Chapter 71 Empty Terror - Can Xue and Kafka (Daiba)

sandy water Generally speaking, we learn the history of literature with the help of words (original text or translation), but to appreciate the "literature" in the history of literature, we must rely on the "heart".However, this rarely happens due to the difficulty of communicating from heart to heart.Therefore, for thousands of years, the history of literature has a completely disproportionate understanding of literature.The things created by human artists cannot be fully appreciated by all human beings even after several cycles of birth and extinction. That itself is a boundless world.In this world, the sparks of psychic impact occasionally reveal its infinity to men in the dark, and then die out.People cannot use this to see the bottom of the human heart, but they are inspired by it, knowing that there is not nothing in the dark, but there are other souls that are groping and longing like themselves. Quietly across the sky in the lonely night sky.

Therefore, in the West at the beginning of the twentieth century and the East at the end of the century, the encounter of two writers with similar artistic styles, Kafka and Can Xue, is extremely interesting and even exciting.How this could happen is hard to imagine.The backgrounds of the times, regions, cultures and thoughts of these two writers are so different, and even their genders are also different (and gender is regarded by some people as the most important factor of a writer’s characteristics today, so there is "women's literature" One theory), why do they achieve communication on the most mysterious matter of literature?Is this communication real?If people can confirm or believe this, it will show that the human spirit really has a kingdom that transcends race, national border, age, gender and individual, a high "castle", although it is unattainable, it cannot be surveyed and touched , but it actually has a realistic effect on all creatures endowed with human nature, making the most sensitive among them know what the other party is saying as soon as they open their mouths.Because they know that this kingdom or castle is not actually anywhere else, it is in everyone's heart, but most people never look inside and have no way of discovering its existence.But even if one looks and stares into the interior desperately, one cannot grasp its general outline; it is shrouded in layers of fog, which can never be approached, and can only be viewed from a distance.Even so, after all, it is possible for people to recognize its existence, and devote their greatest efforts, even their whole life, to find ways to get close to it and describe it.The effort itself is a testament to its existence.

Undoubtedly, Can Xue used her sensitive artistic mind to interpret Kafka.In her works, Kafka presents a completely different appearance from what other critics have stated, and from the Kafka that we are quite familiar with and stereotyped.This Kafka is an artist in his purest form, not a moralist, a religious scientist, a psychologist, a historian and a social critic.Of course, he is somewhat like a philosopher, but this is only because pure art itself is close to philosophy.Only a pure artist can make such a long drive to another pure artist, put aside some external, superficial, and fragmentary information, and directly grasp the most important core, and show the inner form of the soul itself, because they They met in the spiritual kingdom of nothingness and darkness.Feeling is everything here, or at least comes first.The tentacles of this feeling have penetrated into the structure of reason and command it and point it in the right direction.In Can Xue's view, it is tantamount to nonsense to solve the mystery of Kafka without the resonance of the heart, or to grasp Kafka's artistic soul by standing on the periphery of the feeling aside.Everything is attempted from Kafka's origin, family, childhood and boyhood.Attempts to directly interpret Kafka's works by starting with character expression, life encounters and setbacks, social environment and the atmosphere of the times are all attempts to make ends meet.The correct direction is rather the opposite: first read the work sincerely and without prejudice, and then use those external (that is, outside the spiritual kingdom) materials to support it after reading it.What if there is no feeling?Better to give up, or wait for other, more perceptive readers and critics to lead the way.A work of genius needs a genius reader (or critic), and this is especially true of modern art.

One of the most important differences between modern art and classical art is that the artistic vision turns to the inside, to the spiritual kingdom of nothingness and darkness.Therefore, modern art can only be created and appreciated by those modern people with extremely rich inner layers and extremely complicated spiritual life.This means that the readership of modern art is narrow, and it is getting narrower.It is farther and farther away from popular culture and popular art, and it is always ahead of its time and ahead of the public's acceptance.This also brings about the second important feature of modern art, which is the eternal unfinished nature of works.This kind of incompleteness does not only refer to the fact that many works are unfinished and in the process of being produced (this is especially evident in Kafka’s works, his main works and works are not finished, and many works are just fragments) ; more importantly, modern art is essentially unfinished without the critics' creative comment on it.These works as "text" are just an inducement, a calling or a call for freedom. The poetic and spiritual connotation expressed by the author with his whole life absolutely depends on and expects the cooperation of the poetic spirit of the readers. , otherwise it does not exist.This fully reflects the process and social nature of the spirit itself.What is spirit?The spirit is the eternal restlessness and self-denial, and the spirit is the dissatisfaction with the spirit and the appeal to fine Zen, which is determined by the infinity of the spiritual background, that is, infinite possibility and infinite depth.Therefore, a stable spirit is no longer a spirit, and neither is a self-satisfied spirit. They are both the sinking and "materialization" of spirit.Just as the spirit can confirm itself as spirit only in the presence of other spirits, so the work of modern art can only truly complete itself in the presence of the reader.

After several years of prolific writing, Can Xue entered into another completely different kind of creation in the year of lop, that is, interpreting Kafka, which she has long admired, one by one.This is indeed a kind of "creation". In these works, we can find all the unique styles of Can Xue.In fact, Can Xue has never believed that there is a clear line between writing and commenting. She has always been writing while constantly commenting on herself, such as in "The Mystery of Can Xue" (Guizhou People Publishing House (1993) collected 8 Can Xue's formal self-reviews and creation talks.Even her works are full of comments on her own writing, and many of her novels can basically be regarded as her own writing essays, and most of her series of writing essays are works in themselves, that is, some "poetic interpretations". Poetry".Among contemporary Chinese writers, she is the only one who does this, and in world literature, Kafka is the most prominent representative of this practice.These works, in which art and commentary on art are fully integrated, are the best entry point to understand writers like Can Xue and Kafka (think of Kafka's famous works such as "The Hunger Artist" and "Josephine and the Nation of Mice"; In Can Xue, there are "Dialogues in Paradise", "Breakout Performance", "Thought Report", etc.).If it is said that Kafka's "hunger artist" died of a hunger strike because there was no "food that suits your appetite", then Can Xue is much luckier than this artist. She found "food that suits your appetite" from Kafka .Of course, this kind of food does not stop hunger, but stimulates it even more intensely, because this spiritual food is nothing but hunger itself.But after all, this "hunger for hunger" is a higher level than mere hunger art, it becomes the completer of hunger art, because as mentioned earlier, Kafka's hunger art is an appeal, Can Xue The reading is a response, and thus a completion: Can Xue "completes" Kafka's works.

Among Kafka's works, the heaviest and most popular ones are , , and .It is by no means an accidental oversight that Can Xue, who completes Kafka's work, does not discuss it.On the contrary, this shows Can Xue's special general consideration of Kafka's works, that is, Kafka's immature works. When the main core ideas in later works have not been revealed, this early one The meaning of work is always misinterpreted and ignored.In Can Xue's view, all of Kafka's works are the author's continuous and in-depth investigation and pursuit of his inner soul, which is the painful self-torture work of Lu Xun's so-called "changing one's heart to eat one's own food, wanting to know the original taste".If we accept this position, then we can indeed see that it is the starting point of this journey where the direction seems unclear.Does Gregor Samsa's transformation into a giant beetle signify an indictment or a discovery?The usual understanding is the former.People play around with the words "alienation" and "absurdity", thinking that this exhausts all the meaning of the novel.However, even though alienation is such a terrible human disease from the perspective of sociology and historical philosophy, it is an indispensable self-awareness and self-reflection for human beings from the perspective of literature and spiritual life. homework.Without entering and experiencing alienation, the human spirit will have no depth, and it will be impossible to experience the true state of existence of human beings; this state of existence is not a temporary state brought to people by a certain era or a certain society (such as modern Western society). situation, but the general situation of human beings, that is: people are not connected with each other, but they yearn for human care and love in their bones; Integrity of personality means picking up the fragments of the soul, even if he is a beetle.However, the color of "accusation" in the book is still too strong, although the author's original intention may not be to accuse.He knows all too well the frailties of human beings, and he caresses these scarred hearts with great tenderness and kindness, but people think that the only difference between him and the critical realism of the nineteenth century lies in the grotesqueness of his technique. .Therefore, this tone of "criticizing reality" set the stage for interpreting Kafka's artistic direction from the very beginning, and what people care about is only how he criticizes and how to accuse.

This bias also affects the interpretation of some of Kafka's other works, most notably the interpretation of Psalm.The popular explanation is: This is a deceptively solemn event.The "trial", which is actually absurd, unreasonable, and has no place to redress its grievances, is actually an inexplicable murder; although the protagonist Joseph K made a heroic self-defense and resistance, he finally became a victim of the dark system for no apparent reason.In the Chinese version of "The Complete Works of Kafka" (edited by Ye Tingfang, Hebei Education Press, 1996 edition), it was translated as "Litigation", which seems to be a manifestation of this sociological interpretation.However, Can Xue's artistic experience has brought us to another new dimension and level, that is, to regard the entire trial as the protagonist's own trial (the translation of "Litigation" prevents this kind of understanding).In her article "Difficult Enlightenment", she said at the beginning:

"The morning of K's arrest was the beginning of his inner self-examination process." Abandon everything that exists and be reborn." From the initial self-belief of innocence and good self-feeling, K gradually fell into despair and became aware of his deep sins (not necessarily the "original sin" of religion, but a life attitude, that is, to torture himself as a sinner) , and finally willingly go to death and let their shame "stay in the world" to warn the world (you can't get rid of shame in life, you should know it): this is by no means an indictment of fascism or any external persecution, but a description of a The struggle, struggle, and realization of the soul.There's sordidness and filth along the way, the inner court of the soul littered, the baleful and schadenfreude laughter terrifying, and the intrigue lurking behind playful sloppiness.This is because, here is not God's fair court, but a sinner himself judges himself.Sinners judging sinners will inevitably appear ridiculous and ambiguous; but in essence it is a serious thing, even the only serious thing in this world.What is really ridiculous is the defendant's serious self-justification. Of course, this kind of self-justification comes from the instinct of life, which everyone who loves life must actively participate in; but it lacks self-awareness.But looking at it the other way around, it is this life instinct that promotes the further development of the trial step by step, because this instinct is the root of all crimes.Without crime, there is no judgment of crime; without further crime in self-justification (self-justification is itself a sin, arrogance), there is no further revelation of deeper crime.Therefore, from a formal point of view, the law is high, ruthless, and unshakable by crimes; but from a process point of view, "the law is attracted by crimes." That is, it is attracted by life.The law leaves plenty of room for man's free will, just as the priest said: "If you come, it will receive you; if you go, it will not keep you."But all the eloquent efforts in life will be ridiculous if there is no self-examination.However, self-examination will make people's life full of heavy confession and shame. Will it stifle the brilliance of life?Will it make people feel that there is no fundamental difference between life and death, or even accept death calmly (like K)?This is Kafka's problem, and it is also Can Xue's problem.Another answer to this question is given in .

What is a "castle"?Castles are the purpose of life.All life activities of human beings belong to it, but it itself is hidden in a mysterious fog.Canxue wrote: Contrasted with the indestructible and ideal place of the castle, the daily life in the village seems so hesitant, difficult and without outline.The thick fog of stew erodes all rules, and everything becomes ambiguous.Why it came out like this?Because the ideal (Kram and everything about the castle) is in our hearts, the mysterious, supreme will of the castle is in our soul... And what is a castle?It seems to be a void, an abstract place, a phantom, and no one can tell what it is.

The strange thing is that it really exists, and it dominates all the daily life in the village, and it embodies its pure nature in everyone in the village. irreversible will. K is doubtful and uncertain about everything about himself, but his belief in the castle is unwavering.Take "The Light of Ideal") In fact, as long as we follow Can Xue's perspective and regard the "law" in the book not as external persecution, but as the highest basis for self-examination of the soul, we can see that "law" and "castle" are essentially one and the same. thing.That is to say, human self-examination, human will to live, and the pursuit of ideals are one thing.So the obscure story told by the priest that we read in the novel is actually already in its infancy.The story says that a countryman came to the gate of the law and asked the gatekeeper to let him in to see the law. The gatekeeper said that it was not possible now, so the countryman waited at the gate for a lifetime.Before he died, the doorkeeper told him: "This door was opened just for you, and now I'm going to close it."The mistake of the countryman is that he is not as bold and energetic as the K in the film. He does not know that only by committing crimes (such as breaking through the barriers of the gatekeepers and breaking through one after another) can one approach the law and evaluate and judge according to the law. Examine your own life.The K in the movie is a "countryman" who has come to his senses. He broke into the villages outside the castle by force and tried to pass one after another: the boss and his wife, Frieda, the messenger Barnabas, Orr Gaga and Amalniu, the assistants...these are the gatekeepers of the castle.If you obey them, they shut you out and make you useless for life; if you deceive them and conquer them, they become your mentors and guides.But this collision of life requires creative genius, improvised wit, and the determination to "go all out."One of the biggest differences between K in the novel and K in the novel is that he no longer thinks he is pure and innocent, and his self-examination has become an essential structure in his heart, thus greatly releasing and stimulating his life instinct.As Can Xue said: K will always be that dull foreigner who will always need earnest teaching and tireless guidance. His nature is always a bit stubborn, but he has good wishes. The unforgettable eternal lover in his dream is accompanied by him. He, making him pass level after level, trudged along the path leading to the castle.But K is no longer a pure outlander. After experiencing so many disappointments and frustrations, he obviously can't become a formal villager. He still has to make mistakes again and fall into the mud again, but every time Wrong, every time you fall, there will be a kind of "deja vu".This is the difference between K after entering the village and K before entering the village. ("Unforgettable in Dreams..." However, no matter how much K's ideological realm improves, no matter how far he enters the gate of the law and how close he gets to the castle, his confrontation with the castle or the law can never be completely resolved. Until the end , he is not fundamentally different from the foreigner who died of old age at the gate of the law. "How could K have expected that the sacred place, which is high above and can never be entered, exists only for him? What did the villagers think?" To lead him to this, or to prevent him from reaching it?" ("The Image of the Castle") and always constitute an unresolved contradiction, neither can be reduced to the other, neither is better than the other, Because this is the eternal contradiction of human beings: without self-denial (self-examination), life will sink; but without life, self-denial cannot be activated; self-denial will deny life and lead to death; Isn’t the existence of existence) the embodiment of a strong and powerful life? Life itself moves from one level to another higher level in this kind of self-contradiction and self-conflict. No. A delicate rose is nobler than a whole Himalaya.

In addition to the comments on the above two long works, Can Xue's comments on some other works are also very interesting, and they show us the multi-faceted nature of Kafka's inner world.But everything remains the same, and the core idea that runs through it is the thinking of the root of human nature exposed by human beings in modern society.This kind of root of human nature has been lurking and hidden in the past thousands of years of human history, but it is presented to people today with a naked, appalling and unbearable truth, and it is once again forcing mankind to an ultimate goal. The question: to live, or not to live? The inscription "Towards the Hometown of Art" reveals the background of the root of humanity in Kafka's art.In America, Kafka symbolically describes the formation of the modern personality in which modern art, including his own, has gained a foothold.The premise of this process is the "abandoned state".In Can Xue's words: "Abandonment actually means spiritual weaning," "If a person comes to this world, if he does not go through the 'orphan' stage spiritually, he will never be able to grow up. To mature, to develop My own world, but only a strange creature.” But what a painful process it was!Contradictions and terror entangled him, and yearning and memories for warmth disintegrated his determination.Kafka's own harrowing experience illustrates most clearly the brutality with which this process can both train and destroy.He dreamed of getting married again and again, trying to ease the fierce conflict in his heart with worldly happiness.But he stood up resolutely every time, determined to bear his fate alone.The tuberculosis that took his life was as much a symbol of the world as it was of humanity.Life is a battle of attrition against the diseases you were born with, and no one can help you.If you can't hold on to yourself, it's your time to die.Reading "America" ​​from this point of view reveals a tragic meaning, but it is by no means satisfied with the pathetic "exposure" and "righteous victory" in Dickens' novels; An irony of "overcoming" is a somber recognition of true freedom.In the novel, "Carl walked towards freedom step by step, towards this strange experience. His experience told him: freedom is the horror of being alone and helpless, and freedom is the pleasure before falling from a cliff. For freedom, Everything in a person is a burden, and everything is to be lost."How superficial it is to think that Kafka is exposing the falsity of American-style liberal democracy!Kafka is indeed "unmasking", but more importantly he is bearing.This is not some "false" freedom, this is freedom itself, the ugly truth of freedom, it depends on whether you have the courage to bear it! The hometown of modern art is entirely based on this freedom, its creation and appreciation It takes not only genius, but also courage. The article "Unattainable Proof: The Source of Eternal Pain in Creation—Read Bu Tiaogou's Research)" is also in line with the theme of "Towards the Hometown of Art".The actual process of making art is directly discussed here. The novel "A Study of a Dog" and "The Hunger Artist" belong to the same theme. In the novel, there are plots in which a "dog" as an artist creates beauty through hunger and hunger strike, but the issues involved are much broader.When we look at the signifier-signified list of symbols (metaphors) listed by Can Xue at the beginning of the article, we can see the complexity of the inner composition of Kafka's artistic spirit.Only Can Xue, relying on her delicate artistic sense and strong rational penetrating power that is rare among writers (especially female writers), can go deep into the interior of this structure to make such a clear dissection.This is actually Can Xue's analysis of her artistic self.Rationality and irrationality, the instinctual impulse of life and scientific principles, the individual and society, reality and thought, the experience of life and the call of death, this is a whole psychology of art, but it does not appeal to concepts and arguments, but to Rational mastery of the senses or direct realization of principles (principles).In it, the purpose is not to elucidate the hidden mechanism of artistic creation, but to express a breathless emotion with the help of the revelation of this mechanism.This kind of emotion is presented more directly in the article "Eternal Wandering——Interpretation (Hunter Graccus)", which is the feeling of desolation that wanders forever between the world and hell, with no destination and nowhere.The hunter Graccus was supposed to report to Hell, but the ship that carried him went in the wrong direction, and he had to wander around the world.This is Can Xue and Kafka's common inner experience of being an artist: "Wandering, besides wandering, is still wandering, alone", "If you want to live, you can't die"; There is absolutely no part for him, "The life course of a hunter is the course of all those who pursue the highest spirit but cannot sever their marriage with the world." This self-analysis of creative emotions or the creative emotions expressed through self-analysis also runs through Can Xue's interpretation of several other short stories.In Can Xue's view, "When the Great Wall of China was Built" symbolizes "the artist's way of life"; "Report to an Academy of Sciences" records "the journey of an ape artist overcoming ape nature and achieving self-awareness"; The teacher embodies the "descriptor's artistic self" and "artistic conscience"; "Example, Woman" and describes "the structure of the poet's soul"; Two devils not only restrain each other, but also encourage and support each other, and form an alliance to deal with the sense of nothingness that destroys and covers everything." It is a symbol of the situation of the artist, but a manifestation of the true contradiction in the artist's heart, that is, the artist wants to escape from existence and escape into the void, but also escapes from the void and strives to exist. The double fear makes him rush back and forth between being and nothing, exhausting Energy, to construct KitKat's magnificent artistic project, and at the same time "experience the pain of its inescapable existence" (the above quotations are all from Can Xue's articles).The career of an artist is a concentrated expression of the general living conditions of human beings. The artist is the spiritual bearer of all the sufferings of contemporary human beings, and he is Jesus who bears the cross; at the same time, the artist is also the creator of the meaning of life, the light in the dark, The presence.We can even say that because of artists, there are people.It is not difficult to understand why both Kafka and Can Xue regard the self-analysis and self-deepening of the artist's soul as the main theme of their art.This is by no means "divorced from life", "divorced from reality", "made behind closed doors" and "subjective fiction", but it is the most profound life placed at the cutting edge of human life.Because the soul of a real artist is the representative of the human soul (such as Lu Xun is recognized as the "national soul"), even if it is difficult for the public to understand him and get close to him, he is doing a kind of work for the public with his hard work and creation. Work that enhances human dignity and promotes a sense of self, without whom the masses would be reduced to spiritual animals. Now we are going to talk about the consistency between Can Xue and Kafka in terms of temperament and spiritual life. Without this premise, it is difficult for an artist to enter Kafka's spiritual kingdom even if he has good wishes.Can Xue and Kafka have "a clear understanding of the heart": both of them have a rebellious inner character, a courage to endure suffering and a martyr spirit to guard loneliness, and both have a keenness beyond ordinary people and the ability to see through the essence. Wisdom Eye has a firm goal of self-reflection, self-chewing, "going deep" and a strong endurance to endure severe pain. It has a kind of devilishness of being outside the self and laughing at oneself, all sincere determination and painful tears. There is a kind of gloomy, hopeless, dark but desperate savagery that voluntarily ventures into a darker place, and a mischievous pleasure of self-separation and intentionally placing oneself in self-contradiction... Of course , was also misunderstood and criticized by his contemporaries. Kafka was regarded as a critic of modern society or the mouthpiece of the Frankfurt School, and Can Xue was also said to be a "nightmare" of an era and a delusional person with abnormal personality.Judging from the works, the works of both of them show the various levels, relationships, contradictions and conflicts within the soul, and the reflection process at different stages, and both reflect the living pain and ideal pursuit of the artist, and thus all human beings, both of which are so subjective. , Introverted, dark, full of confessional consciousness, but also so tough, indomitable, covered in bruises but always planning new resistance.One of the most interesting spectacle in world literature of this century!This spectacle may be due to the fact that they represent Chinese and Western cultures in different eras and cultural backgrounds and entered into the artistic conception of "the end of the century" together, and conducted the most thorough reflection on the roots of human nature in the two cultures. Bar.But this also brings up some subtle differences between the two. These differences are largely rooted in two different cultural mindsets.Let’s start with the surface art style.Can Xue and Kafka are very close in style, for example, both of them have long and eloquent arguments and narrations, but the language is also clean and pure, without redundant words; they are both good at passing dialogues (including inner dialogue) to betray the mood of the speaker; each of their characters is symbolic in order to express an emotional philosophy; their passions are reserved, their intellect strong, and their feelings is the lubricant of all writing.However, Kafka still clearly inherited the detailed description of critical realism in the nineteenth century. He can describe the plot, no matter how grotesque, as if he had personally experienced it, and his dialogue is so logical. There are almost no jumps, and any obscurity must be caused by the complexity and deep learning of the thought itself.On the contrary, Can Xue doesn't pay much attention to external details, her techniques are similar to line drawing, and her language and dialogue are very jumpy, even similar to Zen "koan"; To communicate; she sometimes allows the protagonist's inner self to appear directly and even lyrically, which is absolutely impossible for Kafka.The latter still maintains the principle of "psychological realism" of objective description at the deepest level. The influence of cultural mentality is manifested in the shaping of the protagonist's soul at a deeper level.In a sense, Western culture is a "guilt culture", which is particularly evident in "Kafka's Clash" (and "Letter to My Father").The protagonist's self-awareness is mainly reflected in "conviction".In Can Xue's works, this point is greatly weakened.The work that can be compared with Can Xue is "Thought Report", in which the awakening of the protagonist A's self-awareness is not reflected in "knowledge of guilt", but in "knowledge of mistakes"; However, "The Confessor" is actually just the protagonist himself, at most his other ego, and definitely does not represent the voice of the other side of the world.This confession is thus basically an enlightenment of the ills of one's own stupidity, self-righteousness, and unconscious hypocrisy; the pain in it is the pain of not being able to find your true self, and the fear in it is only the fear of facing death and nothingness , instead of facing the fear of hell and punishment.In fact, Can Xue's protagonist would even be happy if there was such a thing as hell.Because I can finally get rid of the horror of nothingness, the punishment of hell is also a kind of "life" after all, and it may also be used as a subject for artistic creation!On the contrary, in Kafka, the fear of existence is almost equal to the fear of nothingness (see "The Burrow" and Can Xue's interpretation of it), so Joseph K can treat death so calmly when he is convicted, even There is a tendency to commit suicide.Therefore, generally speaking, although Can Xue's works are also dark, evil, desperate, full of dirty plots and dirty images, they are progressive, constantly colliding with contradictions, and constantly striving for self-improvement.Kafka's works are retreating, mournful, and wailing, and his strength is mainly manifested in his commitment to crime and pain, rather than taking the initiative to attack.His motto is: "Every obstacle crushes me".Related to this is that due to the tradition of the separation of man and nature in Western culture, Kafka's pursuit of ideals is the pursuit of a "castle" in the other side of the world. This "castle" is fixed and vaguely presented from the beginning. The outline of it can be drawn, but it is impossible to pursue it. The pursuit of it constitutes a suffering course in the world; on the contrary, the ideal pursued by Can Xue is presented step by step with the pursuit of the protagonist. In her "Journey" middle and contrast), the protagonist (Pip Zhun) knew nothing about the higher state he was going to reach beforehand, and only when he entered this higher state did he suddenly realize that he had greatly improved from the original state. But there is still another unknown higher realm waiting for him in the dark.Only the protagonist's inner desire to survive is certain, and this desire pushes him to continuously improve and deepen from one "village" to another.Furthermore, in terms of the relationship between characters, Kafka's characters are always rejected, abandoned and neglected by others. All relationships must be established by the protagonist himself. Even so, such relationships are unreliable and will be lost at any time. Can Xue's characters are always in the involuntary mutual peeping, caring and mutual interference, and they can't get rid of it even if they want to. The protagonist is often the focus of everyone's attention.Therefore, when Kafka and Can Xue advocate the same independence of personality and spiritual freedom, their emotional atmosphere is not exactly the same: Kafka has infinite warmth for all people, working hard from the mood of the "surplus". Stand up and encourage yourself to go on a lonely journey; while Can Xue breaks out from the crowd with gloating viciousness, and at the same time, from a higher standpoint (that is, as an independent person) restrains her inner disgust to hang out with ordinary people, To sharpen your own soul.Of course, this is not only the effect of culture, but also related to the different personalities of the two of them: Kafka's aloofness and aloofness made him fragile and easily injured, while Can Xue was more civilian, secular, tenacious and rational. Face your life. Therefore, it is not surprising that in Can Xue's comments on Kafka, we did not find the profound influence of Western religious spirit on Kafka's artistic creation.尽管卡夫卡不是一个虔诚的教徒，这种潜移默化的影响应当是无法根除的，它事实上使卡夫卡后期转向了对犹太教的浓烈兴趣。就此而言，我们可以说，在这本书里呈现出来的是一个“残雪的卡夫卡”。或者说，残雪把卡夫卡“残雪化”了。这是中国人一般说来可以理解和感觉到的一个卡夫卡。然而，正因为残雪所立足的人性根基从实质上说比宗教意识更深刻、更本源、更具普遍性，所以她对卡夫卡的把握虽然没有直接考虑宗教这一维，但决不是没有丝毫宗教情怀；另一方面，也正由于绕过了西方人看待卡夫卡所不可避免的宗教眼光的局限，她的把握在某些方面反而更接近本质，它是一个中国人在评论卡夫卡的国际论坛上所作出的特殊贡献。 1998年10月5日，于植咖山。