Chapter 67 Small world

When typhoon Andy came to visit, I was chatting in my friend's study, and the sound of wild and noisy wind and rain came through the window from time to time, and a small candle flickered in the wind, but the stronger the wind and rain outside the house, the more I felt The quietness of a friend's study, and the fragrance of books. I often think that in the vast world, everyone should have their own small world. This small world is a place where you can think, wander, rejoice, grieve, and even repent without being disturbed at all. In this way, being an independent person makes sense.Because of the small world, when the wind and rain in the great world are dark and the rooster is crowing, we can observe with a clear mind; When we return to this castle of the soul, we can find comfort in it; the wounds of the soul heal, and then we can make a better start than before.

The best place in this "Small Thousand Worlds" is undoubtedly the study room, because most people's study rooms contain countless great minds, who can come to meet us at any time, we share those glorious creations, and our secrets can still be revealed. exclusive.I think that the places where everyone has lived can express his character, especially the study room, because the study room is the most intimate place of a person, and it is also the portrayal of a person's soul. I probably spend several hours in the study every day, sometimes reading and writing, most of the time doing nothing, letting my imagination run quietly, sometimes thinking about a poem I have recited, sometimes returning to my childhood The small river in front of my house, sometimes savoring a bottle of good wine brought to me by a friend from afar, sometimes looking at the distant stars through the screen window and thinking about my previous life, almost to the point of thinking about everything, that kind of The induction is as if in a dream.

Once, when I was sitting at the desk, I saw that the wastebasket in the study room was full. There were many manuscript papers that I had ruined, and some were notes that I had already used, all of which were crumpled and thrown into the wastebasket. Later, I had completely forgotten the content. When I was going to dump the wastebasket, I had an idea, picked up the papers I had discarded one by one, laid them flat on the table, and then I saw a part of my life reappear , Some even recorded some of the deepest secrets in my heart, some thoughts that made me blush when I read them. Later, I realized the benefits of "respecting the writing and paper", threw away the wastebasket, and corrected the habit of throwing away the writing and paper in the past.

There is such a big mystery hidden in the wastebasket in the study room, and the world on the bookshelf shows how vast the world is. On the night of Typhoon Andy’s visit, I chatted at my friend’s house until late at night before returning home. Unexpectedly, water entered my study room. The sewage with broken leaves was half a foot high. The bottom shelf of my bookshelf All the books were ruined overnight. When I saw that the rescue was impossible, I felt a tingling pain in my heart. I immediately thought of an elder: Professor Xu Jieyu in California. His house was flooded and his wife and children ran away. After going out of the house, in order to rescue the books and materials in the basement, he did not come out until his son urged him repeatedly at the gate, and then he came out of the house. At this moment, he brought the house and the books and materials he had just rescued together. Washed downhill, the body was found dozens of miles across the countryside.

Xu Qiyu had many friends during his lifetime. When I was traveling in the United States, I heard Zheng Chouyu, Deng Qingmao, Bai Xianyong, Yu Chongxin, and Jin Hengwei all talk about his death.An international famous sinologist, full of poems and books, died in a foreign land in order to save the books and materials in the basement. His hard work and his favorite study were washed away by the flood, so how sad is his mood?When you think about it this way, you can relax a little bit. I was very sad when I saw the flooding of the study room, because at the bottom of the bookshelf are a batch of books I read when I was a teenager. Although they have faded with the years, I have read them thoroughly. However, they used to accompany me when I was young, and many books still deeply affect me today; no matter where I move, I always bring these books of my youth with me, and I can’t bear to throw them away. It can quite remind me of the high-spirited days in the past, and it still has the effect of inspiring self-reflection for me now.

Among these flooded books, the earliest one was "The Sorrows of Young Werther" translated by Lu Jinhui published by Dazhong Bookstore in 1958. My elder sister bought it for five yuan. In my hands, I read this book in the first grade of junior high school. Picked up some wet books, including Schweitzer's "African Notes", Ingmar Bergman's "Weed Poison", André Gide's "Congo Notes", Adler's "Inferiority and Life", Schopenhauer's "Love and Life Distress", Tennessee William's "Birds of Youth", Huxley's "Flashing Candle", Salinger's "The Catcher in the Rye", Merrick And Pushkin's novels, as well as Aspen's posthumous manuscripts, a total of more than 500 volumes were lost.

For a book lover, the damage to a book is like a farmer's field being flooded. That feeling is not only a loss of material, but a scar of time and emotion.I squatted in the study and read the books after the catastrophe, and suddenly remembered the scene of reading these books when I was young. Books are also sentient. We can buy new books with the same content in bookstores at any time, but the mood of books can never be bought. came back. "Little Thousand Worlds" is every "Little Great Thousand", and all kinds of records are like tattoos of blood branded in my heart, which cannot be erased by wind and rain; but when I abandon my favorite books in the wind and rain, I have Daisy. The mood of burying flowers in jade, a flower is like a book, they have their own hearts, but as ordinary people, we sometimes can't understand it.

— August 11, 1982