret... In fact, it is not surprising that this novel ends with this, because Meng Zhongtian's magnificent and charming spiritual strength has always been It is closely intertwined with personal desires, and this genius has also been portrayed with a devilish and ugly side. He has all kinds of bad deeds and cruel nature, all of which are similar to his in the world. are closely related to the way of desire inObviously, these contents are contrary to the extraordinary creativity of Meng Zhongtian mentioned above, and may also be the part that confuses readers the most in the novel. On the important part, Zhu Sujin wrote such a complex and contradictory character, in fact, this should also be the projection of his own confused feelings about reality in his works[7].

Notes: [1] Quoted from Dai Jinhua's "Adventures and Breakthrough--Women's Writing in the 1990s", "Literary Review" Issue 5, 1996. [2] "Women Group Poems" is included in Qu Yongming's Poetry Collection, Lijiang Publishing House, 1988 edition. [3] "Consciousness of the Night", first published in Anhui Poetry Newspaper on November 15, 1986. [4] Li Zhensheng, "Seasonal Rotation", Xuelin Publishing House, 1996 edition, p. 219. [5], first published in the mainland in the ninth issue of "Taiwan and Hong Kong Literature Selection" in 1995. [6] "Born in Despair", first published in the third issue of "Zhong Shan" in 1989. [7] For the content of this section, please refer to Chen Sihe’s dialogue “Zhu Sujin: The Sublimation of Desire and the World

Can the vulgar fetters be transcended? ", included in "Understanding the 1990s", People's Literature Science Press, 1996 edition, p. 219.