Chapter 24 postscript

Is it a Buddhist or a philosopher who said: Life is a kind of fate. In 1994, I had several intersecting journeys with Mr. Xiangmei's life trajectory, so this biography was born. It was dusk in May, and the fragrance of gardenias was strong but not strong, clear but not weak. Chen Xiangmei and her party were invited to visit the home of President Pan Jiluan of Nanchang University.The principal told me that if you come to accompany me, you are all female compatriots and both write books, so there must be a common language.And asked me to send some books to her.Respect is worse than obedience, but I can't help but mutter in my heart, Ms. Chen is a famous figure who has been involved in American politics, connected with China and the United States, cross-strait ties, and traveled all over the world. No strain.

In the faint twilight, Chen Xiangmei got out of the car. She was wearing a silk dress with a pattern of floating white clouds on a sapphire blue background.In an instant, the swimming blue sky and white clouds also highlighted the image of Flying Tiger General Chennault on the screen of my brain.When I was creating "The Love Between Chiang Ching-kuo and Zhang Yaruo", I searched for General Flying Tiger's past. After Chennault came to China in 1937, he trained the Chinese Air Force at Nanchang Airport; in 1944, the military and civilians in southern Jiangxi built Xincheng Airport with blood and sweat, which was used as a base for the Flying Tigers, and the Flying Tigers also tried to land on the base. , just because of sudden changes in the current situation, Xincheng Airport was blown up without being used.Chen Xiangmei and Chennault can also be said to be destined to each other. Their life-and-death love, I once read "A Thousand Springs" written by Chen Xiangmei by chance. .This is the same as seeing Ms. Chen Xiangmei for the first time, and I feel that her eyes are still very clear and calm, and I think that decades of political storms have not extinguished the fire of her inner feelings?

After taking a seat, I didn't expect Principal Pan to introduce me immediately after a few opening remarks!President Pan was originally a professor at Tsinghua University, a member of the national academic department, and Jiangxi has no key universities, no academic department members, and no doctoral research sites. heart of.He is "ladies first", but I was unprepared, my eyes were flushed, and I only held the three books I had prepared, "Here Is Spring Water", "Rose Rain" and "The Love Between Jiang Jingguo and Zhang Yaruo" to Ms. Chen Xiangmei, and opened my mouth. It turned out to be: "Teacher Xiangmei, please correct me." Probably in this life, after leaving the school and entering the school, the lifelong career is destined to be a teacher. I cherish my broom, and the old 9 coins are the subconscious honorifics.Everyone in the room smiled friendly, not knowing whether to laugh at my embarrassment or my title.Principal Pan laughed loudly and said: "That's a good title. You are colleagues, and those who debuted early will be teachers. Besides, we are about to hire Ms. Chen Xiangmei as a visiting professor at Nanchang University." Teacher Xiangmei said: "Hu Xin, I know , I read your book in America." That was unexpected!My "Four Forty-Year-Old Women" was translated to the United States by teacher Zhu Hong, and it was included in "White Serenity", an anthology of short stories by Chinese female writers. This is a fact.However, after entering the mainstream life in the United States, she has the leisure to read our novels, which is unexpected.My heart warmed up. As a writer, what could be more gratifying than being noticed by others?At the same time, I also realized that Teacher Xiangmei did not cut off her literary complex!In future conversations, I asked her, what are you most proud of and comforted by?She immediately replied: She became a writer, wrote dozens of books, and always left something for the world.I believe that this comes from her heart and is not hypocritical.

The atmosphere of the dinner was very harmonious and active, and Chen Xiangmei was very familiar with adjusting the atmosphere.This is her third visit to Jiangxi. In her words, if she pays attention to the developed coastal areas, even if she is not eager for quick success, it can only be regarded as icing on the cake.Caring for the relatively closed inland areas is a timely help, and it also harvests simple sincerity. This kind of sincere feeling is really precious in today's world.In Jiangxi, she has set up the Chen Xiangmei Teaching and Learning Award in Nanchang University and Nanchang City respectively, hoping to be in education and in the younger generation.Her sincerity and persistence naturally moved us. Secretary Zhou Shaosen said, Hu Xin, please write a biography for Teacher Xiangmei.This was unexpected again, but to be honest, the first impression was quite good. Teacher Xiangmei has shown her unique charm, but writing a biography is not the short, flat and quick reportage of today, and it can be completed after the interview.

After falling asleep slightly drunk at night, the phone rang suddenly. Looking at the clock, it was already 0:30. I didn't expect it to be Teacher Xiangmei's call!She said that people who play with words are night owls, I guess you are still awake.I was ashamed in my heart, and I said yes.So we chatted for more than an hour. She talked about the past time, reviewed her life-and-death love with General Chennault, and chewed on the ups and downs of her single-handedly running the world in Washington after becoming a new widow. Gradually, I felt the blood all over me. When it gets hot, a woman's passion and persistence remain unchanged even at the age of seventy. Perhaps this is where the eternal charm and infinite charm lie.On a warm and slightly hot night in May, I listened to the legend of a woman who is far away but approaching.The idea of ​​writing a biography for her became clear. After that, I rushed to the library reference room, collecting all kinds of materials about her and Chennault.

At the end of June, I received a letter from Teacher Xiangmei from Washington, informing me that she would go to Beijing for a meeting at the invitation of the State Education Commission in mid-July, and that she had read the book I sent and said that I was "very good at writing".People probably like to listen to good things, and I am no exception.But after reading a lot of articles written by Teacher Xiangmei, I found that she and I have a common habit: we both like to quote Chinese classical poems.Some poems of the ancients are indeed at their peak.I think this is also where I hit it off with her.After I reported this letter to the principal and secretary, they supported me to go to Beijing and talk to Teacher Xiangmei again.

Teacher Xiangmei lived in the Presidential Suite of the Beijing International Hotel. From morning to night, there were many guests, but we still found time to talk three times. She wrote two pages in my diary similar to the power of attorney, and mentioned me again The writing is very good. She was very moved after reading my work. I wrote a biography for her and she is willing to cooperate.Teacher Xiangmei actually brought my book back to Meijing. She finished reading "The Love Between Jiang Jingguo and Zhang Yaruo" (Taiwan Edition), and then read "Rose Rain". She also brought "Rose Rain" with her and complained to me. Said, why is the paper so bad, the words are see through on both sides, she is dazzled.Most of her seriousness is because she wants to understand my temperament and personality and literary skills. The writing is like a person, but there is also the magic of her literary complex.One of her favorite sayings is: Knowing how to read is a blessing.

She also brought me most of her works published in Taiwan, and she talked to me about the outline of the out-of-print works.After I read it, I felt that the concatenation of the titles was the life journey of a Chinese woman, and it was also the mentality of a Chinese scholar. "Distant Dream", "The Heart of an Inch Grass", "General Chennault and China" (translation), "A Thousand Springs", "General Chennault and Me", "Chen Xiangmei Time", "Chen Xiangmei Correspondence", "How much do you know about the past", "Leave Clouds and Borrow the Moon" "I see New China"!Maternal love, marriage, struggle, and search permeate between the lines. The search of Chinese scholars is full of ups and downs.I am no stranger to this.My father, mother, and my grandparents are all Chinese scholars.Although Ms. Xiangmei was born in a wealthy eunuch family, she grew up in troubled times and shared her fate with the suffering common people. Her path was blazed step by step by herself. Her words and emotions can resonate with ordinary people.This woman is no stranger.

After I returned to Nanchang, Teacher Xiangmei sent me nearly a hundred photos.I remember Zhang Ailing said that the photos are like black and white melon seed shells, and the melon seeds have been chewed into my heart in the bitter journey of life, and what are left are pieces like melon seed shells.But I don't have this kind of desolation. I love to enjoy photos, especially those from long ago, especially those of family gatherings and dispersal.Clothes and hairstyles, appearance and demeanor, make people think about it, in a trance, the distant background is drawn closer, the dead characters are revived, and the withered events are alive, perhaps mixed with the author's subjective imagination, but Who doesn't have self-emotions pouring out of his pen?No matter how cold and objective it is, isn't the material collected from the perspective of all people full of likes and dislikes?Photographs, after all, are instant art, which must make people have artistic imagination.

However, alternate with pleasure and pleasure are hardships and pains.I found that what I was facing was a huge project!This extraordinary woman was entangled with modern Chinese history in the first half of her life, and ups and downs with contemporary American history in the second half of her life. The background is too broad and profound, and the relationship with historical figures is too intricate. It can also be said that she herself is a historical figure.I don't know, but everyone's handwriting is not good, can I control my hero's unconstrained style?This year, I don’t know how many books I have read, and the time spent on reading is much longer than the time on writing. What encouraged me to write down was a sentence: the burden is as light as it is.That was a sentence sent to me by a Kyoto critic after my debut novel "Four Forty-Year-Old Women" was published.People not only need self-confidence, but also a little self-reliance. The most reliable person is themselves.Of course, because this biography will be published in time for the 50th anniversary of the victory of the World Anti-Fascist War and the victory of the Chinese Anti-Japanese War, I have no time to go to the United States to observe Teacher Xiangmei’s field life. It must be a bit vain to write, and I will make up for it later.But I believe that I have gradually approached her and gradually understood her.

In the golden autumn of September, Teacher Xiangmei came to Jiangxi to present awards again.Before that, she went to Zhijiang, Hunan.During the War of Resistance Against Japan, Zhijiang was an important air force base in China. Chennault's 14th Air Force was stationed in Zhijiang, and Chennault participated in the command of the great defense of Zhijiang. Moreover, Zhijiang was the surrendered city after the victory of the Anti-Japanese War.From Zhijiang to Nanchang, Teacher Xiangmei was full of travel, but she was never tired, and recalled the years of the Anti-Japanese War to me very emotionally. She said that the Chinese should not forget the past disasters and humiliations, and they must be united and connected by blood. Keep our roots, only when the roots are deep can the trees flourish.The Chinese heart of Chinese women cannot be changed. This time, she asked me to stay by her side. I thought it would be good, because people are hypocritical, but when we get along day and night, it's hard to hide the real me.Besides, I respect Teacher Xiangmei, and I really like her a little bit. She is not the kind of celebrity who completely disguises herself. The itinerary is very full.After Nanchang awards, go to Ji'an to participate in the economic and trade exchange conference, and then go to Jinggangshan.I wonder how this close friend of the Jiang family would feel in the revolutionary base area back then?Originally, I was arranged in the car behind, but Teacher Xiangmei refused and came to me. In this way, I would ride in the same car with her. She said that it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to chat along the way, so why bother to talk about the specifications?I have long been able to free myself, the writer is the uncrowned king, the so-called arrangement of seats can sometimes be tricky in the writer's writing.But this time, Qianli Tongche has benefited a lot. We are free to talk about everything, but I found that the topics we talked about most were women, women's emotional world, being a daughter, being a mother, marriage and family.Many emotions may be dispensable embellishments for men, but they are the flesh and blood of a woman's world.Sometimes she smiled shyly, and sometimes shook her head sadly, saying that there is no need to write these.I said, why not write?If you are a real and complete woman. In my opinion, Teacher Xiangmei is a Chinese scholar nurtured by the wisdom of traditional Chinese culture, and a Chinese woman shaped by traditional Chinese moral norms. In the blending and collision with Western culture and Western contemporary concepts, she not only abides by the fundamentals of China, He has also absorbed the essence of the West, and Chen Xiangmei is this Chen Xiangmei. For several days in Jinggangshan, the autumn rain continued.We traveled to Longtan in the rain and visited Huangyangjie.Near Longtan, it used to be the Red Army Hospital, but now it is an all-natural tourist attraction with green bamboos, green waterfalls and splashing beads. "The sound of gunfire in the Huangyang world reported that the enemy army was fleeing at night."The heroic atmosphere of the majestic pass is still vaguely felt.Teacher Xiangmei looked up at the monument in the rain, and stood for a long time in front of the portraits of the martyrs. She said softly, "You are too young, and you are only in your early twenties." It is "the blood of the martyrs did not flow by itself".So, how should she comment on that lost history?However, in the transcript of her visit to China poems she gave me a few months later, this sentence was changed to "Who will the military strategists ask today".Does it reflect Chen Xiangmei's true heart?I searched and searched again and again, but always kept a sincerity. "The road is long and long, and I will search up and down."Don't forget that she is a girl born on the Dragon Boat Festival. She especially cherishes sincerity and yearns for returning to the original.In the ancient city and in the mountains, she gave a voluntary speech with passion.In the United States, she is a paid lecture, and the fee is not low.A middle school temporarily took her to give a speech, and the auditorium was full, and there was a sea of ​​people outside the auditorium.She said to open all the doors and let the students come in and sit on the rostrum.The theme of her speech is inseparable from the unity of the Chinese people, and the dragon must take off.Many people asked for inscriptions, and she gave them both familiar ones and unfamiliar ones. Some wrote for hours, and a light was still on in the green forest late at night, which made people feel distressed.Walking through the bluestone path and the cottages with smoke from the kitchen, the elderly and children looked at her curiously. She walked over and took pictures with the old man with her arms around the children.Looking at the mother-in-law in the mountains with broken teeth and the country cub who has changed teeth, I am happy. I think that Mrs. Xiangmei with heavy makeup must have the kind and homely atmosphere of "the world is close to each other". On the way home, she asked about my family background. I said that my father was a university professor, my mother was an educated woman, and I had six sisters, and I was the second child.She laughed loudly and said, we are really destined.She also has six sisters and is also the second child.There is no coincidence in the world without a book. She thought about it and said: We are really destined.In the world, I am afraid that there are very few biographers who have spent such a long time with the biographer day and night. I think it would not be surprising if the two were originally relatives, friends, teachers and students, but we were originally two strange women, and this is called a chance. In my vision, I don't think Teacher Xiangmei is a perfect woman, and she has more or less flaws as a woman.On the way home, the night was dark, and while chatting, she suddenly found that the police car clearing the way ahead had disappeared!As a result, the convoy stopped and searched, and after a long detour, they found the Pioneer. Her anger was serious, and the people in the police car must come over to make it clear.I find this little episode quite amusing. If Teacher Xiangmei always has a perfect image of "tolerance is great, no desire is strength", she should be a clay bodhisattva instead of a living person. In the car, she wrote me a poem: There is also a sad corner of a successful woman's heart. Is she completely open to me?I have no idea. After working hard for a whole year, this biography is finally finished.I only hope that after the reader closes the book, he will sigh: "There is someone in it, and it is ready to come out." I once expounded my views on biographical literature in the paper "Fiction Walks Through Documentary", and at the same time, it is also the day of my creative experience: A biography is a personal history of the subject.And how can personal history escape the background of big history?People are, after all, social beings.Biography is the life trajectory and electrocardiogram of the subject in the big historical picture.However, let's look at the big history first. Even the big history that is recorded in the annals of history and written in textbooks, isn't it rewritten several times in the long river of time?Moreover, the history of events may not be changed, but the history of narratives has its own narratives and is in a state of flux.We often say that things are different from people, but the actual situation is: people are not things, let alone things!The monuments and sites we visited, let alone a lot of man-made destruction and reconstruction, even if the original appearance has been painstakingly preserved, in fact, where can it escape the ruthless years?And where is it not in the midst of ever-changing?What is involved this time is not the same as before. Looking at the personal history of the hero, it is nothing more than a trace of a person in the long history, although Emerson said: "All history can easily decompose itself into the biographies of a few strong and serious people." And I I think this famous saying is too much, let’s not discuss whether history is created by heroes or the people, just think about it calmly, if there are no ants and ants, how can human beings have history or not history!Nowadays, more and more biographies are written, more and more extensive, and more and more complicated. From a certain perspective, it seems to be a display of a personal sense of history.Personal trajectories and personal stories in the larger historical background, this is biography.Of course, some of these trajectories and stories may actively influence or even write big history, and most of them may be passively restricted or even dominated by big history, but their traces have been densely left on the pages of history that have been turned over. But historians artificially think they can be ignored. Biographical literature is to display the content of personal history in the form of literature.People always highly emphasize the documentary nature of biographical literature.What is documentary?Record the truth.In ancient times, real records depended on historians, word of mouth, and pen and ink; with the development of modern media, news seems to be able to keep pace with the truth, and high-tech can even record your words, deeds, and even every frown and smile.However, historians are also the vision of a family of historians. Although news communication is multi-faceted, multi-perspective and multi-faceted, it still has its own bias. Oral transmission, pen and ink, and high technology cannot exhaust all the characters and things!Yes, inexhaustible. Biography of the master's life, whether you are a great person or a common man, in addition to dominating or following the trend of the times, personal traces are more accumulated from the memories he (she) has done and said, but he (she) )’s autobiography, diary, letters, articles, photos and other words, pictures or oral materials, etc., are they absolutely true?In addition to intentional taboos and unspeakable secrets, the protagonist is just a flesh and blood body, there will be various deviations and even fallacies due to various reasons, and the memory seems to be true and illusory!There are also expressions of inexhaustible ability and lack of meaning, etc. This is the first description of his own life by the protagonist himself, and it is actually the first rewriting.Not to mention the information provided by all kinds of people related to the protagonist, just look at the differences and even the strangeness in the description of the same person and the same event in the current continuous tense, which is enough to understand the difficulty of the documentary.If you encounter troublesome people who add oil and vinegar or even turn black and white, it will be even more novel than a novel.This is the second description and rewriting of the subject by related people.When the biographer intervenes, the so-called collection of materials, excavation of materials, and then screening of the false and the true, and the arrangement and combination of drastic and exquisite art, is the third rewriting of the life history of the biographer. The third time is the examination, absorption and deconstruction of the first time and the second time. If the autobiography of the hero is a chain of life connected by his own bleak management, then the various reviews of the people around him are all kinds of fragments , the biographer is always making futile fragments of the jigsaw puzzle, the reconstruction of the chain, trying to resurrect the past people of the past time.The biographer is always full of self-confidence, thinking that his biography can finalize the subject. However, the vast majority of smart biographers will not easily express their opinions on the biographies written by others, even if they are entrusted, it is not just out of modesty. Leave room.Generally speaking, the biographer will not object to multiple biographies. Human beings are polyhedral and changeable. If you can make yourself complicated and confusing, it is not a blessing. Who wants to see everything at a glance? Mr. Qian Zhongshu said in "Guan Zhui Bian": "When historians recount real people and facts, they always have to understand human feelings from a distance, think about the situation, put themselves in the situation, concentrate on the inside, think about it, and try to figure it out. Human relations are reasonable." Resurrecting history is a restoration of art.Reduction is the imaginary backward travel in time and space.Because of the "original" limitation, the biographer's imagination must be limited by the so-called reality, but, just because of this limitation, Fang can see a master in the limitation!Only masters can make imagination and fiction restore the long-gone truth, and the human feelings are reasonable.The literary reproduction of the big historical background and the creation and rendering of the historical atmosphere can be seen from the fictional ability of the biographer; when looking for the traces of the hero, the author uses his own cognition and perception; When it is flesh and blood, it is actually using its own life to "resurrect" him (her).It cannot be divided by simple and clear empathy, sympathy, hatred, disgust, etc.Biography is a biographer who uses his own eyes to explore other people's lives, uses his own heart to experience other people's feelings, and uses his pen to describe other people's stories. The author's artistic skills such as language and writing are too important, even more important than novels More inspiring and provocative.The ghost of the author haunts the biography. In the process of writing this biography, Teacher Xiangmei provided oral and written materials, and I also consulted relevant historical materials and works. Here, I would like to express my sincere respect and gratitude. The publication of this biography received the full support of the Writers Publishing House, especially Ms. Li Yuying, who did a lot of detailed and meticulous work, and met and talked with Teacher Xiangmei several times with me, so that this biography was successfully published.Here I would like to express my sincere respect and thanks to all of you. The leaders of Nanchang University have given selfless help to the writing of this biography, and hereby express their sincere respect and thanks.