Chapter 11 Preface to "Selected Essays of Bing Xin's Novels"

The sixteen novels and six paragraphs of essays in this anthology of novels and essays were compiled from works written between 1920 ("May 4th" period) and 1943 (the period of the Anti-Japanese War). I started writing during the period of the May 4th Movement, which was a new stage of China's anti-imperialist and anti-feudal bourgeois-democratic revolution. At that time, Chinese society was extremely dark.Therefore, the first few novels I wrote described and exposed the dark side of the society at that time, but I only exposed the darkness and did not find the light, because I did not have the courage to find the light!As a result I retreated into the narrow circle of my family, writing and extolling "human love" that was impossible in a class society.At the same time, my targets and my interests were mainly focused on a small number of petty bourgeois intellectuals. I did not "go to the masses of workers, peasants and soldiers, to the fiery struggle, to the single, broadest and richest source." .Being isolated from the masses, my life is empty, so what I write becomes poorer, more empty, and more forced; finally, I can't write any more!

Such poor and empty things are published as an anthology. In my opinion, the reason for the development of the new literary trend since the May 4th Movement has been a process. This process is like a series of steps leading to the The gates of socialist realism.To show the fullness of this development, even a small stone occupying the lowest and most distorted corner of a flight of stairs is refused to be dug out and thrown away.That is the reason for publishing this anthology!July 13, 1954, Beijing. ("Selected Essays of Bing Xin's Novels", the first edition in September 1954 by People's Literature Publishing House.)