The first is thinking about the civil war. To borrow a sentence from the protagonist Zhao Guangling: We are a group of tamed lambs, wandering in the blood of our compatriots, without glory, only shame. In history, it is not uncommon for brothers to turn against each other. According to Liang Qichao's account of Li Hongzhang's meeting with Bismarck, they talked about military affairs. Li Hongzhang readily talked about how to eliminate Taiping rebels and bandits. Bismarck said through an interpreter: "We Europeans take advantage of our ability to fight against different kinds, and we can protect ourselves from the same kind of harm. Europeans don't call it that." If it is a heroic feat to defend our country, what about beating our compatriots? Revolutionary theory can follow the wishes of leaders, and everyone's irreconcilable position has legitimate reasons, the just coat of war and its distortion of human nature. Until 70 years later, in My Blood My Land, I broke away from the dog blood plot about the civil war in the past, from the correct political orientation, and read sincere humanity and reflection.
Secondly, the death of Li Gongpu and Mr Wen Yiduo and the influence of intellectuals on China People's Blood, which is an excellent part in the creation of My Blood and My Soil. The Republic of China was an era of brilliant knowledge and contention among masters. It is precisely because of these noble, pure and profound instructors that so many young students have joined the army, fought bravely and have no regrets, and that an intellectual like Fan Wen, who is full of conscience and sense of responsibility, has tried to return to the original historical truth. It is such a glorious period of knowledge that China's context began to recover after 30 years of silence.
Thirdly, this is the true attitude of Japan towards the most inhuman war in the history of the China people. This part is most worthy of our thinking and vigilance, including learning. This nation and the Chinese nation have extremely different national personalities, which doomed China, as the victorious party, to have much more and deeper sufferings and pains than them. As descendants of Bushido spirit, they are firm and cold. The Japanese don't remember the pain they caused to others like the Germans. On the contrary, they remember their failures and pains, and they know much more about China than we do. This war is not a war of a few militarists, but a war of the whole people. This book describes a Japanese veteran, Qiu Jifu-san, who survived the humanitarianism of China soldiers. He kept the fighting spirit and pursuit of a Japanese soldier all his life, and never forgot his mission, but he had no gratitude and guilt for the people of China. There are also interesting descriptions of Japanese comfort women. In our impression, Japanese comfort women are a group of women who are the most miserable, devastated and qualified to condemn the war in the world, but they are actually advocates of Japanese militarism baptism and have contributed to this war. I think this nation is strong and ruthless, so their economy can recover quickly after the war and squeeze into the world's strong forest. I think that if such a nation wants to spend its old age peacefully, it can only knock them down again, rather than relying on gratitude, kindness and tolerance in our national blood. It is not sensational that there will be a war between China and Japan. Therefore, I sincerely hope that China people can read my blood and my soil, and understand why they should boycott Japanese goods and work hard.
Fourth, respect individual life. So far, this concept is still relatively unfamiliar to many people in China. According to this book, China people don't pay attention to the remains of their comrades. When an American priest and a guard of honor held a sea burial ceremony for a soldier, the soldiers in China just watched and felt for the first time that someone would respect the body of an ordinary soldier in this way. On that day, I carved the name of every soldier in the whistle of the Burmese police. For decades, our warriors can only vaguely write on a certain inscription that the heroes of a certain era or a certain battle are immortal, with unknown names, ages and places of origin. How lucky the officers and men are to leave their names and records. These historical traces were destroyed in the Cultural Revolution. If we only measure the weight of history from the number of deaths, which country has as many as us? But if you ask me how many people died, I can't answer. How can a group without numbers and a hero without a name be immortal? Today, when the China shopping tour group flies around the world, the cash in the wallet
And the bank card makes them confident, is it still another interpretation of disrespect for individual life?
After reading "My Blood, My Soil", I specially consulted some anti-Japanese war materials, which was even more shocking. "My Blood, My Soil" is spread out with the battlefield in Yunnan and Burma as the background. The data of the Anti-Japanese War impressively record that there are three rivers and four waters in Hunan, a tragic front that once ran through the north and south of Hunan and finally extended to Yunnan and Myanmar. Then the battlefield between Yunnan and Burma is actually the end of the Anti-Japanese War, which is so magnificent and tragic in Fan Wen's works, and what kind of baptism of blood and fire has my hometown Hunan experienced?
Fan Wen said that only these veterans who participated in the anti-fascist war in the world are the most unusual. Yes, the victorious soldiers of no country in the world will suffer as many tests and hardships as they do. They are heroes of history, but they have become sinners of the people. There is no country in the world where the victorious soldiers have no names, look like them, and even don't know the number. The victorious soldiers of no country in the world will be as tenacious and pure as they are.
Tagore once said, "If you can't see the road under your feet in the dark, take off your ribs and use them as torches." Zhao Guangling, Liu Cangbi and Liao Zhihong in the book, Fu Xinde, Lu Wu and Li Changshu outside the book, and many heroes who came back from the dead, including my troubled grandfather, have a similar fate with Zhao Guangling, a major general officer of the Kuomintang, who is proficient in poetry and medicine. His children are farmers. None of them has his knowledge. It was they who took off their own ribs and lit up endless roads for our descendants.
My blood, my motherland, my feelings.
Canglangke
Although we are well aware that the Chinese nation has always lacked the backbone of "I recommend Xuanyuan with hot blood", it also lacks the determination and solemn and stirring of "an inch of mountains and rivers and an inch of blood, a hundred thousand teenagers and a hundred thousand soldiers". However, in Fan Wenxin's newly published novel My Blood and My Soil, I still can't hide the impulse that blood vessels are about to burst: "There are not enough weapons, take our blood. Without warm comfort, take our blood. Blood is all we have left. Free land should be irrigated with blood, and you and I have not forgotten it. "
Blood is always hot, but in the autumn when the nation is in danger, it can cool and solidify, become hard, and can stab the dagger of the aggressor.
We don't preach hatred, but we must never forget history.
Fan Wen is three years older than me. As a generation born in 1960, our impression of the war of resistance against Japan is that it is "very fun" from the movies such as tunnel warfare and mine warfare. I am a little older and can read by myself. After reading novels such as Biography of luliang heroes, King Kong of Fire, Biography of Heroes of New Children and Storms, I found that the war was actually "not so interesting". At the beginning of 2009, I was shocked to read "Soul of a Great Power" written by Deng Xian, which described the whole process from failure to victory when Chinese expeditionary forces entered Myanmar in the 1940s. Then, through movies such as "Bright Sword", "Defending Changsha" and "The Brave Go Out of Sichuan", I deeply felt the bitterness of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the suffering and unyielding of the Chinese nation, and began to reflect on all literary and artistic works describing war epics. Regrettably, this kind of reflection is often limited to the literati catching shadows on the wine table or being "tough". Fortunately, "this regret finally disappeared in this cool autumn, on the occasion of the 69th anniversary of the victory of China people War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, because of Fan Wen's My Blood and My Soil". This is a happy thing. " Literary criticism Jia Shu said.
At the press conference of the new book "My Blood and My Land" held in Beijing on September 14, 2004, some experts concluded that China's anti-Japanese war literature has made great achievements in subject matter, structure and text, but it also inevitably fell into the bottleneck of creation. Too old thinking mode, too single character plot and too narrow creative space have inevitably eroded the literary creativity of this theme to some extent. On the basis of combing and studying the existing literary achievements, excavating and possessing first-hand historical materials, My Blood and My Soil broke the traditional guiding principle of "ideology" in literary creation, integrated the fate of Chinese expeditionary veterans and modern intellectuals, and showed the pain, hesitation, suffering and glory of a generation of China backbone in the long historical changes before and after the Anti-Japanese War.
Of course, it is difficult and unnecessary to retell this story of hundreds of thousands of words in a limited space. Listen to what the model essay says-
Lang Ke: After the trilogy "Hidden Land" (Water Land, Compassion for the Earth and Song of the Earth) was a great success, how did you suddenly devote yourself to writing "My Blood and My Land", a heroic epic in which a generation of intellectuals fought bloody battles with the enemy in different historical periods during the national The National SouthWest Associated University period?
Fan Wen: Let me tell you two short stories first. In the early 1990s, I attended a pen meeting with several Beijing intellectuals in western Yunnan. When we arrived in Baoshan, the local people told us the story of the Chinese expeditionary force fighting against the Japanese devils here. A writer friend from Beijing was greatly surprised: How did the Japanese come to your Yunnan? I always thought Yunnan was the home front.
Li Changshu, a veteran living in Kunming, has participated in many important wars, such as Taierzhuang War, and is known as the "living fossil of Yunnan Army". But after his deeds were reported by a media in the province on 20 12, a retired history teacher found him and said, I didn't expect you to hit the Japanese.
I was shocked: how can a vast and magnificent history of saving the nation from extinction not be known? How come a group of anti-Japanese war veterans who fought bloody battles for national survival don't even know people like writers and history teachers?
In fact, people who have been to western Yunnan will be moved by the anti-Japanese battlefield and the dedication of Yunnan people to War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, whether it is the memorial cemetery in Tengchong or the battlefield in Songshan. The remains of the war are vivid, and the memory of the war has never been drowned by ruthless time. I remember my first contact with the history of the anti-Japanese war in western Yunnan. Also around the 1990s, I went to western Yunnan on business and saw a set of literature and history materials compiled by the local literature and history department. In fact, from then on, I began to make up the history I didn't learn in this book. During 1999, I once climbed Gaoligong Mountain on foot. In the weeds and bushes more than one person deep, I can still see Japanese trenches and collapsed bunkers. The local people told me the story of the Chinese expeditionary force countless times. But at that time, my mind was on Tibet and Tibetan culture. I have been wandering in Tibetan areas for ten years and wrote the next trilogy in Tibetan areas. However, the theme of the history of the anti-Japanese war in western Yunnan has been haunting me, and I may need an opportunity and an inspiration for writing.
In the autumn of 20 1 1, I was invited to Tengchong to participate in the "Loyalty and Righteousness Returning Home" public welfare activity of China Anti-Japanese Expeditionary Force. With the support of the government and the help of enthusiastic people from all walks of life, the remains of 19 expeditionary soldiers buried in Myanmar were fortunately excavated to welcome them home. It is called "lucky" because at least100000 people died in Myanmar during World War II. More than 60 years have passed, and these anti-Japanese athletes who died in foreign countries for national survival have almost been forgotten, ignored and left out in the cold. Finally, after the arrival of the 2 1 century, this dusty history was gradually uncovered by some conscientious people in China. Just like in a dusty old house, someone dug out a thick book, gently brushed the dust off it, and carefully opened the pages of Huang Yi-fragile pieces of paper, a piece of history that was deliberately hidden, and people full of heroic spirit slowly came to us.
The organizers invited a group of surviving anti-Japanese war veterans to meet the loyal souls of their comrades with us. When these plain-dressed and trembling veterans lined up in the Tengchong National Memorial Cemetery, when their old eyes welcomed the remains of their comrades-in-arms, and when those scattered souls finally returned to their homeland and were buried, I witnessed some earth-shattering shocks-tears fell from the sky and grief began from the heart. The world in Wan Li, which was just clear, turned into a downpour, and the dense rain fell to the ground with tears in people's eyes. Funeral in the rain seems to awaken people not to forget the rainy battlefield 66 years ago, the cry of a nation to save the country in that stormy world, the ordinary soldier who went to the anti-Japanese battlefield in sandals ... that was the first time I approached those anti-Japanese veterans who were as precious as national treasures and pandas. They have been forgotten for too long, just like the old father who was abandoned in the corner of the unfilial home.
If a person's life experience is a book, what about veterans?
For a writer, nothing can inspire rich imagination and respect for heroes more than exploring the old battlefield and facing a veteran of the Anti-Japanese War who has experienced vicissitudes.
20 10 I have been looking for a new creative direction after completing the "Tibet trilogy" for ten years. I don't need to surpass or break through anything, just need to prove that I am still alive. For a man who writes for a living, there is nothing to write about, just like a soldier who has no war to fight. Now, a group of old soldiers who have participated in the war are standing at the end of time and waving to me frequently. I feel it is my responsibility and obligation to recreate a history that has been covered up.
Lang Ke: You have been dormant for four years to write about my blood and my soil. It is said that during this period, you consulted various historical books, went deep into western Yunnan, interviewed many anti-Japanese war veterans, and went to Taiwan Province Province, Japan and other places to collect ideas? I heard that you also interviewed the old Fu Man Sindh, one of the prototypes of Zhao Guangling, the hero of the novel, and his descendants, who were called "living fossils of the Anti-Japanese War"?
Fan Wen: When it comes to veterans who have experienced wars, we always think of the famous saying: "Veterans will never die, but will only fade away." This is a process of "withering", which may not be fully presented by any writer. I interviewed about 20 veterans and collected and sorted out the life files of more than 50 veterans, involving anti-Japanese war veterans in Yunnan, Sichuan and Guizhou provinces. I went to those respectable veterans and found that their youngest was 88 years old (Tengchong veteran Lu) and the oldest was 1 15 years old (Longling veteran Fu Xinde). Facing them, I only have the regret of "meeting each other late". Most of the veterans are over 90 years old, and some are deaf and confused. Some people have long been disabled and confused. Of course, there are also veterans with clear thinking, tough back, firm eyes and vaguely recognizable military appearance. Their eyes can still penetrate the dust of history and see the posture of their former comrades on the battlefield. The battlefield in their hearts seems to be filled with smoke, and the victory flag with bullet holes is still flying. Unfortunately, however, in just one year's interview, I witnessed the "withering" of two veterans. Li Changshu, a veteran of Kunming, and Fu Xinde, a veteran of Longling, died one after another in less than half a year when I interviewed them. Old Li Man Changshu gave me a box of wine from his hometown, which contained asparagus carefully cultivated by the old man. Because he was surrounded by his family, he really didn't know how to repay the love from all walks of life, so he raised several pots of asparagus and distributed them to the volunteers who came to visit him. It seems that in the past, he was always reformed, supervised and responsible to the society. Although he has done so much for the country and the nation, this little genuine love from the human world is not suitable for him, and he is still a little nervous. I have been putting the can of asparagus he gave me in the study. When writing this book, I will often think of this veteran who participated in many major battles such as the bloody battle in Taierzhuang and the four major battles in Changsha. Although he has been in prison for more than 20 years, he is still elegant and gentle. In a poor and lonely life, he is quite open-minded and cheerful, just like this elegant and green asparagus, ordinary and ordinary. However, when you hear this 96-year-old man, you can clearly and accurately repeat the slogan of inspirational killing the enemy on the battlefield-"If you face the enemy and die, you will be remembered forever!" Better die than surrender and win glory for our country! Soldiers on the battlefield, regardless of life and death. Send things down, eat and drink. If you don't have enough money, ask your family for it. "At this time, you will feel that the blood of the iron man is not attenuated by half because of age. Even Fu Xinde, a 100-year-old veteran, lost his ability to speak when I visited him. He can only lie in bed all day, and his nearly 60-year-old son takes him out to bask in the sunshine in the afternoon, like an old baby, struggling in the chaotic world, silent in the gorgeous sunshine and opposing the footsteps of death. This Henan medical officer from the Battle of Songhu to the Battle of West Yunnan is a "walking dictionary" of the history of the Anti-Japanese War. At that time, he was called the longest-lived anti-Japanese war veteran in China. We can't imagine the history he witnessed, and the war he experienced was enough to make those who fabricated the "dog blood drama" of the Anti-Japanese War ashamed. However, the interview that day failed emotionally. The old man said nothing but lived in his own world. All historical information comes from the retelling of the old man's son-fortunately, the glory and suffering of parents will be passed down like blood. But the most amazing thing is that in the course of our conversation, Fu Xinde, an old man who has lost his language ability for several years and is like a vegetable, suddenly looked at me with pity eyes and said vaguely, "I hit the Japanese!" "
This sentence, the earth shook and the history penetrated.
The prototype of the protagonist Zhao Guangling in the book is actually a veteran named Lu Wu. The 97-year-old man now lives in the family building of Kungang. He is a sophomore in the law department of Dayun University, from Yunxian County, Lincang. The military and political departments of the National Government went to the school to recruit young students to join the army. At that time, because the Japanese used chemical weapons against the China army, many soldiers didn't know how to prevent them, so he chose "Kurt"-the specialty of chemical anti-virus. At that time, it was called the "Chemical Corps" of the military and political departments, and most of the instructors were people who came back from studying abroad. Later, the "Chemical Corps" was incorporated into the Whampoa Military Academy 15. Lu Wu was assigned to the war zone in World War II as soon as he graduated, and later returned to his hometown Lincang to fight guerrilla warfare. After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, he left the army automatically. At that time, he was a very literary young man who liked literature and drama performances, read many books by Lu Xun and Shen Congwen, and his thoughts were quite left-leaning. He almost went to Yan 'an because he wanted to go to Yan 'an for further study in Lu Yi. The progressive youth of that era hated social corruption and injustice and yearned for Yan 'an and revolution. In 1950s, he founded a drama club in Kunming by selling cakes, and also adapted The True Story of Ah Q into an opera to perform in Kunming. He told me more about Lu Xun and Shen Congwen when I interviewed him. How can such an anti-Japanese veteran not be awe-inspiring
As for going to Japan specially, it was after I finished writing the first draft of this book, because I also described the image of a Japanese veteran in the book. I want to do a writer's torture through this character: where is the historical crux of the dispute between China and Japan? Why doesn't Japan plead guilty to its crimes? What are the different fates of Chinese and Japanese veterans? -from the life-and-death struggle on the battlefield to the "fate confrontation" after becoming a veteran and resisting the "bloody drama of the war of resistance."
Lang Ke: On the occasion of the 83rd anniversary of the outbreak of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, on September 18, the new book release conference of My Blood and My Land was held in Beijing. What message does this convey? It is said that in addition to the leaders of the Federation of Literary and Art Circles, Writers Association and Publishing House, you also invited representatives of anti-Japanese war veterans to participate. Can you tell us something about the grand occasion?
Fan Wen: Zhang Fulin, a veteran who once participated in the first expedition of the Chinese Expeditionary Force to Myanmar and defeated savage mountain, later lived in Mandalay, Myanmar, has an unforgettable saying: "We are not afraid of death, but we are afraid of forgetting."
Therefore, "refusing to forget" is a theme I want to convey in this book. The publishing house chose the special anniversary of "September 18th" to launch this book, not because my novel is so important to the writing of China people's history of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, but because it hopes to arouse people's memories of that eventful time again in the name of literature. I also hope that China people will remember history and national humiliation. Just as many cities sounded the alarm on this day, as China people, we should never forget the shame of our nation and the great war of resistance of the China people.
On the same day, I was very moved to invite Mr. Lu, a veteran of the Beijing Anti-Japanese War, to attend my new book launch conference. The old man is a student of The National SouthWest Associated University History Department 1944 grade. When he graduated, all the boys in their grade were recruited into the army as translators or soldiers. At the press conference, the old man relived the years of blood and fire full of youthful passion, and let the participants feel the feelings of their generation again. A reporter came down to tell me that he couldn't help crying when he listened to the old man Lu recalling his experiences in the war. In fact, the history of life and destiny of every anti-Japanese war veteran is the history of our nation.
Lang Ke: You once said, "What I hope to discover in this work is the powerful and invincible unique charm of China culture, and take it as a writer's responsibility." Can you explain this sentence?
Fan Wen: At present, the re-excavation, discovery, combing, research and artistic expression of the history of the Anti-Japanese War are in the ascendant. As a writer, I first studied it with an attitude of respecting historical events. I can't avoid the pain point of history for political correctness. Secondly, as far as I know, China people's great war of resistance is not only a struggle by force, but also a cultural persistence. At that time, the Japanese army did not regard China's army as an equal opponent on the battlefield, but they were guilty and violent in the face of profound China culture. They are students who beat the teacher, but they know that they don't have the profound knowledge and self-restraint of the teacher. Japanese soldiers know very well that it is easier to conquer China militarily than China culturally. At the beginning of the war, they bombed Nankai University, looted libraries and laboratories in Peking University and Tsinghua, and later bombed the National Southwest Associated University, which moved to Kunming. National treasure masters Wen Yiduo and Hua almost died under Japanese bombing. No country's army would treat an important learning place so cruelly. This destruction of civilization and culture is the logic of brutal war that they try to change the national cohesion and cultural core of a country. "National subjugation and extinction" was a nightmare for China people in those days, and it was also a wake-up call for everyone in China who didn't want to be conquered people. If the war fails, it can be done again. The "species" have been changed and the culture has been extinct. This is a disaster that we can never recover. Fortunately, the traditional virtues of our nation, such as destroying the family, helping the poor, resisting foreign aggression and uniting with others, far exceeded the expectations of the strategic commanders of the Japanese Empire. Facing the culture of China, they will never learn well.