Chapter 48 Section 3 From Chicago to Nankai Campus

Mu Dan entered the University of Chicago because his girlfriend Zhou Yuliang had already studied there. Zhou Yuliang was originally from Dongzhi, Anhui. His great-grandfather Zhou Fu made his fortune in Li Hongzhang's Huai army. In the late Qing Dynasty, he successively served as the governor of Shandong and the governor of Liangjiang.Grandfather Zhou Xuehai, a Jinshi in 1892, went to Zhejiang as an alternate Taoist official, and his biography is in the "Drafts of Qing History".Brothers Zhou Xuehai and Zhou Xuexi used to be teachers of Li Ciming, and Li said in his diary that the Zhou brothers had no aristocratic spirit.Zhou Xuehai loves medicine and has published three episodes of "Zhou's Medical Series".Zhou Yuliang's father, Zhou Shutao, was a famous national industrialist and bibliophile, and later moved to Qingdao and Tianjin. After the founding of New China, he served as the deputy mayor of Tianjin and the vice chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.

Zhou Yuliang has ten brothers and sisters, namely: eldest son Zhou Yiliang, second son Zhou Jueliang, third son Zhou Genliang, fourth son Zhou Gaoliang, fifth son Zhou Yiliang, sixth son Zhou Zhiliang, seventh son Zhou Jingliang, eldest daughter Zhou Xunliang, second daughter Zhou Yu Liang, and the third daughter, Zhou Yuliang.Because it is a well-known family and a wealthy and scholarly family, the ten brothers and sisters are all well-educated.Among them, Zhou Yiliang, Zhou Jueliang, Zhou Genliang, Zhou Gaoliang, and Zhou Yuliang all later became famous professors and scholars. , I often see people from the Zhou family.And Zhou Yuliang’s eldest brother, Zhou Yiliang, was even more famous for a while. He was considered by the academic circles to be the most capable candidate to inherit Chen Yinke’s academic mantle. Sweeping the floor, completely insulated from Chen Yinke's academic mantle.Zhou Jueliang was born in the Department of Foreign Languages ​​and Literatures of Tsinghua University, and was in the same class as Mu Dan. After the war, he and Wang Zuoliang, another classmate of Mu Dans, served as professors of the Department of Foreign Languages ​​and Literatures of Tsinghua University.It was precisely because of this relationship that Mu Dan met Zhou Yuliang, his younger sister who was a graduate student in the Biology Department of Yenching University at the home of Zhou Jueliang in 1946, and they quickly established a relationship. At the end of 1948, Zhou Yuliang went to the Department of Biology of the University of Chicago to study for a Ph.D., and Mu Dan then entered the University of Chicago to study, which was logical.

Since the 1920s and 1930s, the University of Chicago has been one of the main gathering places for Chinese students studying abroad.If divided by a broad historical framework, people like Rao Yutai, Ye Qisun, and Cha Liangzhao who studied here before the war belong to the first generation, while those who entered the school after the war should be counted as the second generation, and the number of second-generation students is far It is several times better than the first generation.When Mu Dan entered the campus of the University of Chicago, Yang Zhenning, Li Zhengdao, Li Zhiwei, Zou Xun, Lu Yizhuang and his wife, Zhou Yuliang’s second brother Zhou Jueliang, Fu Sinian’s niece and Fu Lehuan’s younger sister Fu Leshu were studying and visiting here. , Chen Mengjia's wife Zhao Luorui, Wang Yitong, Lou Anji's family who just transferred to the University of Chicago from Harvard University to teach Chinese, and Chen Shiingshen who taught mathematics at the University of Chicago. Wu Ningkun et al.Many years later, Wu Ningkun recalled: "In March 1948, after I graduated from Manchester College in Indiana, USA, I entered the Graduate School of the University of Chicago to study for a doctorate in English and American literature. At that time, dozens of Chinese graduate students were studying there. International apartment' boarding. I also lived there after I arrived at the school, and met many of them. Among the graduate students of the English Department, there are Zhao Luorui, Zhou Jueliang, Cha Liangzheng (Mu Dan) and others, all of whom are domestic English speakers. He is an elite in the world, my good teacher and helpful friend, and my acquaintance in times of need for decades." He also said: "Jueliang, I met once at the Southwest Associated University in Kunming, and his cousin and my Wangnian friend Professor Zhou Xuliang introduced him. At that time, he had already graduated from the Department of Foreign Languages ​​of Tsinghua University, and he stayed at the school as a teaching assistant. I was a freshman in the Department of Foreign Languages. It happened in 1939, and after nine years of separation, I became a classmate from a foreign country who passed by day and night.”

Wu Ningkun arrived at the University of Chicago more than a year earlier than Mu Dan, so she met and became friends with girls such as Zhou Yuliang and Zhao Luorui. Yu Zhida met, and Zhao's husband, Chen Mengjia, returned to China early. Zhou Yuliang's older brother, Zhou Jueliang, had been hired by Tsinghua University and returned to China. When he was in San Francisco, he met Mu Dan who was going to Chicago. The dozens of dollars he brought with him asked Zhou to bring them to Peiping's mother.It should be said that when Mu Dan entered the gate of the Chicago campus, the climax of studying in the United States after the war had receded, and it was the last moment to decide whether to leave or stay, return to the mainland, or go to Taiwan.

On December 23, 1949, Mu Dan and Zhou Yuliang married in Jacksonville, Florida. The wedding ceremony was extremely simple. After registration at the city hall, Zhou Yuliang's fourth brother, who was studying animals at Harvard University, Zhou Gaoliang, who is engaged in postdoctoral research at the center, and two American tutors are witnesses.After marriage, the couple lived in a small hotel for a week before returning to the University of Chicago. First they shared an apartment with Li Zhiwei from the Department of Economics at the University of Chicago, and then they shared a two-room apartment with Wu Ningkun.It was this experience of being classmates, eating together, and living together that enabled Mu Dan and his wife to form a lifelong friendship with Wu Ningkun, and they comforted each other on the road to life in the future, and spent a period of tragic and tragic years together.

In 1950, the overall situation in the country was settled, and the whereabouts of Mu Dan and his wife gradually became clear, that is, once Zhou and Liang received their doctorates, they would return to the motherland together to serve the new China led by the CCP.Because of this decision, while studying English and American literature, Mu Dan began to consciously choose Russian literature.During his time at the Southwest Associated University, Mu Dan had studied Russian, and for a time he took a Russian literature course taught by Russian expert Professor Liu Zerong.According to Fu Leshu, a classmate at the University of Chicago at the time, recalled: "This course is six hours a day, and there are classes every day. It starts from learning letters, and ends with being able to read Russian literature, newspaper news, and government documents. Taking this course, It’s equivalent to taking three years of Russian classes.” Fu Leshu, who graduated from the Institute of Liberal Arts at Peking University in June 1947, was devastated by this course because of her poor Russian skills, which was extremely painful.But in the eyes of Mu Dan, who was born in the Department of Foreign Languages, it is not that difficult. In a short time, his reading ability has surpassed that of graduate students in the United States. For this reason, he is often nominated by his tutor to do reading demonstrations in class.I think that during the Anti-Japanese War, Mu Dan walked from Changsha to Kunming, and once created a miracle of reciting an English dictionary.On the campus of the University of Chicago, the scene of the year was staged again. In one year, a Russian dictionary has been recited by Mu Dan.At this time, the living conditions of Mu Dan and Yang Zhenning, Li Zhengdao and other public-funded international students are very different. As a self-funded student, he has to work part-time, attend classes or self-study during the day, and go to a post office at night to do heavy work that only black people are willing to do. Work delivering mail packages to earn tuition and living expenses.Every day at three or four o'clock in the morning, I can go home to rest. In order to save money, whenever I go home from work, I just go to the black district to buy a 5-cent "hot dog" to satisfy my hunger. Sometimes I am too tired, and when I hold the "hot dog" , Feeling mixed with sadness and emotion, shed tears.

In 1951, Mu Dan and his wife, together with Yang Zhenning, Li Zhengdao, Zou Xun, Wu Ningkun and other Chinese students from the University of Chicago, organized a "China Research Group" to conduct research on the situation after the founding of New China.Regarding whether to return to China, Yang, Li and others are undecided, while Mu Dan and Wu Ningkun are inclined to return to China as soon as possible to welcome the great era that has come. While studying English and Russian literature, Mu Dan tried to translate his poems into English and published them in some American newspapers, which were very popular with readers and attracted the attention of poetry critics. In 1952, ALittle Treasury of World Poetry edited by American poet Herberc Creoreore included two works by Mu Dan. First works: "From Hungry China" (From Hungry China), some chapters in "Eight Poems" (There Is No Nearer Nearness), signed by Cha Liang-cheng.There are only two modern Chinese poets selected in this "Poetry Library", and the other is He Qifang, who once served as the director of the Institute of Literature of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

At the beginning of the summer of this year, Zhou Yuliang received a Ph.D. in biology.Not long after, Mu Dan and his wife received an invitation letter from National Taiwan University, inviting them to teach at National Taiwan University.Almost at the same time, he also received a letter of employment from the University of Delhi in India (South note: Shi Mudan's brother Zha Liangzhao is the provost of the University of Delhi).At that time, some universities in the southern United States often went to the University of Chicago to recruit teachers, and it would not be difficult to teach at the Southern University.However, the couple still decided to return to the mainland of the motherland. The reason is that the parents, brothers, sisters and other relatives of the couple are all in the mainland. After returning to China, they can also break new ground in their respective majors.In Mu Dan's heart, his concerns and dreams are more about his favorite poetry creation and translation of foreign literature, and he believes that if Chinese poetry wants to experience a "Renaissance", it must learn from the strengths and new artistic conception of foreign poetry, otherwise , There is no way out, and I am undoubtedly one of the bearers of this great mission and one of the sowers of the newly reclaimed land.This state of mind and ambition was clearly revealed in Mu Dan's letter to Du Yunxie, one of the "Nine Leaf School" poets who were formerly a classmate of the Southwest Associated University's Department of Foreign Languages ​​after returning to work in Shanxi. Lun's long poems produced "The Prisoner of Chillon" and "The Siege of Collins". This kind of narrative poem can be used as a reference for our poems. I also feel recently that if we want the Renaissance now, we have to translate it from foreign countries. Start. You said that your students read your "Winter and Spring" and were "difficult to understand". The level of appreciation is so low. It's really dumbfounding. So this is because he has only drank plain water and never tasted wine. Domestic Poetry is the slogan, the branch editorial, and the distance from poetry is far and far away...In this case, it is somewhat useful to change foreign poetry into Chinese poetry.”

However, the mainland of the motherland has changed color, because the CCP has made it clear that it is on the side of the Soviet Union, and it is not easy to return at this time.According to Zhou Yuliang’s recollection: “At that time, the foreign students were all holding passports from the Kuomintang government. It was also during the Korean War, and anti-China and anti-communist sentiments were in full swing in the United States. I was a doctor of science graduate, and the U.S. government did not allow me to return to mainland China.” So I had to try to ask for help, and asked around for a way to return.After tossing for a paragraph, I finally "found a Jewish lawyer and spent money to clear the immigration bureau, and my tutor, Professor B. The national defense of the United States is not in danger. In addition, our husband and wife said that returning to China is to settle in Hong Kong, and they were finally allowed to return to Hong Kong. Relatives in China have completed the immigration procedures for us in Hong Kong....In fact, we did not enter Hong Kong at all, and were directly picked up by a Chinese travel agency back to Shenzhen ".

In January 1953, Mu Dan and his wife traveled from Guangzhou to Shanghai and received a banquet hosted by Ba Jin and Xiao Shan. In the summer of 1940, when Mu Dan graduated from the Foreign Languages ​​Department of Southwest Associated University and stayed at the school as a teaching assistant, he met Chen Yunzhen, who had just been admitted to the Foreign Languages ​​Department of the Southwest Associated University, and Xiao Shan, who later became Mrs. Ba Jin, a famous modern writer.Because of their common love for literature and poetry, Mu Dan and Xiao Shan established a deep friendship.When Mu Dan and his wife returned from Chicago, Ba Jin was working at Pingming Publishing House in Shanghai. When old friends met, they talked about the dream of literature that had always been in their hearts.When Mu Dan said that he was going to translate and introduce Russian and Soviet literature to Chinese readers, he was encouraged by Ba Jin and Xiao Shan. He hoped that the translation would be published by Jiaopingming Publishing House as soon as possible, so as to adapt to the literary transformation under the new situation and the tastes of readers.After hearing this, Mu Dan agreed with gratitude.

At the end of February of this year, Mu Dan and his wife arrived in Peiping from Shanghai. Mu Dan temporarily stayed in the guest house of the Ministry of Education, and Zhou Yuliang returned home in Tianjin.While waiting for the assignment, Mu Dan began to translate "Principles of Literature" written by Timofeev of the Soviet Union.At this time, Zhao Luorui, who was studying at the University of Chicago, had returned to China and became the director of the Department of Western Languages ​​at Yenching University. In order to expand the camp of the Department of Western Languages, Zhao Luorui reported to President Lu Zhiwei for approval and invited Wu Ningkun to return to Yenching University to teach. In the first half of 1951, Wu Ningkun, who had not yet completed his doctoral dissertation, left the University of Chicago full of passion and the heavy harvest of several years of hard study abroad. He came to San Francisco in early July to wait for the ship to return home.At that time, Li Zhengdao, who had obtained a doctorate degree from the University of Chicago and was working as an assistant researcher and lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley, came to help pack his luggage when he heard the news. The words "Beijing Yenching University Wu Ningkun" and other words were written correctly. On the morning of July 18, Wu Ningkun boarded a cruise ship bound for Hong Kong, and his classmate and friend Li Zhengdao came to see him off to say goodbye.At the moment when the two said goodbye to each other, Wu Ningkun suddenly felt an inexplicable sadness and ominous omen, and blurted out a sentence: "Why don't you go back to work for New China?" Li Zhengdao didn't seem to care too much, smiled He laughed and said, "I don't want people to be brainwashed." Wu Ningkun seemed to have a feeling, but he didn't take it to heart, so he laughed it off.To Wu's surprise, the two met again at the State Guesthouse in Beijing Hotel 20 years later. As a Nobel Prize winner in physics, Li Zhengdao was naturally a distinguished guest welcomed by Chinese politicians, while Wu's identity was a The "ghosts and snakes" of "internal control" have just been released from the bullpen.Of course, this is something. Wu Ningkun came to Beijing by train from Guangzhou in mid-August of this year. He met Zhao Luorui, who had been separated for more than two years, and successfully entered the Department of Western Languages ​​of Yanda University to teach.At this time, Wu Ningkun felt a sense of uneasiness and restlessness in his heart. This feeling was definitely not due to Beijing and Yanda campus and personnel affairs, but a kind of visible but indistinguishable, flickering. in the background.In other words, when his travel-stained figure entered the city of Beijing, an ominous omen rushed into his heart, and it was Zhao Luorui who went to Beijing Qianmen Railway Station to meet him.Facing Zhao Luorui, the beauty of the generation who is like a fairy descended from the world in the minds of scholars, Mrs. Wu was "quite curious to see that her clothes had changed a lot. At the University of Chicago, she always liked to wear a simple and unpretentious suit. , looks elegant and pleasant. She is wearing a faded gray cloth Zhongshan suit in front of her, which is crumpled and nondescript. At first glance, she looks a little haggard, but her demeanor remains the same as before." Soon after Wu Ningkun arrived at the school, Zhao Luorui arranged for him to teach the fourth-grade courses of "History of British Literature" and "Advanced English Composition", and encouraged him to use the Marxist-Leninist perspective to teach the history of English literature.Unexpectedly, a few months later, the "Intellectuals Reform Movement" descended from the sky. The Beijing Municipal Party Committee's working group entered the campus and demanded that "everyone pass the test." ".As Zhao Zichen's daughter and Lu Zhiwei's goddaughter, Zhao Luorui was not spared and became the target of crusade, and because Wu Ningkun was introduced by Zhao from the United States, it was difficult for the Wu family to "pass".As a result, the courses taught were dismissed, and then in 1952, during the national adjustment of departments, Yanda University merged with most departments in the North, and was "assigned" to Nankai University.Regarding this experience, Wu Ningkun said in his recollection: "In July, Luo Rui visited and informed me about the distribution of teachers in the department. Among the five professors, she herself and the other three professors went to Peking University. Yu Dayi, Hu Jiayi, Wu Xinghua), the only place where I go is Nankai University in Tianjin. As soon as the words came out, she couldn't help but burst into tears. I understand her feelings. She was the one who asked me to give up my unfinished doctoral dissertation. How can she not feel sincerely guilty about how I can only let me be at the mercy of others, helpless and unpredictable? At the beginning, she was full of confidence to strengthen the English professor camp in Yanjing, with the English Department of University of Chicago as the leader Originally established an excellent English major. Now the ivory tower she built with her rare talents has been reduced to ashes in the storm, and her beautiful dreams have turned into mirrors, how can she not be heartbroken?" Although Zhao Luorui was heartbroken, the building was helpless. It has been poured out, except for "there is no words for each other, only a thousand lines of tears", what else can the husband say? Wu Ningkun was kicked out of the Yanda campus by the authorities. In November 1952, in the bleak autumn wind, he took his old stepmother and simple luggage and drove from Qianmen Railway Station to Tianjin to teach in the Department of Foreign Languages ​​of Nankai University.Because of this fate, when Wu Ningkun learned the news that his classmates and friends Mu Dan and his wife had returned to China, when the school lacked teachers and urgently needed to employ people, the Mu Dan couple was established in 1953 with the help of Wu and the approval of the school and the Ministry of Education. In May, they both entered Nankai University, with Mu Dan as an associate professor in the Department of Foreign Languages ​​and Zhou Yuliang as an associate professor in the Department of Biology.The young couple had accomplished what they had learned, and Ye Luo returned to her roots.After Mu Dan and his wife taught Nankai, they were assigned a dormitory next to Wu Ningkun, and they often visited and chatted with each other. Yang Zhenning, Li Zhengdao, etc. who decided to leave, as well as the past and future of Nankai University... some are memories, some are topics, and some are longings and dreams.The loneliness and loneliness when returning to the country disappeared, and there were only figures and ideals rising in the new world.During this period, due to the encouragement received from Ba Jin and his wife and the needs of the new situation, Mu Dan intensified his work on translating foreign masterpieces while teaching.Following the completion of the translation of Timofeev's "Principles of Literature" in December 1953, "Introduction to Literature" and "How to Analyze Literary Works", and published by Shanghai Pingming Publishing House presided over by Ba Jin, in February 1954, Mu Dan also translated and published "The Process of Literary Development" by Timomofiev of the Soviet Union in Pingming Publishing House.The reason why the above work was completed in such a short period of time is that Mu Dan had already read through the original Russian version and made some translation notes intermittently when he was at the University of Chicago.The publication of the above-mentioned three literary theory works immediately attracted the attention and praise of domestic literary theorists, and was selected by many colleges and universities as textbooks for the introduction to literature and loved by teachers and students. Of course, as a poet, Mu Dan's favorite thing is poetry creation and translation.In just nine months from March 1954 to the end of the year, Mu Dan translated and published Pushkin's Poltava, The Bronze Horseman, Prisoner of the Caucasus, Eugen "Onegin", "Pushkin's Lyric Poems" and other series of works, the translation and publication speed, high quality, and the vast readership are amazing. A "Pushkin craze" immediately set off in society. Mu Dan's reputation is not only It has attracted attention in the small circle of academic circles in the ivory tower, and has attracted widespread attention and pursuit among a wider range of readers, especially young students.This situation was revealed in Mu Dan's letter to his poet friend Du Yunxie a few years later: "I am sometimes encouraged by hearing that people appreciate Pushkin's poems. In short, it is a 'special' hobby, different from ordinary ones. A worker master in his thirties in the factory asked the teachers if they knew the translator (I didn’t know I was in Nantah) when he went to Nantah University to open his school. It's the little occasional things like this that give me strength." Because the translated poems were loved by the workers and masters, "increased strength", and added a sense of accomplishment in my heart, and I also wanted to use this performance, "I want to prove to those who haven't come back, how good it is to come back" Mu Dan did not expect that the spring of his life would soon pass, and the coming summer and winter would soon be.Many years later, Zhou Yuliang recalled: "It was the golden age of Liang Zheng's translation of poetry. At that time, he was in the prime of life and had great energy. He got up early and went to bed late, attended classes during the day, attended various meetings, and spent all his spare time in the evening Devote yourself to translating poems." Unfortunately, however, "top-notch business", "many books published", "good lectures", "popular with students", etc., have inadvertently attracted some people's "can't believe Allow".This mentality of incompatibility out of jealousy soon broke out with the help of political power.With the famous "Foreign Language Department Incident" at Nankai University at the end of 1954, Mu Dan's bad luck came. Before this famous incident, Nankai University, like all universities in the country, carried out endless "thought reform", cleared "Hu Shi's thought", "Yu Pingbo's research on wrong ideas" following waves of political movements one after another. "Wait for criticism.In order to set an example for the whole country, the leaders of Nankai University ingeniously set up a "Marxism-Leninism Night University", ordering all the professors of the school to attend lectures at this special university at night and accept "brainwashing" ideological reform.A young male teacher who was sent by Nankai to study at Renmin University of China returned to Nankai, and as a "professor's professor", he read aloud to professors from all departments of the school, including Wu Ningkun and Mu Dan, what Soviet experts taught when he was "advanced" at Renmin University. Notes on Marxism-Leninism.The school stipulates that all professors attending the class must take notes, and there will be an exam at the end of the term.For a while, the professors were very tired and bored. Some professors kept smoking during the lectures, and some simply resisted by dozing off.After more than a dozen nights in a row, the professors who attended the class began to express their dissatisfaction. The young and vigorous Wu Ningkun muttered to his older colleagues on the way home after the evening school: "This is really a compliment to the wisdom of the professors." The insult!" Unexpectedly, the next day, someone gave a small report, and the school leaders sent someone to find Wu Ningkun, accused him of "backward thinking", and severely warned him to only listen to the class honestly and not to talk or move, otherwise he would be opposed to Marxism-Leninism. activists dealt with. Because of this series of political reforms, criticisms, and learning movements, the warmth between people is getting weaker and weaker, and the relationship between colleagues and teachers and students is getting colder and colder, until it develops into mutual suspicion, trembling like walking on thin ice, and even intolerance. It is a cruel and terrifying situation that must put the other party to death.Faced with this harsh political and living environment, Mu Dan felt extremely uncomfortable and dull. In his letter to Xiao Shan, he expressed his indignation, disgust and helplessness in his heart: "This is a dull period. I think you have seen what I said in the last letter. My friends are so suspicious of each other. Du Yunxie not only feels that he has offended me, but also Wu Ningkun. When I mention this to Ningkun, where did he come from this time? The reason I feel depressed these days is because my classmates raised their opinions indiscriminately, and I have to review individualism during the meeting. I have to hold three or four afternoon meetings a week. At the end of each semester, it is a particularly uncomfortable time. I have a very good time. It’s meaningless, and I’m thinking: life is like this, let’s just end it soon.” As the saying goes, life is not easy, and death is also difficult.At the end of the year, the "foreign language department incident" finally broke out amidst long-term depression.