I will tell you about him.
In autumn, the season of shooting wild ducks begins. Thanks to my father's kind words to my mother, my mother promised me a few weeks off, so I had a good time.
..... That autumn, many people came to hunt with us. My favorite is Calais Cooper. I've seen many of his films, and he really doesn't look like his role. He is extremely handsome, gentle and amiable, polite, and has an innate unique noble bearing.
I remember once after hunting, we decided to do some shopping and walked into a shop. An old lady recognized Cooper and asked him to sign it as a souvenir: "Mr. Cooper, I like your movies so much." Do you know why? " Because you are the same in all movies. "
Cooper just smiled, signed his name and said to her, "Thank you, madam."
It is hardly a compliment if someone tells an actor that he plays the same role in every movie. But dad swore that Cooper would never tell the difference between words. I don't think so. Otherwise, why doesn't dad talk about it as long as Cooper is present, even though he likes to talk about the old woman?
Whenever we have lunch, the dishes are cooked with pheasants we hunt. Dad always talks to Cooper for a long time, but they are basically talking about hunting and Hollywood. Although they have nothing in common in temperament, they are close and harmonious, and both get real joy from the interaction, which can be seen from their tone of voice and eyes. They only have wives and children around them, and there is no one who needs to impress them strongly. That's good. Needless to say, but you should know that they are all big shots, and they are used to getting ahead, sometimes consciously and sometimes unconsciously. They are both heroes and idols of the times. They have never competed with each other, and there is no need to compete. Both of them had reached the peak at that time.
Many people assert that being with Cooper may be boring. Although I am a child, I have no such feeling at all. I also think he is "like everyone else", or a "handsome gentleman" who came to Hollywood, although he looks beautiful.
Cooper shoots with a rifle very well, as well as my father, or even better, but when he holds an ordinary shotgun in his hand, the calmness and confidence that were originally conducive to shooting turned him into a slow shooter, and so did his father. If he is a professional hunter, he is excellent, but as an amateur hunter, he is ordinary. Indeed, dad is still in trouble. He has a problem with his eyesight. Put on his glasses, it will take him a long time to see the pheasant clearly. Therefore, it is difficult to hit the target easily. It's like playing softball, standing on the farthest base of the field, a ball flew in, delayed to catch it, and finally had to catch it with an incredible jump, which could have been easily caught as long as it ran in time.
Ingrid bergman also came to Sun Valley this time. I first met Bergman on a Sunday. She was radiant, radiant. I have seen her film "Off and On". This is specially shown for my father. She is much more beautiful in person than in the movie.
Some actresses can fascinate their fans for a while. But Bergman can make this charm last forever.
Wow! It is almost impossible to reach her. Look, Howard Hawkes, Calais Cooper or my father is always around her. It's interesting to see them so full of energy when she is present.
Autumn has passed, and I must go back to Kieves, to a warm place, to my mother and to school. ...
I am eighteen years old and have graduated from middle school. I want to go to college. I'm thinking about my future ...
Of course, I have plans. I got good grades in middle school, so I can basically enter any university ... but what I want to do most is Hemingway's hero.
However, what kind of person should Hemingway's hero be? This can be answered by analyzing all Hemingway's works. But in the final analysis, there is a simple answer, Hemingway's owner is Hemingway himself, or the best thing in him. However, if you want to live a charming lifestyle like Hemingway's, you must be relaxed, noble and elegant under the most difficult circumstances, and at the same time earn money to support your family. You must also be able to write them all down. And the passport to a better life is genius, and genius is innate. In addition, you should master writing skills, which can be learned. I decided to be a writer. It's easy for me to say this today, but it was extremely difficult at that time.
"Dad, when you were young, which books had the greatest influence on you?" I asked him once during my summer vacation in Havana.
My question makes my father very happy. He gave me a list of books that I must read. So I began to study, and my father advised me to say, "study hard and deepen the development of characters and plots." In addition, reading is of course a pleasure. "
During the summer in Havana, I read all my father's favorite novels, from The Adventures of Harburg Finn to The Portrait of a Young Artist. Sometimes like my father, I read two or three novels at the same time. After that, my father asked me to read the works of Mo Bosang and Chekhov, the masters of short stories.
"You don't want to analyze their works, you just have to appreciate them and have fun from them."
One morning, my father said, "well, now try to write a short story yourself." Of course, you can't expect to write an amazing novel. "
I sat at the table, holding my father's sharpened pencil in my hand, and began to think and think. I looked out of the window, listening to the birds singing, listening to a female cat whining for the company of birds, listening to the rustling of pencils mechanically drawing something on paper. I chased away a cat, but another one appeared immediately.
I got a small typewriter from my father, and he was useless at that time. I slowly typed out a short story and showed it to my father. Dad put on his glasses and looked at it. I waited by, and he gave me a look after reading it. "Very well, pass the exam. Much better than when I was your age. There is only one place. If I were you, I would change it. " Then he pointed out to me what needs to be changed. It's about a bird that fell from its nest. Suddenly, thankfully, it found itself standing with its wings spread out and didn't break into pieces on the stone. He said, "What you wrote is:' The bird suddenly and unexpectedly understands that it can fly'. It is better to change' suddenly, unexpectedly' to' suddenly'. Try not to write too long, it will transfer the development of the plot. "
Dad smiled. It's been a long time since he smiled at me like that. "You are lucky, son. If you want to write, you must devote yourself to study, be strict with yourself and be imaginative. You have shown your imagination. You have succeeded once, so you should succeed again a thousand times. Imagination will not abandon people for a long time, or even never. "
"My God, in key west, life is really miserable." He went on to say, "Many people send me their works. I only need to look at the first page to conclude that he has no imagination and will never have it. " When I reply, I always make it clear in every letter that it is a lucky opportunity to master writing skills and write well. As for glory, it's more like winning the lottery. One in a million people are lucky. If you are born with this talent, no matter how strict you are with yourself, even if you master all the knowledge in the world, you can't help you. If something is mentioned in the letter, "Ladies and gentlemen, I can be an excellent engineer. However, I really want to write something like this, so I will answer him:' Maybe everyone is right, and you are likely to become an excellent engineer. You'd better forget the idea of becoming a writer. Giving up this idea will make you happy. "
"I have written hundreds of such letters. Later, my reply became shorter and shorter. Just say that writing is a hard job, and it is best not to get involved if possible. Maybe people will complain about me like this:' such a self-righteous son of a bitch, nine times out of ten, he didn't read anything I wrote. He thinks that since he can write, it is impossible for everyone to write.
"The most important thing is, son, I can guide you now, because it seems that it may not be in vain. I can say without arrogance that I know this business like the back of my hand.
"I would have wanted to write less. Writing is not as easy for me as it used to be, but if I can help you, it will be as happy for me as writing by myself. Let's celebrate. "
As far as I can remember, only once was my father so satisfied with me. Once I shared the championship with someone in a shooting competition. When my short story won the first prize in the school competition, he was sure that there was another big man in our family.
In fact, Turgenev deserves this award. This is his short story. I just copied it and changed the location of the plot and the names of the characters. I remember, I copied it from a book that my father didn't have time to finish reading. I said he didn't finish reading it, because there were still many pages left. ...
When he found me plagiarizing, I was lucky that I was not with him. Later, someone told me and asked him, is your son Gregory writing? "Yes;" He answered proudly at once and smiled. This is his professional smile, always fascinating. "Gregory wrote a check, although he didn't write it very well." Needless to say, everyone laughed.
Dad often said that before he started writing, he was always clearly aware of how sentences were formed in his mind. He always tries to write this sentence in different ways. Then choose the best plan. He pointed out that when his character speaks, words gush out. Sometimes, the typewriter can't keep up with the speech. Therefore, I don't understand why dad wrote to critics in the late 1940s and 1950s, saying that ... a writer's job was "hard work" and so on, hoping to arouse their pity for him with these words.
Now I understand, what Dad means is that he is not as easy to write as before. It used to be a gusher, but now it needs to be pumped. His extraordinary sensitivity to language did not betray him. Besides, it goes without saying that he is more experienced and wise. However, his earlier reckless attitude has been lost. The world no longer flows in his mind like a purifier. If he is purified in the purifier, he will be a truly excellent person. He is no longer a poet ... he has become a craftsman, complaining about his fate and sighing that his plan has come to nothing.
Except for a short period of time. At that time, an Italian young woman from a rich family visited her father's grange in Cuba, and her father had a Platonic admiration for her, so the door of her creation reopened. During this period, my father finished The Old Man and the Sea, and the first and third chapters of his unfinished work "Island in Rapids". The Nobel Committee pointed out that he was full of worries about the fate of mankind and sympathy for people, and thought it was "the development of creation" and the result of his new fantasy. This new illusion is that he realizes that his talent has been exhausted and he doesn't know how to live in reality, because he knows how many other people with little talent are still alive.
He always wants to win, and he can't stand failure. He often says to me, "Son, success depends on yourself." Or, "Do you know how to gamble? Always keep moving. " Perhaps, when his talent runs out, he understands the method of gambling, and winning or losing depends entirely on fate.
He has everything in his life. When he was young, he was as beautiful as a movie star and was often surrounded by women. They will never believe the way they worship him unless they see it with their own eyes. He was born extremely sensitive, strong, energetic and optimistic, which enabled him to recover from physical and mental trauma without caring about his own body. And this kind of trauma, if endured by weak-willed people, is likely to destroy them. He is a man with rich imagination and sound thinking ability, and can think calmly when things happen-people with these qualities are rare at the same time. So his success is almost natural. Genetic advantage enabled him to recover after being seriously injured and dying.
However, after the publication of For Whom the Bell Tolls, people like him find that their talents are getting worse and worse, and they get angry easily and can't control themselves. Shouldn't it be weird? If a person has all the above qualities and is good at describing vividly what can be understood because of these qualities, it is impossible to show exaggeration. But if the talent is exhausted, it is entirely possible.
Later, like Xiao Yangchun, his genius returned and a masterpiece was born. Although the scale is not large (because the short spring weather cannot produce large-scale works), it is full of love, insight and truth. But then-forever-long autumn and cold winter.
If you knew my father when he was young, you wouldn't love him or worship him, but when he is old, you will only recall his past sadly, or you will only pity him because you remember how beautiful he was when he was young!
In any case, he won't look for a career where he can see his aging and be indifferent. But anyone with his talent, insight into life and deep and rich imagination, I'm afraid it's hard to do this. ...