The literary era since 1979

August 8, Lu Xun Academy of Literature.

Yu Hua walked back to the dormitory in slippers, holding a basin full of water in her hand and a towel around her neck.

"It's a hot day!"

"you do not say!"

Wang Shuo wiped the sweat from his forehead. Even though there was an electric fan in the room, it only blew out hot air.

"Here, let me lend you this towel to wipe yourself."

Yu Hua put the towel into the basin to soak, then wrung it dry deftly.

"Thanks!"

Wang Shuo took the towel from him.

"Are you still writing that crappy love story of yours?"

Yu Hua leaned over and saw a pile of manuscripts of "Half Flame Half Sea Water" on the table.

Wang Shuo rolled his eyes, "How can you talk like that? How did this become a broken love story?"

Yu Hua curled her lips and said, "A female college student falls in love with a gangster, and is deeply trapped in the quagmire, unable to extricate herself, and even commits suicide for him. Isn't this a bad story? Can't you write something good, praising love? If that doesn't work, just write a love tragedy like "Stewardess"."

"You don't understand this."

Wang Shuo smiled and said, "This is called the 'downward freedom' that is unique to women."

"What do you mean?"

Yu Hua looked confused.

Wang Shuo wiped his face with a towel. "Beauvoir once said in The Second Sex that 'freedom downwards' is not real freedom. Women are always surrounded by irresistible temptations. They are not asked to strive upwards, but are only encouraged to slide down to reach bliss. When she finds out that she has been fooled by the mirage, it is already too late. Her strength has been exhausted in the failed adventure."

"Ha, that's interesting!"

Yu Hua carefully examined you from head to toe. "When you've been away for three days, you should look at you with new eyes. I didn't expect that after you joined the literary creation class, you not only speak in a literary style, but also can quote from classics. I really didn't expect that."

"That's right. You guys are making progress, but I can't stand still!"

Wang Shuo touched his nose and said, "But I didn't see these words. Teacher Fang said them after reading my manuscript."

Yu Hua recalled the scene of Fangyan coming to Lu Xun Academy of Literature to teach a few days ago, and then looked around, very surprised:
"Where are Tiesheng and Acheng?"

"I went to the editorial department with Teacher Fang to talk to Hai Yan about the script of Die Hard."

Wang Shuo handed the towel back.

Yu Hua sighed, "So that's how it is. No wonder I haven't seen them this morning."

The two chatted in the dormitory for a while, but Shi Tiesheng and Zhong Acheng still did not come back. Until they talked about the TV series "Stewardess" being broadcast too late and missing the Golden Eagle Awards, they finally returned to the dormitory, each of them holding a sample issue of the magazine in their hands.

"This is?"

"Chinese Writers."

"Isn't this the magazine that published "Transparent Carrot" and "May 19 Long Shot"?

Wang Shuo recognized it at the first sight.

"This is it."

Yu Hua was puzzled because this issue of "Chinese Writers" was published nearly a week later than the previous one.

Shi Tiesheng explained with a smile that "Chinese Writers" had already completed a series of work including typesetting design, and the only thing left was printing. However, because they received Fangyan's latest work at the last minute, the original plan was naturally disrupted.

"Is there a novel by Mr. Fang in this issue?!"

Yu Hua was stunned. "And it's your favorite magical realism. No, to be more precise, it's the hallucination realism that Yanzi wrote based on it."

Shi Tiesheng opened "Chinese Writers" and skillfully found the page where the dialect novels were located.

"Hallucinatory realism?!"

Yu Hua, Wang Shuo and others were shocked. They had never heard of this special term before and they became interested all of a sudden.

At the same time, students who happened to pass by in the corridor heard the noise. Some ran into the house excitedly, while others ran around to tell each other and spread this amazing good news. Students in the neighboring dormitories and even the entire dormitory were alarmed and swarmed over.

In an instant, Shi Tiesheng's small dormitory for four was packed with people, and there was almost no place to stand.

But the crowd did not feel crowded at all. Their eyes were fixed on the "Chinese Writers" that was being circulated.

Just like in "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Marquez, he fictionalized a town called Macondo, which is the hometown of the Buendía family.

Faulkner created a place called Yoknapatawpha County, and the dialect also has its own real and imaginary town, but this town is different from Macondo and Yoknapatawpha County. It is a "global village" that brings together different regions and races from all over the world.

"hiss!"

“It looks like magical realism, but I always feel like something is wrong?”

"It's not written in the editor's draft. This is a dream-like novel that combines the techniques of magical realism with the narrative of Chinese dream culture."

"........."

Hearing the sound of heated discussions, Shi Tiesheng looked at Yu Hua who was watching fascinatedly:
"how do you feel?"

"I read the same feeling I had when I watched Snow Country: violence, ruthlessness, and indifference. Especially the hunting scene at the end. The snow under the sun should have been the warmest, and misunderstandings and barriers began to melt like ice and snow. But I didn't expect that the cold bullet brushed past the protagonist and pierced the elk. It was the coldest and darkest scene."

Yu Hua's tone was full of admiration.

"Yes, a bad guy did a good thing before dying, that's good, a good guy did a bad thing, that's evil, but this 'evil' is still unfounded, framed, but everyone knows that he may have been wronged, but they all made a mistake, so when the truth is revealed, they will all remain silent."

“I had the same feeling when I read another novel by Marquez.”

"Which one?"

"A Murder Premonition."

Yu Hua was talking about Marquez's most widely circulated and influential novel after "One Hundred Years of Solitude".

It tells the story of the wedding of a rich businessman and a poor girl. On the night of their wedding, the rich businessman discovered that his wife was not a virgin, and in a fit of anger he sent the bride back to her parents' home. Under questioning from her family, the bride claimed that the person who destroyed her chastity was the protagonist Santiago.

The bride's two brothers felt that the family's honor was insulted, so they took a butcher knife and went to the protagonist's home to seek revenge, and told the residents of the town that they were going to kill Santiago. The residents of the town basically knew the news of the murder, but no one stopped the two brothers from seeking revenge, nor did they inform Santiago, who was completely unaware of the killing, and no one doubted the authenticity of the whole thing.

Because apart from the bride's testimony, there was no evidence to prove that Santiago had taken the girl's virginity.

As a result, everyone in the town knew that someone was going to kill Santiago, but he was brutally murdered without knowing it.

"Everyone knew someone was trying to kill him, but he still died."

Shi Tiesheng said: "In Yan Zi's "Hunting", everyone knows that he was wronged, but everyone hopes that he can die like an elk."

"You always say that my novels are full of blood, cruelty, and indifference, but compared to Teacher Fang, they are nothing!"

Yu Hua's face was full of excitement, and it was obvious that the writing style of "Hunting" touched his heart.

When these words were spoken, everyone agreed with them deeply. Reading them really made people's backs cold and horrified. It was really too cruel!
After reading it, I thought about it again and again. This story is obviously not complicated, but why does it make me feel so scared?
Everyone expressed their own opinions, but they all reached a consensus on one point, that is, in addition to the setting of the storyline, the author and the dialect also made excellent use of the so-called "illusionary realism" technique, making the atmosphere of indifference and despair between people permeate the entire novel.

"His way of blending fantasy and reality is different from Kafka, Faulkner, and Marquez. He combines traditional Chinese narrative art with modern realism. He has created a kind of oriental magical realist narrative!"

Shi Tiesheng's evaluation was agreed, affirmed and supported by many people present.

Especially for avant-garde writers like Yu Hua, the "hallucination realism" of dialect seems to have opened a whole new door for them.

Magic realism can actually be written like this? (End of this chapter)