Chapter 38 1986 "Red Sorghum"

Genre: Novella Author: Mo Yan Published: 1986 The novella "Red Sorghum" published in 1986 is Mo Yan's most famous work.The book creates Mo Yan's literary kingdom "Northeast Gaomi Township", and through the narration of "I", it describes the vigorous, heroic and tragic life stories of "my" ancestors in Northeast Gaomi Township during the Anti-Japanese War. "Red Sorghum" won the 4th National Novella Award, and was translated into nearly 20 languages ​​and distributed all over the world.The film "Red Sorghum" based on this adaptation won the Golden Bear Award at the 38th Berlin Film Festival.

About the author: Mo Yan, a native of Gaomi, Shandong.He successively graduated from the Department of Literature of the PLA Academy of Arts (1984-1986) and the graduate class of Beijing Normal University Lu Xun College of Literature (1989-1991), and obtained a master's degree in literature and art. Started to publish works in 1981.Author of 11 novels such as "Red Sorghum Family", more than 20 novellas, "Happiness", and "Master is More and More Humorous", and eight short stories, such as "Thumbcuffs", etc. More than ten articles.Still created, wait for drama, film literary script to wait.Works have been translated into many foreign languages. In 1987, "Red Sorghum" won the Fourth National Novella Award.The film "Red Sorghum" adapted from this novel and participated in the screenwriting won the Golden Bear Award at the 38th Berlin Film Festival. In 1988, he won the Taiwan United Literature Award.The movie "Warm" based on this novel won the Golden Unicorn Award at the 16th Tokyo Film Festival. In 1996, he won the first Honghe Literary Award; in 2001 (French version), he won the French "Laure Bataillin" Foreign Literature Award; in 2001, he won the Taiwan United Daily News Top Ten Best Book Award in 2001; in April 2004, he won the "Chinese Literature Media Award" Annual Outstanding Achievement Award"; in March 2004, he was awarded the French Order of Culture and Art; in January 2005, he was awarded the 30th Italian NONINO International Literature Award; in December 2005, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters by the Open University of Hong Kong; in July 2006, he was awarded Fukuoka, Japan Asian Culture Award; September 2008, Hong Kong Baptist University "Chinese Novel Dream of Red Mansions Award"; October 2008, University of Oklahoma, USA "Newman Chinese Literature Award"; June 2009, was selected as Bavaria Corresponding academician of the Academy of Arts and Sciences; elected as a member by the Modern Language Association of America (MLA) in December 2010; won the Korean Wanhai Award in August 2011; won the Mao Dun Literature Award for a novel in August 2011; won the Nobel Prize in October 2012 Literary Award.

Although "Red Sorghum Family" is a novel with the background of the Anti-Japanese War, it describes the theme of war.But it feels refreshing.In the past, novels on the theme of the Anti-Japanese War gave people the feeling of a strong contrast between justice and evil, and they portrayed almost perfect righteous patriotic heroes.However, some anti-Japanese heroes portrayed in "Red Sorghum Family" are the incarnations of justice and evil. They are a group of unique heroes who belong to Red Sorghum, with vivid life and humanity. The protagonist Yu Zhanao is a passionate man, just and brutal.He killed a monk who was having an affair with his long-widowed mother, who was then hanged.He killed and set fire for women, and took over Dai Fenglian, who later became his wife.In order to avenge his humiliation, he practiced his marksmanship hard, and wiped out the bandit Huaneck who had molested his wife.In order to restore the innocence of a village girl, he did not hesitate to shoot his uncle who raped after drinking.For the sake of his concubine, Lian'er, he fell out with his wife and separated.For the righteousness of the nation, he resolutely resisted Japan, but in the end the entire army was wiped out... He fought hard for love, was cruel for revenge, decisive for justice, and fought for honor... The author Mo Yan wrote to him in the article Comments like this: "He never figured out the relationship between man and politics, man and society, and man and war all his life, although he was spinning rapidly on the giant wheel of war, although the light of his humanity always broke through the cold iron armor and radiated. But in fact, even if his life can radiate bright light at a certain moment, this light is cold, crooked, and mixed with some kind of profound animal factors." It is true that he resisted the Japanese, but he did not really understand it. to the essence of war.Although he exudes fresh humanity, he is also full of savage and ignorant animal nature.

In the novel, we can see that the author speaks very highly of Mrs. Yu Dai Fenglian, she is a legendary woman.Mo Yan wrote: "My grandma's life is "great conduct without restraint, great gifts without hesitation", her heart is higher than the sky, her life is as thin as paper, she dares to resist, dare to fight, and she is consistent with the original." Indeed, she is a woman with a flower-like appearance , A woman with a fire-like character.Because she hated her parents for marrying her to a leprosy patient, she rejected her father; in order to save herself and Zhanao, she concentrated her wisdom and worshiped the county magistrate as her godfather, and escaped; because of love, she resolutely Combined with Yu Zhanao, who was a savior in name but a husband-killer in name; in order to maintain her love, she drove away Lianer; in order to revenge, she stimulated Yu Zhanao to hang out with black eyes; in order to support the Anti-Japanese War, she sent her only son to the battlefield, She herself buried the sorghum fields with beauty.In such an era when feudalism was conservative and women's consciousness was suppressed, she was indeed a remarkable woman.

Yu Zhanao and Dai Fenglian are two typical sorghum heroes in "The Red Sorghum Family".They didn't quite understand the essence of the Anti-Japanese War, but in such a turbulent era, they expressed their resistance and dissatisfaction with the suffering in their own way.They firmly guard their freedom and proudly live out the intensity of their lives.They are a group of red sorghum heroes with sorghum blood and exuding fresh humanity. "Red Sorghum Family" is a work with great influence contributed by Mo Yan to contemporary Chinese literature. It has been translated into nearly twenty languages ​​and distributed all over the world.He created his literary kingdom "Northeast Gaomi Township" in this book. Through the narration of "I", it describes that during the Anti-Japanese War, the ancestors of "I" staged scenes of vigorous, heroic and tragic dance dramas in Northeast Gaomi Township. The ancestors in "my" family, such as grandpa, grandma, father, aunt, etc., fought against the brutal Japanese invaders on the one hand, and on the other hand, had a legendary love story that made future generations pale in comparison.The book is full of Mo Yan's unique rich and full imagination, admiring emotional descriptions, and the vigorous vitality of the Chinese nation with Wang Yang's unrestrained pen. It can be called an epoch-making epic masterpiece in contemporary literature.

It is an anti-Japanese story told from a folk standpoint.This kind of folk standpoint is firstly reflected in the two aspects of the plot frame and the characters of the work.The description of the story of the War of Resistance is not uncommon in contemporary Chinese literature, but "Red Sorghum" is different from previous revolutionary historical war novels in that it uses all pen and ink to describe the war organized by the bandit commander Yu Zhanao in the form of virtual family memories. Civilian armed forces, and all kinds of wild stories that happened in the rural world of Northeast Gaomi Township.The plot of this novel is intertwined with two story lines: the main one is about the cause and process of the ambush of the Japanese motorcade by civilian armed forces;Yu Zhanao was a bearer when Dai Fenglian was married. He tried to flirt with her along the way, and led the crowd to kill a bandit who wanted to rob the sedan chair. Then he ambush Dai Fenglian by the roadside when she returned home, and took her into a sorghum field. This is how I started a passionate love affair, and then Yu Zhanao killed Dai Fenglian's leper husband, officially became a bandit, and officially became her lover.It is not difficult to see that in this story line, what is always highlighted is a kind of vigorous folk passion, which contains the fascination with sex and violence, and is based on wild and unruly wild vitality.This obviously goes beyond the limitation of political ideology, giving a direct observation and free expression to the folk world.The previous thread of the anti-Japanese story begins with the long-term worker of Dai Fenglian’s family, Uncle Luo Han, who was ordered to be brutally skinned to death by the Japanese, to Yu Zhan’ao’s indignant mobilization of bandits to ambush the Japanese car convoy on the side of the Jiaoping Highway. A civil war fought by bandits and villagers.The whole battle process reflected a spontaneous violent desire of the people to rise up and resist for survival, which to a large extent weakened the political color of historical wars and reduced them to a naturalistic struggle for survival.In a nutshell, the plot of "Red Sorghum" is based on folk themes. Although it tells the story of the War of Resistance Against Japan, what stands out in it is mainly the vivid violence and sex in the folk world. content.What is related to this is that this novel also removes the concept of positive and negative characters based on the traditional ideological binary opposition in the creation of characters. He has dual identities, and in his character, he tried his best to exaggerate a kind of folk color that is rough, violent and full of primitive sense of justice and passion for life. Similar reckless characters also appeared in modern historical novels in the 1950s and 1970s, but it was necessary to establish an orthodox hero with political and moral standards beside him, so as to convey the ideological content stipulated by ideology, but in "Red Sorghum In ", Yu Zhanao is the only main hero who is highlighted. His reckless shortcomings and heroism have not been judged or corrected by any political standards, but he has restored the true nature of the people with his true character.These characteristics are also reflected in the portrayal of characters such as "my grandma" Dai Fenglian and Uncle Luohan.For example, the warm, plump, pungent, and decisive feminine beauty of "my grandma", the loyal, persevering, and indomitable peasant nature of Uncle Luohan, and the reckless and impulsive temper of "my father" Xiaodouguan. The indulgence and vitality of the people are full of it.Since the narrator writes these characters as the elders of his own family, he reflects in them the willful and easy-going feeling rarely seen in previous revolutionary historical stories.This makes this novel very clearly express a tendency to truly identify with the folk value scale in terms of character image creation and emotional affinity.It is based on the value orientation of folks advocating vitality and freedom. The author describes the murder of "my grandpa" and the wild love of "my grandpa" and "my grandma", as well as various rough and unruly personalities and behaviors of other characters. , to create a strong and simple beauty so naturally.

"Red Sorghum" has opened up a vivid folk world in the creation of modern historical war themes. In this sense, it can also be said that what this novel tells is not about historical wars, but the writer's meaningful experience in the space of folk discourse. Entrusted.The narrator has a passionate exclamation at the beginning of the novel, strongly praising his hometown, praising his heroic ancestors, and saying that the deeds of the ancestors and their heroic tragedy "dwarf us living unworthy descendants, While progressing, I really feel the degradation of species.” This kind of sigh runs through the whole novel, and it becomes more intense and touching, which undoubtedly reflects a kind of living state that the writer regards the folk as his ideal.Folks are a place of freedom and lawlessness, folks are in a state of vitality and enthusiasm, and folks are a splendid, magnificent, gentle and honest spirit. These are the sources of the charm of freedom that people yearn for.The narrator compares the real life with such a folk ideal state, but finds that this state is only the existence of the past tense. The heroic dramas in Northeast Gaomi Township are all staged in the past time, which makes him feel regretful. He couldn't help expressing the emotion that the progress of civilization implies the degradation of caste.This obviously introduces a historical judgment scale that has nothing to do with political ideology and intellectual tradition: looking at historical development and social reality from the standpoint of the people, it reveals a tendency to disperse vitality and limit freedom .In "Red Sorghum", this kind of regret and emotion in turn strengthens the idealization and praise of the once existing state of folk freedom, so that it presents a more brilliant and charming color.

However, we cannot fail to see that identifying the folk world as an ideal state will actually make it natural to depict the vulgar and ugly side of it: like the portrayal of the vulgar character of the characters in "Red Sorghum", the brutal killing ( Especially the description of the naturalistic bloody scene of human skinning) all use stimulating violence to present a strange beauty that is in harmony with the work as a whole, but fundamentally, this tendency reflects the inherent nature of the folk world. Vulgar cultural forms.It's just that this tendency in "Red Sorghum" can still maintain a shocking force because of the author's full artistic ideals, and it is still conducive to reflecting the humanistic care contained in the work.However, as far as the later trend of new historical novels is concerned, the indiscriminate expression of folk vulgar forms pioneered by "Red Sorghum" has become more and more vulgar in nature. Once the support of real folk ideals is lost, this kind of The description naturally degenerates into the author's self-indulgence in sensory stimulation, and loses the humanistic meaning that should be recognized by the people.

Regarding "Red Sorghum", it is worth mentioning the novelty of this novel in writing.Mo Yan was deeply influenced by the American writer Faulkner and the Latin American writer Marquez. From them, he boldly borrowed the time and space expression techniques of stream-of-consciousness novels and the plot structure of magical realism novels. In "Red Sorghum", he It almost completely breaks the traditional time-space sequence and plot logic, and tells the whole story very freely.But this kind of seemingly arbitrary narration is governed by the writer's main emotion, which is secretly consistent with the vigorous free spirit in the work.In addition, Mo Yan also showed his excellent ability to master the Chinese language in this novel. He used a lot of rhetorical devices such as metaphor and synaesthesia, which are full of imagination and always go against the rules, forming a unique language at the language level. This kind of magnificent and magical feature creates the emotional support of the unusual folk beauty in the whole novel.