Chapter 46 Section 1 A nation has risen

After Chen Mengjia's death, Xie Mian, a professor at Peking University and a poetry critic, said: "Every season of poetry has its fashion and popular customs. To be a poem that can not only convey the pulse of that era, but also make your own voice stand out The poet is difficult. Inertia tries to coerce all poets to speak in one way and with one gesture, which means harm to genius; and tragedy almost without exception happens when genius tries to rebel against that order." When Mian said this, he was thinking of Chen Mengjia, but he was specifically referring to the tragedy of another poet who was similar and friendly to Chen Mengjia's experience and fate.The poet's name is Mu Dan.

Mu Dan, formerly known as Cha Liangzheng, was born in the Cha family in Haining, Zhejiang Province, and was born in Tianjin.The Cha family in Haining was originally from Wuyuan, Anhui, and was born in the Spring and Autumn Period Cha Zi, taking the land as the family.In the seventeenth year from Yuan to Zhengzheng (1357), Cha Yu moved to Yuanhua Town, Haining to start a business and manage his family because of avoiding military chaos, and gradually developed.By the Ming Dynasty, Xianye had been established, and he was a famous family in the south of the Yangtze River. The family fortune has been prosperous for hundreds of years.Since the third generation, it has been divided into three branches: the south, the north, and the small. It has been a famous "family of literary officials" since the mid-Ming Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty.Famous literati and scholars such as Zha Yue, Zha Bingyi, and Zha Jizuo in the Ming Dynasty, and Zha Shenxing, Zha Sisu, Zha Sheng, and Zha Kui in the Qing Dynasty all belonged to this family.When Emperor Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty toured the south, he bestowed "a giant family since the Tang and Song Dynasties, and there are few families in the south of the Yangtze River" on the couplet on the outer gate of his ancestral hall as a compliment.And modern famous people Zha Renwei, Zha Mengji, Zha Jimin, Zha Liangzhao, Zha Liangjian, Zha Liangrui, Zha Liangming, Zha Liangzhong, Zha Liangzheng, Zha Liangyong, etc. are all members of their tribe.As far as the academic circle is concerned, Zha Liangzhao’s personality and knowledge are generally respected. This is because he graduated from the University of Chicago and Columbia University in his early years and served as the executive director of the Chinese Student Association in the United States. In November 1921, he led the students in the United States and the domestic Public groups and overseas Chinese echoed and supported the Chinese delegation participating in the "Washington Conference" and became famous.After returning to China, he successively served as the president of Henan University, the dean of the Southwest Associated University, the dean of Kunming Teachers College after the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, and the professor, dean of the dean of Taiwan University, and the chairman of the Overseas Chinese Student Advisory Committee of National Taiwan University after the KMT and the Communist Party. The positions in the academic and political circles are related.But all this is not the main thing, the important thing is that Mr. Cha himself not only understands education but also values ​​education, and in his own position, especially in the difficult years of chaotic chaos in the later period of Southwest Associated University, he was prudent, selfless and fearless. The power of character and personality is admired by the world.Zha Liangzhao's spirit and achievements can be regarded as the mainstay that the Standing Committee members of the Southwest Associated University rely on to maintain school discipline, teaching and research for eight years.

But in terms of fame in the secular society, the Chinese at home and abroad know more about Jin Yong (Cha Liangyong), the martial arts novelist who later became famous all over the world.Mu Dan, Cha Liangzhao, and Jin Yong are all uncles and brothers of the same family. They are ranked according to family generation, and they are all of the "Liang" generation, and their names are all accompanied by gold characters.Later, Cha Liangzheng and Cha Liangyong became a famous poet, and the other became a famous novelist all over the world, and they both had elegant pen names.Cha Liangzheng dismantled the word "Cha" into Mu Dan - Mu Dan; Cha Liangyong dismantled "Yong" into Jin Yong.Jin Yong's mother is Xu Zhimo's cousin, and Xu and the Cha brothers of the same clan belong to the same hometown.Jin Yong wrote in his postscript published in 1975: "I am from Haining, Zhejiang.... Haining belonged to Hangzhou Prefecture in the Qing Dynasty. It was a small coastal county and was only famous for its tides. Famous figures in modern times include Wang Guowei, Jiang Baili, Xu Zhimo, etc. , their characters all have some melancholic and tragic undertones, and they all carry a bit of untimely stubbornness....But Haining does not produce warriors, and even the military strategist Jiang Baili can only talk about martial arts, but not use them." Jin Yong He said that it is generally not bad, whether it is the lives of Wang, Jiang, Xu and even Mu Dan, they are all full of tragedy.As far as the chic and detached life is concerned, perhaps only Jin Daxia, who has both sides in troubled times, is Haining's "great man of chivalry". No matter in character or life experience, he is not as melancholy and desolate as the previous few elders and celebrities.

In July 1935, 18-year-old Mu Dan was admitted to the Department of Foreign Languages ​​and Literature of Tsinghua University from the high school of Nankai Middle School in Tianjin. Soon after entering the school, he began to create poetry, and wrote "The Watchman", "The Wanderer", "Ancient Wall" and so on. Published in "Tsinghua Weekly", Peking "Literature" and other publications, signed "Mu Dan".At this time, Mu Dan gradually gained some fame on campus and in the northern poetry circles. For example, his classmate and friend Wang Zuoliang recalled "How did Mu Dan come into being?" "An article wrote: "We are in the same class. From the south, I noticed that this thin northern youth—in fact, his ancestral home is Haining, Zhejiang—was writing poems, Shelley-style romantic poems , has a strong lyrical temperament, but also vents dissatisfaction with reality." And "as the 'explorer' of Chinese modernist poetry in the 1940s, and the master of translation of English and Russian romantic poetry in the 1950s and 1960s, two The reason for this can be seen from the campus poem signed 'Mudan'".The short two years of living in Tsinghua University have indeed played an ice-breaking and navigating role in Mu Dan's poetry creation.

When the Anti-Japanese War broke out in 1937, Mu Dan traveled a long distance with the teachers of Tsinghua University in October of this year to continue his studies at the School of Literature of Changsha Temporary University temporarily located in Hengshan.In addition to the guidance of Chinese teachers such as Ye Gongchao and Wu Mi, the "Contemporary English Poetry" class of the British lecturer William Empson (William Empson) also began to teach at this time. ) teaching method and content, for a group of young talents gathered in the Department of Foreign Languages, such as Cha Liangzheng, Zhou Jueliang, Wang Zuoliang, Zhao Ruihong, Li Funing, Xu Guozhang and others; it is an excellent way to truly experience the works and temperament of foreign poets Chance.It's just that the teachers and students have to move to Kunming soon after the class starts.Mu Dan packed up and walked out of the desolate and lonely Hengshan Mountain, and followed the "Xianggui Yunnan Walking Group" composed of Wen Yiduo, Zeng Zhaolun and other teachers and students, and started "the arduous and significant long march in the history of world education".On the way across Hunan, Guizhou, and Yunnan provinces, trekking 3,000 miles to the National Southwest Associated University in Kunming, Yunnan, Mu Dan, in his prime, carried a small English-Chinese dictionary in his arms, and recited words and example sentences while marching. By night, he had memorized by heart , so ingeniously imitated the appearance of a foreign poet who was said to be a foreign poet, tore off the pages that had been memorized, and left a poetic and romantic memorial for the land he walked.And when we arrived at our destination, Kunming, there was not much left of that dictionary.

The three-thousand-mile march was arduous and monotonous. In addition to reciting English words, Mu Dan did not forget to observe the surrounding things and customs.The vastness of the land of the motherland, the magical magnificence of the mountains and valleys, and the suffering and unyielding spirit of the people have all left a mark in the depths of his heart and inspired the spirituality of creation. One morning or one night, it pours out with the tip of the pen.However, the poet’s emotion, content and style of poems have changed compared with the Tsinghua Garden era, just as Wang Zuoliang said: “I found that Liangzheng’s poetry style has changed. He walked from Changsha to Kunming and saw China’s The truth of the inland, this is more realistic than some of our other classmates who traveled by sea. His poems have a bit of earthiness, and the language is also tough." As written based on the scenes and customs on the migration road In the famous poem "Departure", Mu Dan wrote:

In Junshanpu, the children sat on the dark high threshold and basked in the sun, never thinking about their fate... In the Taizi Temple, the skinny yellow cow turned up the dirt and dung, and a pair of butterflies flew over its back to hide in the flowering The vegetable fields...in Shimen Bridge, in Taoyuan, in Zhengjiayi, in Maojiaxi...the vast number of Chinese people live in our campsites. During a festival, they struggle and reproduce with sweat! We have different dreams, covering the Yuanjiang River like a thick fog, but every day and every night, the Yuanjiang River is a bright road, and endless emotions are rooted in the land!

O painful dawn!Let's get up, let's walk through the dense tung trees, masson pine, and rich hilly areas, cheering and silent, running on both sides of the river. During the period when the School of Liberal Arts of Southwest Associated University was temporarily established in Mengzi, Mu Dan became one of the backbone and main contributors of the "Nanhu Poetry Club".During this period, under the guidance and influence of a large number of famous professors and poets such as Zhu Ziqing, Wen Yiduo, Wu Mi, Ye Gongchao, Feng Zhi, Bian Zhilin, especially the British William Empson, Mu Dan began to read a lot of Eliot, Austrian The works of foreign poets such as Deng Deng systematically contacted British modern poetry and poetry theory, and found a way to combine "contemporary sensitivity" with the current reality, and the quality of poetry creation has undergone a leap-forward improvement.Regarding this experience and the changes in poetry art, Xie Mian once made such a comment: "If Peking University during the 'May 4th' period is compared to the 'cradle of new Chinese poetry', Southwest Associated University at this time can also be compared In order to revitalize and develop the new land of modern Chinese poetry, a group of young students, under the guidance of famous teachers at home and abroad, once again burst out with enthusiasm for building new Chinese poetry. Mu Dan is the most active, active and representative of them According to relevant materials, it was here that he developed a keen interest in Yeats, Eliot, Auden and even Dylan Thomas. Under the influence of the master, a group of young people including Mu Dan Thanks to the poet's input, the new history of Chinese poetry has opened a new page worth remembering." Xie Mian is worthy of being a first-class modern poetry theorist in China. The background and reason of the birth are revealed together, giving a proper historical position, and predicting that "there will not be many poets like Mu Dan who left memorable and even proud footprints in their short life", which is really true. The profuse secular society and the chaotic poetry critics have rare insights. In 1940, Mu Dan stayed on as a teaching assistant after graduating from the Foreign Languages ​​Department of Southwest Associated University.During this period, his elder brother Zha Liangzhao was serving as the professor of Southwestern United Masters Fan College and the dean of the UNU. When later generations mentioned Zha Liangzheng, they were often confused with Zha Liangzhao, who was 21 years older than him.In fact, Zha Liangzheng was only a student and a young teaching assistant at the United Nations University. He had no status in the professor team of masters such as Lin, at least far less eye-catching than his brother Zha Liangzhao. If you look at that In Mei Yiqi's diary during that period, Zha Liangzhao's name kept appearing and some details were recorded.At this time, Cha Liangzheng was only famous among campus students and some young people who loved poetry for his poems written under the pseudonym Mu Dan.In the following years, as a poet deeply influenced by Western poetry theory, Mu Dan published "Chorus" and "Lyric in the Air-raid Shelter" in Hong Kong's "Ta Kung Pao" Literary Supplement and Kunming's "Wenju" and other newspapers. Poetry", "From Emptiness to Fullness", "Praise", "Eight Poems" and other representative works have attracted wider attention from the world.During this period, China's war of resistance has entered the most difficult stage of confrontation between the enemy and the enemy. China's most elite land has been lost. Although the people are ragged and blood-stained, poverty and suffering entangle the Chinese nation to the death.However, the soldiers and civilians of the Chinese Kuomintang, who were put to death and survived, have realized that in the desperate struggle of blood and fire, the Chinese nation has not only not been crushed by the Japanese kid, but has risen even more and seen a glimmer of victory.As a young poet, Mu Dan, on his way back to Kunming school from Sichuan Xuyong branch school at the turn of summer and autumn in 1941, he witnessed the dilapidated land, mountains and rivers and the people's life difficulties. From the perspective, we can feel the spirit of the people's rise and the hope of victory in the War of Resistance.Amidst the surge of sorrow and joy, Mu Dan completed his "Praise" poem with profound artistic conception, boundless and magnificent:

Endless mountains and ups and downs, rivers and grasslands, countless densely packed villages, cocks crowing and dogs barking, one after another in the originally desolate land of Asia, where the dry wind howls in the vastness of wild grass, in the low pressure Under the dark clouds sing the monotonous eastward water, in the melancholy forest there are countless buried ages. I want to embrace you with everything, you, the people I see everywhere, the people who live in shame, the people who are bent, I want to embrace you one by one with bloody hands.Because a nation has risen. The same is the wind of this long age, the same is the endless moans and cold that spread from the slumped eaves, it sings on the top of a withered tree, it blows through the barren swamp, reeds and insects Ming, the same is the sound of the flying crow.

When I walked by, stood on the road and hesitated, I hesitated for many years of shameful history, still waiting in this vast mountain and river, waiting, our silent pain is too much, but a nation has risen, but a nation has already risen stand up! In the desolate, sad, majestic, and painful lines with a passionate melody, there is a sublime and upright force of rituals, and the repeated lines of "because a nation has risen" in each stanza make people sing The chanter can truly feel the surging blood and the rising figure of the nation, as well as the jubilation of the victorious song about to be played under the fluttering spiritual flag.As soon as this "Praise" poem, which was drawn from the poet's heart and intertwined with blood and tears, was published, it lit up the Chinese poetry circle like a dazzling star. It was the birth of this poem that established the poet Mu Dan's not only It is the honorable position of "the first-rate poetic talent and the first-rate poet". In the 1980s, thirty years after the starlight of the poet Mu Dan was obscured by dark clouds, this poem once again attracted the attention of the world and was selected into middle school textbooks.Many modern poetry critics call him the most outstanding representative of the "Nine Leaf School" poet group, and Peking University professor Xie Mian even called Mu Dan the first person in modern poetry and a bright star in the sky.