Cao Wenxuan believes that his new work "The Book of the King" is a break and a turning point among many children's fantasy works.

When I received the signed new book "The Book of the King" (the first "Huang Liuli") from Cao Wenxuan, I casually asked: "After so many years of writing books for children, do you have any What deep feelings? "Writing this kind of book is very nurturing," Cao Wenxuan replied without thinking, followed by a burst of laughter.

On an afternoon in April, at a Tuscan Italian-themed restaurant in Zhengzhou’s new urban area, Cao Wenxuan started talking about his latest book "The Book of the King" and then gradually talked about his creation process of children's literature and his work on children's literature. concept.

I am not a qualified children’s literature writer

“I have always thought that I am not a particularly qualified children’s literature writer.” When talking about his children's literature creation, Cao Wenxuan made a slightly surprising point of view. Cao Wenxuan considers himself not entirely a children's literature writer. "Because first of all, I have a large number of works that are traditional literary works in a pure sense. Furthermore, I think literature has nothing to do with genre. I just wrote some works that can be read by children. So some people ask me if I write children's literature in a pure sense. I don’t really care about the work. As long as children like it, it doesn’t matter what it is.” Therefore, there are his “Thatched Cottage” and “Bronze Sunflower”, which both adults and children like to see. .

What’s interesting is that adults often ask their children to read Cao Wenxuan’s children’s literature. In schools, teachers recommend it to their students after reading it, and the students spread the word among themselves after reading it. "This is different from other children's literature writers. Children often like other children's works, and teachers go to read them. The circulation process of my works is exactly the opposite." Cao Wenxuan said about this special phenomenon in the reception of his works Quite satisfied. Because he spans two generations at the same time, it is in this sense that Cao Wenxuan can ignore his identity as a children's literature writer.

I write about the past

Cao Wenxuan’s works, such as "Thatched Cottage" and "Bronze Sunflower", mostly focus on life in the 1950s and 1960s. Little is said about current children's lives. "When I went down to give a speech, some children asked me, 'Teacher Cao, why didn't you write about the lives of our children today?'" Cao Wenxuan recalled. Regarding this problem, Cao Wenxuan believes that this is caused by adult realistic literary concepts. He emphasized that “because some people believe that a work’s focus on reality is reflected in its focus on today’s things,” these concepts are also instilled in children. In people's inherent concept, realism means writing about what is happening now, which is wrong. "Realism has nothing to do with writing about yesterday or today, so realism has nothing to do with whether to write about reality. Realism is not equal to reality."

So, for Cao Wenxuan, the past life has not devalued. "There is no hierarchical difference between life in the past and life now. There is no reason to say that life now is more valuable than life in the past." When a reporter asked whether today's children can understand life in the past, Cao Wenxuan said confidently: " I have heard from many parents that their children were in tears after watching "Bronze Sunflower"." Cao Wenxuan then delved into the deeper reasons, "We should see a basic premise, that is, basic human nature has not changed; this is. The reason why people today can still read "A Dream of Red Mansions" and appreciate Lu Xun's works."

The figure of Lu Xun behind the works

Lu Xun is the writer who has the greatest influence on Cao Wenxuan. When talking about which writers were influenced by him in his creative process, Cao Wenxuan said: "Now, in my works, you may not be able to see the traces left by Lu Xun. What can be seen is more that there are A little bit of Shen Congwen, a little bit of Kawabata Yasunari. In fact, the writer who had the greatest influence on me was Lu Xun, because I didn’t have any good books when I was a child. Of course, when I write today, I don’t have any good books. Due to various factors, the traces of Lu Xun cannot be clearly seen, but he has always stood as a huge and powerful figure behind my works."

When talking about Lu Xun's influence on specific aspects of his works. Cao Wenxuan feels that although his works are beautiful, the sadness in them, as well as his concern for natural scenery and attention to language, are all related to Lu Xun.

"Lu Xun's influence on me was not only spiritual, but also gave me some understanding of literature and artistry. I even learned some novel writing techniques from Lu Xun. For example, Lu Xun's line drawing skills are very good. If I talk about my works If there are any characteristics in writing techniques, then I prefer or be good at line drawing."

Cao Wenxuan also talked about the difference between him and Lu Xun, "The difference between us is that Lu Xun looked at the darkness of society and the coldness of human nature with a cold eye; while I depicted more in my way. Brightness and vividness are related to the times and my growth."

The indispensable description of natural scenery

The description of natural scenery is a major feature of Cao Wenxuan's works. Cao Wenxuan affirmed this point unequivocally, and even had the urge to put a unique trademark on his work. "The reason why my works are my works is that one of the most important elements is the landscape element. From a writing point of view, it is very painful and almost impossible for me to leave the description of landscape."

When talking about the serious loss of descriptions of natural scenery in some current children's literature, including other literary works, Cao Wenxuan expressed his views on why there are not many descriptions of scenery in many works today: "Landscape description is the best reflection of writing skills. It is very difficult to describe natural scenery in an unconventional way and to integrate it with the mood, atmosphere and situation of the characters in the work. When I was a child, I copied a lot of descriptions The fragments of natural scenery have benefited me a lot from writing today, and the blessings I received from them cannot be expressed in words. Without these implants, my work today would never be so distinctive. The natural world itself is so vast. It constitutes an Upanishad. Natural scenery is an important part of my work. I think it is very bad for children to read works without scenery. ”

Current literature is very profound. The Disadvantages of Dimension

The topic of loss of landscape descriptions in literary works extends to the evaluation standards of literature. Cao Wenxuan believes that the current evaluation criteria for literary works are single, the Chinese classical standards are seriously lacking, and there is a phenomenon that literary creation does not emphasize enough literariness and artistry. "What we emphasize today is more about the profound content and thought of a work. Profundity has almost become or has become the only dimension of literary works. And this dimension is given by Western culture and is not derived from the development of our culture since ancient times. For example, our value system is elegance, artistic conception, etc. Our ancients always paid great attention to artistic forms, and profound thinking is not our standard."

“At the same time, profundity also hides an illogical logical relationship. It is not based on beauty, but on ugliness and evil. Today’s works like to write about evil because they are based on profundity. As a standard. And there is such a logical inference between ugliness and profundity.” Cao Wenxuan deeply regrets the singleness of current literary evaluation standards and the lack of classical and traditional discourse. He hopes that current literature can inherit classical things and make literary evaluation standards more literary and humanistic.

Let fantasy be full of literary color

Cao Wenxuan's recent work "The Book of the King" is a large-scale work, which is quite different from the beautiful style of previous children's literature. Cao Wenxuan's explanation is that "from the small bridge and flowing water in "Thatched Cottage" and the warm "Bronze Sunflower" to the majestic, golden and iron horse, full of romanticism and even violence, "The Book of the King" seems to be unable to see the difference between them. Connection. This is not actually the case, because I have written the fantasy work "Root Bird" before, and the same is true for several other short stories. In fact, "The Book of the King" and "The Grass House" are still on the same aesthetic platform."

Faced with the endless stream of domestic fantasy children's works, the emergence of "The Book of the King" attempts to reaffirm the concept of "fantasy literature". In Cao Wenxuan's view, the current fantasy literature pays attention to fantasy, but does not pay enough attention to literariness. The overall pattern of fantasy literature is imperfect. Some are good, but most fantasy literature is not literary enough. "I am a person who puts an extreme emphasis on literature. Therefore, I think fantasy must also be put within the framework of literature. If there is only fantasy, this is not my pursuit, nor is it my choice. There can be only writing Fantasy works, but what I like is the perfect combination of fantasy and literature. I advocate that fantasy must be based on the framework of literature. What I want to write now is not a fantasy work, but a fantasy literary work.

This is what I call a new direction." In this sense, Cao Wenxuan believes that his new work "The Book of the King" is a break and a turning point among many children's fantasy works.

While creating "The Book of the King" ", Cao Wenxuan tried to find "original fantasy" and convey its charm. "I think fantasy has different qualities. There are good fantasies and bad fantasies, and the value of fantasies is different. The real fantasy of mankind was in the early people's era. When I was writing "The Book of the King", through the research and archeology of anthropology experts, I carefully understood the fantasy and experience of the ancestors."

In the creation of children's literature Through continuous exploration, Cao Wenxuan gained more than just works, "Writing this kind of book is very nourishing and will move people; I think that being able to be moved often is a very important aspect for a person to maintain a good life state." "Cao Wenxuan expressed his deepest feelings in many years.