Fragmenting Modernisms China Studies

Edited by Glen Dudbridge Frank Pieke

VOLUME 24

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/CHS Fragmenting Modernisms

Chinese Wartime Literature, Art, and Film, 1937–49

By Carolyn FitzGerald

Leiden • boston 2013 Cover illustration: Ye Qianyu, “Stage Set,” from the 1940 sketch-cartoon series Wartime Chongqing.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

FitzGerald, Carolyn. Fragmenting modernisms : Chinese wartime literature, art, and film, 1937-49 / by Carolyn FitzGerald. pages cm. — (China studies ; v. 24) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-90-04-25098-7 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-90-04-25099-4 (e-book) 1. Chinese literature—20th century—History and criticism. 2. Sino-Japanese War, 1937–1945—Literature and the war. 3. Sino-Japanese War, 1937–1945—Art and the war. 4. China—History—Civil War, 1945–1949—Literature and the war. 5. China—History— Civil War, 1945–1949—Art and the war. 6. Motion pictures—China—History—20th century. 7. Art, Chinese—20th century. 8. Modernism (Literature)—China. 9. Modernism (Art)— China. I. Title.

PL2302.F58 2013 895.1’09005—dc23 2013003681

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This book is printed on acid-free paper. Contents

List of Illustrations ...... vii Acknowledgments ...... xi

Introduction Out of the Ashes: Towards a Wartime Aesthetics of Dissolution ...... 1

Chapter One A Sonnet in an Air-Raid Shelter: Mu Dan and the New Lyricism ...... 31

Chapter Two Intersections between Cartoon and National Art: Ye Qianyu’s Search for the Sinicized Cartoon ...... 79

Chapter Three Wang Zengqi’s Collection of Chance Encounters: The Shifting Essence of the Wartime Short Story ...... 125

Chapter Four Between Forgetting and the Repetitions of Memory: Fei Mu’s Aesthetics of Desolation in Spring in a Small Town ...... 169

Chapter Five Fei Ming’s After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane: Wartime Autobiography as History ...... 217

Epilogue Searching for Roots: Modernist Echoes in the Post-Mao Era ...... 265

Bibliography ...... 299 Index ...... 313

Plate Section

List of Illustrations

Fig. 1.1 Photograph of Wen Yiduo listening to a student reciting poetry during a February 1945 field trip to the town of Lunan. Photograph from Lianda: A Chinese University in War and Revolution, by John Israel ...... 33 Fig. 1.2 Photograph of Lianda students and teachers marching to Kunming. Photograph from Lianda: A Chinese University in War and Revolution, by John Israel ...... 37 Fig. 1.3 National Changsha Temporary University Hunan— Guizhou-Sichuan Traveling Corps arrives in the city of Kunming ...... 38 Fig. 2.1 National Cartoon Propaganda Corps member Zhang Leping painting a wall mural of soldiers (1938) ...... 80 Fig. 2.2 Truck covered in cartoon propaganda, used to accompany dramatic performances promoting the cause of resistance (1938) ...... 80 Fig. 2.3 Photograph of Ye Qianyu (left) with Yue Yiqin (right) in front of the propaganda poster, “Four Heroes of the Air Force” ...... 83 Fig. 2.4 Ye Qianyu, illustrated cover of first edition of Resistance Cartoons, January 1938 ...... 85 Fig. 2.5 Ye Qianyu, “Living for Hatred,” illustrated cover of Resistance Cartoons, March 15, 1938 ...... Plate Section Fig. 2.6 George McManus, “Bringing up Father,” Feb. 10, 1935 ...... 87 Fig. 2.7 Ye Qianyu, “Quitting Alcohol,” from his cartoon strip Mr. Wang ...... 88 Fig. 2.8 Ye Qianyu, “Abandon the Civilian Life, Join the Army,” Xin dongxiang 2.10 (30 June 1939) ...... 90 Fig. 2.9 Ye Qianyu, “Stage Set,” from the 1940 sketch-cartoon series Wartime Chongqing ...... 94 Fig. 2.10 Ye Qianyu, “The Artery of Transportation in the Hinterland,” from Wartime Chongqing ...... 96 Fig. 2.11 Ye Qianyu, “After Exhaustive Bombing,” from Wartime Chongqing ...... 97 viii list of illustrations

Fig. 2.12 Ye Qianyu, “New Appreciation for Antiques,” from Wartime Chongqing ...... 100 Fig. 2.13 Ye Qianyu, “Frontline at Shatian,” from his 1942 sketch-cartoon series Escape from Hong Kong ...... 103 Fig. 2.14 Ye Qianyu, “Inspection,” from Escape from Hong Kong ...... 104 Fig. 2.15 Ye Qianyu, “Leaving Kowloon,” from Escape from Hong Kong ...... 105 Fig. 2.16 Ye Qianyu, “The Road to Free China,” from Escape from Hong Kong ...... 106 Fig. 2.17 Ye Qianyu, Cockfight, 1942 painting produced using watercolor painting and Taijiang leather paper ...... Plate Section Fig. 2.18 Ye Qianyu, “In a Miao Village in Guizhou,” sketch-cartoon produced during his visit to Guizhou in 1942 ...... 110 Fig. 2.19 Zhang Daqian, 1942 copy of wall painting of Buddha image in the Mogao Caves ...... Plate Section Fig. 2.20 Zhang Daqian, 1942 copy of Dunhuang wall painting of saint image of West Wei in the Mogao Caves ...... Plate Section Fig. 2.21 Ye Qianyu, “Drum of the Yao People,” 1944 sketch of Dai Ailian performing a regional minority dance .... Plate Section Fig. 2.22 Ye Qianyu, Indian Dance, 1945 oil painting based on his sketches of Indian women performing the Buddhist “Dance of the Offering of Flowers.” ...... Plate Section Fig. 2.23 Ye Qianyu, Indian Dance Pose, 1948 oil painting ...... Plate Section Fig. 2.24 Ye Qianyu, Dance of the Offering of Flowers, 1949 oil painting ...... Plate Section Fig. 2.25 Zhang Daqian, Dance of the Offering of Flowers, 1949 oil painting based on Ye Qianyu’s sketches of Indian dancers ...... Plate Section Fig. 2.26 Ye Qianyu, “Large Painting Table,” from his 1945 sketch-cartoon series Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian ...... 117 Fig. 2.27 Ye Qianyu, “Painting a Beard with a Beard,” from Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian ...... 118 Fig. 2.28 Maurits Cornelis Escher, 1948 lithograph, “Drawing Hands” ...... 119 Fig. 2.29 Ye Qianyu, “Comprehensive Scene within Four Meters,” from Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian ...... 120 list of illustrations ix

Fig. 4.1 Yuwen walks daily along the ruins of the city wall in Spring in a Small Town ...... 172 Fig. 4.2 1948 advertisement for Spring in a Small Town ...... Plate Section Fig. 4.3 Yuwen and Liyan watch Zhichen leave at the end of Spring in a Small Town ...... 179 Fig. 4.4 Advertisement for Fei Mu’s 1940 film Confucius ...... Plate Section Fig. 4.5 Advertisement for China’s first color production, Fei Mu’s 1948 film Regret that Surpasses Life and Death (translated here as A Wedding in the Dream) ...... Plate Section Fig. 4.6-4.8 Fei Mu positions the camera behind Liyan’s bed curtain to film Zhichen’s shadow as he enters Liyan’s bedroom ...... 201 Fig. 4.9 Long take of Yuwen and Zhichen with a chicken walking in the foreground ...... 205 Fig. 4.10 A sickly Liyan sits in the bombed ruins of his home in Spring in a Small Town ...... 209 Fig. 6.1 Ye Qianyu, “Jiang Qing Pulls out my Tendons by Imperial Edict,” from his 1987 sketch-cartoon series Ten Years of an Absurd Dream ...... 275 Fig. 6.2 Ye Qianyu, “The End of the Qing Dynasty, Leaving Behind Childhood,” from his 1993 sketch-cartoon series An Old Brush Recalls Childhood ...... 275 Fig. 6.3 Ye Qianyu, “I am in You, You are in Me, May 1983, Ye Qianyu, Mr. Wang Together.” ...... 277 Fig. 6.4 Ye Qianyu, “He is in Me, I am in Him,” 1987 ..... Plate Section Fig. 6.5 Wang Zengqi on a return visit to his hometown of Gaoyou during the late 1980s ...... 279

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book has been a very long time in the making, and numerous peo- ple have aided me in every conceivable way throughout the process of writing and research. First, I am grateful to my doctoral advisor Lydia H. Liu, who encouraged me to follow my interest in wartime culture and in the writings of Wang Zengqi, and whose scholarship has in many ways inspired my research. David Rolston provided meticulous and lucid cor- rections, guidance, advice, and suggestions. In particular, I am indebted to Jin Feng for her willingness to read ongoing drafts and different versions of my chapters and give me insightful feedback on them. Thanks as well to Miranda Brown for her constructive critique and encouragement. Other readers whose advice and suggestions I greatly benefited from include Jason McGrath, Alina Clej, Shuen-fu Lin, Chris Berry, Xiaobing Tang, Ben Ridgway, Jing Jiang, Desmond Cheung, Linda FitzGerald, and Qiang Ning. In addition, Paul Sorrell meticulously copy-edited my manuscript, and Cynthia Col did an excellent job of compiling the index. Finally, I am indebted to Yi-tsi Feuerwerker for her superb teaching and mentoring. Scholars in China were also instrumental in helping me complete my research. Su Guanxin, Wen Liming, Xie Zhixi, Qian Liqun, Liu Dong, Wu Xiaodong, and Zhang Yongjie shared with me some of their exten- sive knowledge of wartime culture. In addition, they helped me access archives, locate books, and in many cases generously gave me books they felt would be helpful for my research. Also, Feng Yaoping kindly shared with me many of her memories of wartime Kunming. At the University of Michigan, I greatly benefited from the help of Mr. Beni at the International Institute and Calvin Hsu, formerly of the Asia Library. At Stanford’s Hoover Archives Cissie Hill enabled me to find lots of useful materials. In addition, this project was made possible by gen- erous funding from a Fulbright Grant, a Chiang Ching-kuo Dissertation Fellowship, and a Rackham One-Term Dissertation Fellowship. Since coming to Auburn University four years ago, I have been very fortunate to be recipient of an Auburn University College of Liberal Arts semester release from teaching and a summer grant. I am particularly grateful to my colleagues Makiko Mori, Morris Bian, and Samia Spencer for their encouragement and feedback on several chapter drafts and on xii acknowledgments my book proposal. Moreover, Makiko Mori was of great assistance in tak- ing over department responsibilities while I was on research leave. At Brill, Qin Higley, Matt Kawecki, Katie Chin, Yoona Wagener, Rachel Crofut, and Tom Begley have been extremely patient and helpful in answering my many questions and guiding me through the process of preparing my manuscript for publication. Also, I would like to express my deep appreciation to the two anonymous reviewers of my manuscript whose comments and suggestions were tremendously helpful in giving me a new perspective on my manuscript. Portions of Chapter Four were previously published under the title “Spring in a Small Town—Gazing at Ruins,” in Chris Berry, ed., Chinese Films in Focus 2. Grateful acknowledgment is given to the British Film Institute for granting permission to reprint this material. Stanford Uni- versity Press gave permission to publish two photos from John Israel’s Lianda: A Chinese University in War and Revolution. King Features Syn- dicate allowed the reproduction of the Feb. 10, 1935 edition of George McManus, “Bringing up Father.” Above all, I would like to thank my family for their unflagging encour- agement and support throughout the process of researching and writing this book. I dedicate this book to my family. INTRODUCTION

OUT OF THE ASHES: TOWARDS A WARTIME AESTHETICS OF DISSOLUTION

Critiquing what he saw as the failure of many modern short stories to portray a reality inherently marked by chaos and uncertainty, in his essay “The Essence of the Short Story” (Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi 短篇小 说的本质; 1947), Wang Zengqi 汪曾祺 (1920–97) wrote: Life is scattered, not organized in a clear progression, filled with coin- cidence, with thousands of possible beginnings and tens of thousands of potential outcomes. There has never been a person for whom every second of life equates to the paragraphs, sentences, words, punctuation, or empty spaces in fiction—but, preeminently, writers of novels brazenly ignore this situation.1 As a result of his dissatisfaction with fiction organized around neat and well-defined plots, Wang advocated that the short story should instead borrow from other genres: “We are willing that the short story resemble poetry, the essay, or drama. Or if it doesn’t resemble anything, that’s fine, so long as it doesn’t seem too much like a short story.”2 Wang’s rejection of linear plots and his criticism of the inadequacy of the short story in capturing “scattered” (sanman 散漫) wartime realities echoed similar sentiments voiced by other writers and artists during China’s War of Resistance against Japan (1937–45)3 and the ensuing Chinese Civil War (1945–49). In her essay “Days and Nights of China” (Zhongguo de riye 中国的日夜; 1946), written as an epilogue for her 1946 edition of Romances (Chuanqi 传奇), Eileen Chang 张爱玲 (1920–95) described her sense of the transiency of life, wherein “not only will hopes turn to

1 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” in Zhong Jingwen 钟敬文 and Deng Jiuping 邓九平, eds., Wang Zengqi quanji 汪曾祺全集 (Complete Works of Wang Zengqi), 8 vols. (Beijing: Beijing shifan daxue, 1998), III: 22. 2 ibid., pp. 27–28. 3 Although Japanese troops had occupied Manchuria since 1931, it is generally agreed that the War of Resistance did not officially begin until July 7, 1937 after Japanese troops attacked the Marco Polo Bridge outside Beijing in what is referred to as the “Marco Polo Bridge Incident” (Lugouqiao shibian 卢沟桥事变) or the “July 7 Incident” (Qi qi shibian 七七事变). This study will only look at works produced following the outbreak of full- scale war. 2 introduction ash, but anything and everything one touches will ultimately crumble to nothingness.”4 Similarly, in “Out of the Ashes” (Jinyu lu 烬余录; 1944), Chang criticized historians for writing teleological, thematically deter- mined historical narratives and thereby producing fiction instead: This thing we call reality is unsystematic, like seven or eight talking machines playing all at once in a chaos of sound, each singing its own song. From within that incomprehensible cacophony, however, there sometimes hap- pens to emerge a moment of sad and luminous clarity, when the musicality of a melody can be heard, just before it is engulfed once more by layer after layer of darkness, snuffing out this unexpected moment of lucidity. Paint- ers, writers, and composers string together these random and accidentally discovered moments of harmony in order to create artistic coherence. When history insists on the same sort of coherence, it becomes fiction. The reason that H.G. Wells’s [1866–1946] Outline of History cannot stand as a proper history is that it is a little too rationalized, chronicling as it does the struggle between the individual and the group from start to finish.5 While Chang draws from musical imagery here in her description of the “incomprehensible cacophony” of reality and the “musicality of a melody” of artistic coherence, in many of her other wartime writings she crossed generic divisions between popular fiction, the essay, drama, and film. As in the case of Wang and Chang, the chaos of the war years served as the impetus for cross-generic formal experimentation in art and litera- ture as intellectuals searched for a language to express chaotic wartime realities. The aim of this study is to analyze this aesthetic response to the turbulence of war during the War of Resistance and Chinese Civil War. In particular, this book examines developments in wartime modernism, focusing on its high degree of formal looseness, or what Shu-mei Shih has described as the “aesthetics of dissolution,” a blurring of boundaries between popular and elite and Chinese and Western culture, as well as among genres, styles, and narrative points of view.6 Further, by contextualizing

4 Eileen Chang, “Epilogue: Days and Nights of China,” in Nicole Huang, ed., and Andrew Jones, tr., Written on Water (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), p. 216; Zhang Ail- ing, Chuanqi zengding ben 传奇增订本 (Romances, Enlarged Edition; Shanghai: Shanhe tushu gongsi, 1946), p. 391. 5 Andrew Jones translates the title of this essay as “From the Ashes.” See Eileen Chang, “From the Ashes,” in Written on Water, pp. 39–40; Zhang Ailing, “Jin yulu,” in Qian Liqun 钱理群, ed., Ershi shiji Zhongguo xiaoshuo lilun ziliao 二十世纪中国小说理论资料 (Twentieth-century Fiction Theory Materials; Beijing: Beijing daxue, 1997), pp. 248–49. 6 See Shu-mei Shih, The Lure of the Modern: Writing Modernism in Semicolonial China, 1917–1937 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001), p. 383; also see Shih’s epilogue, “Later Modernisms: The War Years and Beyond,” pp. 379–85. out of the ashes 3 the study of modernism within the history of the war period and wartime intellectuals’ writings on the topic of form, this book illustrates how such aesthetic fluidity was a product of the violence and displacement of the war years. The War of Resistance was a particularly tumultuous and bloody chap- ter in modern Chinese history. The number of deaths resulting from the war is difficult to calculate since no formal population census was taken before it began, but estimates range from between 10 and 37 million.7 Following the outbreak of full-scale war on July 7, 1937, widespread dis- placement ensued and tens of millions of people fled from urban coastal cities to the southwest and to Hong Kong.8 In the wake of the War of Resistance, China was once again thrown into turmoil when civil war between the Nationalists and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) raged from 1945 to 1949. Although the War of Resistance brought about tremendous destruc- tion, prior to this period China was racked by ongoing war and repeated foreign invasions throughout most of the nineteenth and early decades of the twentieth century. Since the Opium War of 1839 and the subsequent ceding of Hong Kong to the British, China had been forced to give territo- rial and jurisdictional rights to Britain, France, Japan, Russia, Germany, Portugal, and the United States. As a result of semi-colonial occupation, an influx of Western culture fostered the development of a kind of “trans- lingual” modernity born out of the exchange between foreign and native

7 In War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War (New York: Pantheon Books, 1986), John W. Dower estimates that 10 million civilians were killed. Rudolph J. Rummel cites sources ranging from 10 to 37 million deaths in his China’s Bloody Century: Genocide and Mass Murder Since 1900 (New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 1991). For a com- parative chart and analysis of civilian deaths during WWII, see “World War II ­Casualties,” accessed May 30, 2012, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_World_War_II_casualties_by_ country. 8 As Lu Liu comments in her dissertation “A Whole Nation Walking: The ‘Great Retreat’ in the War of Resistance, 1937–1945,” it is difficult to get a clear picture of the number of wartime migrants or “nanmin” 难民 because statistics vary dramatically: “Vari- ous calculations on the numerical dimension of the wartime nanmin were put forward during the war. The Nationalist government compiled a figure of 26,722,242 nanmin for the period between April 1938 to December 1941; the figure increased to 49,014,892 by the end of 1944. Other contemporary figures vary dramatically: two statisticians agreed on an ambiguous estimate of 30 to 60 million nanmin in 1938; the 1946 yearbook cites 40 million people, while the famous Chinese newspaper Dagong bao (L’Impartial) increased the figure to over 80 million in 1944.” See Lu Liu, “A Whole Nation Walking: The ‘Great Retreat’ in the War of Resistance, 1937–1945,” Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, San Diego, 2002, p. 11. 4 introduction

Chinese forms.9 The formal looseness of wartime art and literature as a response to the chaos and violence of the War of Resistance thus repre- sents an outgrowth of Republican-era and earlier forms of modernism,10 just as the devastation of the War of Resistance and Chinese Civil War was an extension and escalation of the violent conflict that China had experienced during the previous 100 years. In the subsequent sections of this introductory chapter, I first discuss how my methodology diverges from current scholarship on Chinese war- time culture. Then, I examine wartime writings on the topic of form, focusing on theories about both elite and popular culture, including the popular wartime debate over “national forms” (minzu xingshi 民族形式). Next, I analyze several key parallels and points of divergence between wartime and prewar modernism, and argue that the war period should be understood as a maturation of, rather than an end to, the Western- ized cosmopolitanism of the previous decades. Finally, in the last section, I outline the chapters that make up this book.

Remapping Wartime Modernism

Rather than focusing on one specific genre, this study instead provides close readings of a variety of modernist works of fiction, poetry, film, and visual art. The primary pieces to be discussed include: a selection of Mu Dan’s 穆旦 (1918–77) wartime poetry; artist Ye Qianyu’s 叶浅予 (1907– 96) “sketch-cartoons” (manhua suxie 漫画速写) and “national paintings” (guo hua 国画) from the war period; Wang Zengqi’s collection of short stories, Collection of Chance Encounters (Xie hou ji 邂逅集; 1949); Fei Mu’s 费穆 (1906–51) postwar film Spring in a Small Town (Xiaocheng zhi chun 小城之春; 1948); and Fei Ming’s 废名 (the pen name of Feng Wenbing 冯文炳; literally, “the abolition of names”; 1901–67) postwar novel After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane (Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou 莫须有先 生坐飞机以后; 1948).

9 See Lydia Liu, Translingual Practice: Literature, National Culture, and Translated Modernity—China, 1900–1937 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995). For additional studies of prewar modernism, see Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, and Xiaobing Tang, Chinese Modern: The Heroic and the Quotidian (Durham: Duke University Press, 2000). 10 For an analysis of “repressed modernities” dating back to the Qing dynasty, see David Wang, Fin-de-Siecle Splendor: Repressed Modernities of Late Qing Fiction, 1849–1911 (Stan- ford: Stanford University Press, 1997). out of the ashes 5

The motivation for this cross-generic approach is partly that writers and artists intentionally intermixed divergent genres as they sought to produce looser, hybrid forms during the war period. In addition, they were forced by the exigencies of war to cross generic and geographic boundar- ies when they traveled and worked together with local artists from around China. While dramatists collaborated with visual artists and musicians to spread the message of national salvation to the people, cartoonists and other artists worked with experts in woodblock carving. Likewise, intel- lectuals from very different political and artistic backgrounds resolved factional differences and united in an unprecedented way against a com- mon enemy, as in the case of the formation of the “All-China Resistance Association of Writers and Artists” (Zhonghua quanguo wenyijie kangdi xiehui 中华全国文艺界抗敌协会). Moreover, the art and literature discussed in this study was produced in different cities throughout China, including Shanghai, Beijing, Chong­ qing, Hong Kong, Guilin, Kunming, Chengdu, and Wuhan. In this regard, this book diverges from the existing scholarship on wartime culture, which in general posits the division of China into three distinct areas: the Japanese-occupied region (lunxian qu 沦陷区), the Nationalist- controlled area (Guotong qu 国统区) or “great hinterland” (da houfang 大后方), and the “liberated region” (jiefang qu 解放区), controlled by the CCP. In fact, these regions were very porous and their borders shifted many times throughout the war as Japanese troops moved inland, first occupying Shanghai, Beijing, and Tianjin, and later Nanjing, Wuhan, Changsha, Hong Kong, and other areas in the interior. In addition to the massive displacement experienced by the population, the nation’s capital moved inland during the war from Nanjing to Chongqing, and 77 of 114 Chinese universities were relocated as part of the government’s efforts to preserve wartime education.11 For example, Tsing-hua, Peking, and Nankai Universities, China’s premier universities, merged to form the temporary wartime institution known as the Southwest Associated University (Xinan Lianda 西南联大 or Lianda 联大), and students and faculty moved first from Tianjin and Beijing to Changsha, and later to Kunming.12

11 John Israel, Lianda: A Chinese University in War and Revolution (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), p. 15. 12 For an historical study of Xinan Lianda, see John Israel, Lianda. See also Jin Feng’s discussion of Ginling College’s dispersion during the war in Chapter Four, “Dispersion and Reunion (1937–45),” in her The Making of a Family Saga: Ginling College (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2009), pp. 170–214. 6 introduction

By analyzing works from a variety of geographic locations, this book thus sets out to dissolve the static regional divide that has dominated studies of the war period and instead shed light on how wartime culture was shaped by widespread dislocation and displacement. Another goal of this approach is to delineate general trends and themes of wartime cul- ture across geographic divides. More broadly, this study seeks to expand the definition of Chinese modernism, which has generally been conceived of as a metropolitan aesthetic movement that developed in the semi-colo- nial cities of Shanghai and Beijing. Partly as a result of this view, cultural studies in the Western academy have tended to focus predominantly on the occupied regions of wartime Shanghai and Beijing.13 However, I argue that the displacement of the war years requires a paradigm shift due to the fragmentation of cultural centers during this period. A further reason for the focus on the occupied regions in conventional studies was the lack of adequately preserved research materials on the Nationalist interior. C.T. Hsia commented back in 1961 in his A History of Modern Chinese Fiction that “The literary scene in the Nationalist interior is extremely hard to assess because so many of the shabbily printed war- time publications, books as well as magazines[,] have not been preserved.”14 Wartime destruction was not the only cause of this dearth of material. Within China, research on wartime culture outside Yan’an was largely prohibited during the Mao years since the Communist Party was reluc- tant to admit the role of the Nationalist government in fighting the war. For example, the Nanjing University history department was not allowed to publish a book it compiled in 1962 titled Japanese Imperialism and the Massacre in Nanjing (Riben diguo zhuyi zai Nanjing da tusha 日本帝国主 义在南京大屠杀) until many years later in 1979.15 Nonetheless, since the

13 For cultural studies of the occupied regions, see Leo Lee, Shanghai Modern: The Flowering of a New Urban Culture in China 1930–1945 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974); Zhang Yingjin, Cinema and Urban Culture in Shanghai, 1922–1943 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999); Nicole Huang, Women, War, Domesticity: Shanghai Litera- ture and Popular Culture of the 1940s (Leiden: Brill, 2005); Edward Gunn, The Unwelcome Muse: Chinese Literature in Shanghai and Peking, 1937–45 (New York: Studies of the East Asian Institute, 1980); Wen-hsin Yeh, ed., Wartime Shanghai (New York: Routledge, 1998); Wen-hsin Yeh and Christian Henriot, ed., In the Shadow of the Rising Sun: Shanghai under Japanese Occupation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009). 14 C.T. Hsia, A History of Modern Chinese Fiction, 3rd ed. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999), p. 314. The first edition of Hsia’s study was published in 1961. 15 See Yinan He’s essay, “National Mythmaking and the Problems of History in Sino- Japanese Relations,” delivered at the Conference on Memory of War, January 24–25, 2003, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, p. 16, accessed June 10, 2011, http://web.mit.edu/ rpeters/papers/yinan_sino-japanese.pdf. Also, see Robert Gray, tr., Riben diguo zhuyi zai out of the ashes 7

1980s and 1990s, widespread efforts have been made to preserve and col- lect wartime cultural materials.16 A rapidly growing body of research on culture in the Nationalist heartland has also been produced by mainland scholars such as Qian Liqun, and by regional research groups that have sprung up in cities in the Southwest like Guilin, Wuhan, Chongqing, and Nanjing.17 Drawing from these studies on the Nationalist interior, another division in contemporary cultural studies that I seek to collapse is that between formally innovative works and popular national defence art and literature. In doing so, I am inspired in part by Poshek Fu who argues in his Between Shanghai and Hong Kong: The Politics of Chinese Cinemas that “the histori- cal experience of occupied China was fluid and heterogeneous, defying the either/or binarism of the Nationalist discourse.”18 Nonetheless, schol- arship on wartime culture has been largely shaped by this very “either/ or binarism of the Nationalist discourse.” In his earlier study, Passivity, Resistance, and Collaboration: Intellectual Choices in Occupied Shanghai, Fu himself divides occupied wartime Shanghai into the three camps of

Nanjing da tusha, accessed June 10, 2011, http://www.cnd.org/njmassacre/njm-tran/njm- intr.htm#Introduction%20link. In his study of the Nanjing Massacre, Mark Eykholt argues that in 1982 the Chinese government began to focus on the victimization of the Chinese people during the War of Resistance, in contrast to earlier portrayals which focused almost exclusively on the heroic role of the CCP in fighting the war. Eykholt traces this shift to the 1982 controversy over representations of the Nanjing Massacre in Japanese textbooks. See Mark Eykholt, “Aggression, Victimization, and Chinese Historiography of the Nanjing Massacre,” in Joshua A. Fogel, ed., The Nanjing Massacre in History and Historiography (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), p. 28. 16 See, for example, Lin Mohan 林默涵, ed., Zhongguo kangri zhanzheng shiqi dahou- fang wenxue shuxi 中国抗日战争时期大后方文学书系 (Compendium of the Literature of the Great Hinterland from the Period of the War of Resistance), 20 vols. (Chongqing: Chongqing, 1989). 17 See Qian Liqun, ed., Duihua yu manyou: sishi niandai xiaoshuo yanjiu 对话与漫游四 十年代小说研究 (Dialogue and Roaming: Research on Fiction from the Forties; Shanghai: Shanghaiwenyi, 1999); Yao Dan 姚丹, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong 西南联大历史情境中的文学活动 (Literary Activities in the Historical Setting of Xinan Lianda; Guilin: Guangxi shifan daxue, 2000). For scholarship produced by local research groups, see the series titled Kangzhan shiqi Guilin wenhua yundong ziliao congshu 抗战 时期桂林文化运动资料丛书 (Collection of Materials on Guilin’s Cultural Movement during the War of Resistance), including Yang Yiqun 杨益群, ed., Guilin wenhuacheng gaikuang 桂林文化城概况 (Survey of Guilin as a Cultural City; Nanning; Guangxi renmin, 1986), along with four monographs on topics such as wartime periodicals and the first Southwest Drama Exhibition. In total, 50 books have been written on wartime Guilin. 18 Poshek Fu, Between Shanghai and Hong Kong: The Politics of Chinese Cinemas (Stan- ford: Stanford University Press, 2003), pp. 130–31. 8 introduction resistance, non-resistance, and collaboration.19 Similarly, in Unwelcome Muse, Edward Gunn contrasts the diverse and heterogeneous culture of Shanghai with that in the Nationalist interior where “with the start of war all writers were expected to provide a literature of patriotic resistance to Japanese aggression.”20 Likewise, in his dissertation “Heroes without a Battlefield: Nationalism, Identity, and the Aesthetics of Dissolution in Chinese Wartime Literature, 1937–49,” Steven Day writes that it is “para- doxical” that works by Shi Tuo 师陀 (1910–88), Xiao Hong 萧红 (1911–42), and Wang Zengqi were characterized by ambiguity and liminality given the dictates of national defence efforts during this period. He states: Although authors at the time certainly supported national defence efforts, it seems ironic or paradoxical that at the moment of greatest urgency, when literature could seemingly accomplish its founding soteriological mission, some genuinely committed writers produced works which expressed, at best, ambivalence or ambiguity over conforming to stipulations made regarding how to best support this cause. Such ambivalence appears doubly ironic given the fact that it was articulated amidst Nationalistic appeals for and discussion of the creation of “national forms.” Rather than creating works which unequivocally satisfied immediate Nationalistic exigencies, certain writers at this time opted to depict the contingent and everyday instead of the historically inevitable and the heroic.21 However, whereas scholars tend to make a clear distinction between for- mally experimental works and art and literature produced to promote the war effort, most of the modernist works I analyze in this study were produced by intellectuals who were deeply concerned with the cause of national salvation, and whose works were motivated, at least in part, by

19 Poshek Fu, Passivity, Resistance, and Collaboration: Intellectual Choices in Occupied Shanghai (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993). 20 Edward Gunn, The Unwelcome Muse, p. 2. Gunn admits that there were some “social continuities” between Nationalist and occupied regions, particularly later on during the war. He comments that intellectuals in the Nationalist interior expressed disillusionment with the war and were not always willing to simply produce patriotic resistance litera- ture. Nevertheless, his study focuses on the occupied regions, and does not delineate any potential parallels between the occupied and unoccupied regions. In a somewhat similar fashion, Yunzhong Shu juxtaposes the “centripetal” tendency of wartime literature with the centrifugal force of Hu Feng’s “July School,” which launched “vigorous challenges at prevalent patriotic beliefs.” See Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front: Wartime Prac- tices of the Qiyue School (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000), p. 1. Nonethe- less, Shu also comments that he has come to question the notion of wartime typicality. 21 Steven Day, “Heroes without a Battlefield: Nationalism, Identity, and the Aesthetics of Dissolution in Chinese Wartime Literature, 1937–49,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of California Los Angeles, 2010, p. 4. out of the ashes 9 nationalistic aims. Modernist poet Mu Dan served as a translator in the Nationalist military in Burma, and many of his poems express patriotic love of his country and encourage the nation’s people to rise up. Like- wise, Ye Qianyu’s formal experimentation with cartoon and sketch were driven by his efforts to popularize the war, and by his search for “national forms” of cartoon. In addition, Fei Mu’s highly modernist and experimen- tal film Spring in a Small Town can be read as a national allegory. While during the war period Fei Mu produced dramas to support the war, prior to the outbreak of conflict he directed the anti-Japanese film Blood on Wolf Mountain (Langshan diexue ji 狼山喋血记; 1936). Similarly, in his postwar novel After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, Fei Ming comments that he wrote the novel to serve as a kind of national history of the war period, intended to educate readers about the dangers of Western modernity and militarization. In some ways, Wang Zengqi is an exception, and his short story “Revenge” (Fuchou 复仇; 1944) can be interpreted as a call for peace. Nev- ertheless, even in Wang’s case, his stories from the postwar period evince a shift away from the focus on individual interiority towards a growing interest in realism and an awareness of a larger social collective. Wang’s rejection of wartime heroics is also more generally emblematic of the late war and postwar year when many intellectuals became increasingly disil- lusioned with overblown martial rhetoric. However, despite such weari- ness with the protracted war, the vast majority of intellectuals could not easily divorce themselves from “nationalistic appeals.” Nor were writers and artists necessarily successful in producing wartime propaganda even when they set out to do so. As David Wang observes with respect to the wartime fiction of Lao She 老舍 (1899–1966), who served as secretary general of the War of Resistance Art and Literature Association (Kangzhan wenyi 抗战文艺): . . . it is precisely because Lao She labored hard, probably too hard, to put into practice the ill-defined concept of “national resistance literature” that he ended up turning his fiction into a drama of polemics. Private desires and fears, public concerns and ideological commitments meld in such a way as to manifest, not so much his original patriotism, as his anxiety and skepti- cism towards all causes.22

22 David Wang, Fictional Realism in Twentieth Century China: Mao Dun, Lao She, Shen Congwen (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992), p. 159. 10 introduction

Thus, rather than interpreting wartime modernism within a political framework as oppositional to or supportive of the war effort, I theorize the liminality and formal looseness of culture from this period as an aesthetic response to historical conditions of displacement and wartime chaos. In doing so, I seek methodological inspiration from research on European modernism and the world wars, such as Tyrus Miller’s Late Modernism: Politics, Fiction, and the Arts between the World Wars, Vincent Sherry’s The Great War and the Language of Modernism, and Marina MacKay’s Modern- ism and World War II.23 In Tyrus Miller’s Late Modernism, he argues that post-World War I cul- ture was in many ways a reaction against earlier modernism, and that it prefigured postmodernism in its formal looseness. Also, Miller shows that later European modernism was focused on everyday life, which he theo- rizes as a product of disillusionment with the heroic master ­narratives of war. This understanding of later modernisms as both an extension of and a reaction against earlier ones is helpful in examining the aesthetic looseness in wartime Chinese culture. Although wartime modernism was built on earlier forms, at the same time many intellectuals, such as Fei Ming, Wang Zengqi, and Mu Dan rejected these forms as inadequate for representing wartime realities. In some respects, parallels between late modernism in both Europe and China stem from the fact that Chinese intellectuals were reading works by European writers and artists. Also, like post-World War I writers in Europe, Chinese wartime modernists became increasingly disinterested in wartime heroics as they grappled with disillusionment resulting from wartime devastation. Vincent Sherry’s study provides close readings of works by Ezra Pound (1885–1972), T.S. Eliot (1888–1965), and Virginia Woolf (1882–1941), con- textualized within the World War I period. Specifically, Sherry argues that literary modernism can be understood as a linguistic subversion and parody of a rational conception of language in reaction against the trauma of World War I, or what was promoted as the “War of Liberal Rational- ism.” Similarly, Marina MacKay analyzes late modernist works by Virginia Woolf, T.S. Eliot, Rebecca West (1892–1983), Henry Green (1905–73), and Evelyn Waugh (1903–66) within the political milieu of Britain during World War II.

23 Tyrus Miller, Late Modernism: Politics, Fiction, and the Arts between the World Wars (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999); Vincent Sherry, The Great War and the Lan- guage of Modernism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004); Marina MacKay, Modernism and World War II (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). out of the ashes 11

Nonetheless, whereas Sherry interprets British modernism as a reac- tion against the “War of Liberal Rationalism,” the War of Resistance was conceived of by most Chinese intellectuals as a life-and-death struggle to protect national sovereignty against colonial invasion. Also, Sherry’s anal- ysis refers to World War I rather than World War II. Unlike the British during either world war, the Chinese nation suffered 8 years of full-scale war and occupation during the War of Resistance, and as a result writers and artists viewed their role in the war differently. Although Sherry and MacKay’s methodologies are useful, Chinese modernism in many ways does not follow the British paradigm of being oppositional to the war or to the government of the day.

New and Old Wine Bottles

Apart from contextualizing my analysis of wartime art and literature within contemporary scholarship on the war period and European mod- ernism, I examine wartime intellectuals’ writings on artistic form. In doing so, I draw from a large body of theory produced during the war years. A further characteristic of wartime culture besides its formal looseness is its self-consciousness about issues related to form. The popular debate over “national forms” is the most well-known example of such theorizations. In particular, writers and artists were influenced by Lao She’s exhortation to pour “new wine into old bottles” (jiuping xinjiu 旧瓶新酒), or nationalistic themes and messages into traditional forms like folk art. Yet, intellectuals producing more elite forms of art and literature also wrote extensively on formal issues during the war period. While many wartime intellectuals called for the use of popular traditional forms in order to promote the war effort, others advocated the deployment of loose and hybrid forms as a means to better represent chaotic wartime realities. In a 1944 discussion forum held in Beijing, titled “Creation and Criti- cism” (Chuangzuo yu piping 创作与批评), writer Guan Yongji 关永吉 (1916–) argued that literary forms should strive to be “lacking in struc- ture” (sanman 散漫) in order to capture the complexities of modern life.24 In part, writers advocated cross-generic formal experimentation as an antidote to teleological plots and wartime heroics. In his 1947 post- war essay, “The Limits of the Art of Fiction” (Xiaoshuo yishu de zhijing

24 See Shan Ding 山丁, “Chuangzuo yu piping,” in Qian Liqun, ed., Ershi shiji Zhongguo xiaoshuo lilun ziliao, p. 267; originally published in Xiao Tiandi 1.1 (August 1948). 12 introduction

小说艺术的止境), Xiao Jun 萧军 (1907–88) criticized the portrayal of heroics in wartime literature. Dividing wartime fiction into two types— poetic and dramatic—he argued for the superiority of poetic fiction, and claimed that fiction ought to adopt elements of poetry, music, and ­painting.25 As writers strove to produce such formless forms, some drew from classical sources. For example, Zhang Tianyi 张天翼 (1906–85) wrote that in the classic Qing novel The Scholars (Rulin Waishi 儒林外史) he found a loose and “very natural style of writing” that “is more suited to actual life.”26 As Zhang rhetorically asked, “Could it be that a person lives a whole life, and his activities, his conduct, his interactions with everything are as conventionally described in fiction with a fully realized form?”27 Joining in the discussion on fictional forms, in a 1941 speech given at Lianda titled “Short Story” (Duanpian xiaoshuo 短篇小说), Shen Cong- wen 沈从文 (1902–88) posed the question, “What is the short story?”28 In response, he defined the short story somewhat vaguely as a form that “uses words very appropriately [qiadang 恰当] to record human experience,”29 adding that short stories should “express the form of life.”30 Apart from closely mirroring life, Shen felt that the short story ought to draw from tra- ditional culture and from a variety of forms and genres, including poetry, painting, music, and the essay. In fact, he privileged other art forms over fiction, claiming that all images from life that move a reader are experi- enced through the senses and are thus difficult to express in words. Set- ting up a hierarchy of different genres, he argued that “in expressing an impression of abstract beauty, words are inferior to painting, painting is inferior to math, and math it seems is not as potent as music.”31 Like fiction writers, many poets promoted the use of loose forms and the intermixing of poetry with other forms and genres. Li Guangtian 李广田 (1906–68) encouraged wartime poets to adopt a looser, more

25 Xiao Jun, “Xiaoshuo yishu de zhijing,” in ibid., pp. 418–25; originally published in Tianjin’s Da gongbao, January 19, 1947. 26 Zhang Tianyi, “Du Rulin waishi” 读儒林外史 (Reading The Scholars), in ibid., p. 167; originally published in Wenyi zazhi 2.1 (Dec. 15, 1942). 27 ibid. 28 Shen Congwen, “Duanpian xiaoshuo,” in ibid., p. 112; originally published in Guowen yue kan 18 (April 16, 1942). 29 ibid., p. 102. 30 Ibid., p. 112. 31 Shen Congwen, “Kan hong zhai xing lu houji,” 看虹摘星录后记 (Afterword to Look- ing at Rainbows and Collecting Stars), in Shen Congwen wenji 沈从文文集 (The Collected Works of Shen Congwen) 12 vols. (Hong Kong: Sanlian shudian, 1984), XI: 48. out of the ashes 13

“essay-like” (san 散) style.32 In his essay “Poetry and Philosophy” (Shi yu zheli 诗与哲理), Zhu Ziqing 朱自清 (1894–1948), argued that poetry should adopt elements of philosophy.33 Also, in “Poetry and the Build- ing of the Nation” (Shi yu jianguo 诗与建国), Zhu claimed that modern poetry should intertwine private and public aspects of wartime life, and advocated a new kind of patriotic poetry that would both promote the war effort and convey “modern man’s complicated feelings and thoughts.”34 While many intellectuals theorized about poetic and fictional forms as they sought to better represent chaotic wartime realities, attempts to popularize the war effort and the debate over “national forms” also gener- ated interest in the subject of form. In Mao Zedong’s 毛泽东 (1893–1976) 1938 speech, “The Role of the Chinese Communist Party in the National War” (Zhongguo gongchandang zai minzu zhanzheng de diwei 中国共产 党在民族战争的地位), he articulated his conception of national forms: “Being Marxists, Communists are internationalists, but we can put Marx- ism into practice only when it is integrated with the specific characteris- tics of our country and acquires a definite national form.”35 In addition, Mao claimed that “national forms” should represent the “fresh lively Chi- nese style and spirit the common people of China love.”36 Responding to Mao’s call, during their first meeting in Hankou in May 1938 the All-China Resistance Association of Writers and Artists dis- cussed the question proposed by Lao She about how writers might pour “new wine into old bottles.” Whereas some scholars, such as folklorist Gu Jiegang 顾颉刚 (1893–1980), were optimistic about the educational and

32 See Li Guangtian 李广田, Shi de yishu: Zhongguo xinshi pinglun ji 诗的艺术中国新 诗评论集 (The Art of Poetry: Collected Commentary on New Chinese Poetry; Hong Kong: Yan wenge shudian, 1943). 33 Zhu Ziqing, “Shi yu zheli,” in Xinshi zahua 朱自清, Xinshi zahua: Kangzhan yu shi 新 诗杂话抗战与诗 (Miscellaneous Talks on New Poetry: The War of Resistance and Poetry; Hong Kong: Xin wenxue yanjiu, 1963), pp. 18–23. 34 Zhu Ziqing, “Shi yu jianguo,” in ibid., pp. 38–45. Also, Zhu translated American poet and writer Archibald MacLeish’s “Poetry and the Public World” as “Shi yu gongzhong shi- jie” 诗与公众世界. In this essay, MacLeish writes that poetry needs to find a way to mix both personal and publicly oriented sentiments in order to avoid sounding prosaic. Zhu Ziqing, “Shi yu gongzhong shijie,” in ibid., pp. 111–26. 35 Mao Tse-tung, “The Role of the Chinese Communist Party in the National War,” in Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, 2 vols. (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1975), II: 209; Mao Zedong, “Zhongguo gongchandang zai minzu zhanzheng de diwei,” in Mao Zedong xuanji 毛泽东选集 (Selected Works of Mao Zedong), 4 vols. (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1991), II: 534. 36 Mao Tse-tung, “The Role of the Chinese Communist Party in the National War,” p. 210; Mao Zedong, “Zhongguo gongchandang zai minzu zhanzheng de diwei,” p. 534. 14 introduction revolutionary potential of popular literature (tongsu wenyi 通俗文艺), others like Zheng Boqi 郑伯奇 (1895–1979), a former member of the neo- traditional Creation Society (xinyue she 新月社), which promoted the use of art for art’s sake, argued that popular works from China’s pre- revolutionary past were “feudal relics” and “poisonous products,” full of violence and superstition.37 Taking a more moderate position, some intellectuals claimed that the usefulness of “old bottles” would have to be determined on a case-by-case basis. As writer Wang Pingling 王平陵 (1898–1964) proposed: If we want to use “old bottles,” we must first determine whether or not they are suitable for current use. We can indeed compose new materials based on old dagu 大鼓 [drum-singing] verses. But we cannot do so with “Eigh- teen Touches” [Shiba mo] 十八摸.38 In short, it is a matter of whether the wine is good or bad, regardless of the age of the bottle.39 In his essay “Literature and Art for the Masses and the Use of Traditional Forms” (Dazhonghua yu liyong jiu xingshi 大众化与利用旧形式), Mao Dun 茅盾 (1896–1981) commented on the wide variety of opinions aired in the wartime debates on national forms: No one opposes the popularization of literature and art for the masses. Espe- cially during our present War of Resistance against Japan, those who once opposed it no longer do. When it comes to the question of making use of traditional literary forms, however, there are a plethora of opinions. . . . Only since the War of Resistance began has this long-unresolved question finally been put into a large test tube for practical experimentation. But who would have expected that no sooner did the testing begin (though only a miserable few were involved in the testing) that opinions again began to diverge.40 In some respects, the wartime preoccupation with national forms was an extension of the debates about the massification of art and research conducted on folk forms during the 1920s and 1930s by intellectuals at Peking University. However, the need to popularize the war made writers

37 Chang-tai Hung, War and Popular Culture: Resistance in Modern China, 1937–45 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), pp. 190–91; for the original record of the first meeting of the All-China Resistance Association of Writers and Artists at Hankou, see “Zenyang bianzhi shibing tongsu duwu” 怎样编制士兵通俗读物 (How to Compile Popular Reading Materials for Soldiers), Kangzhan wenyi 1.5 (May 21, 1938): 34–36. 38 An erotic folksong. 39 Hung, War and Popular Culture, p. 188. 40 Mao Dun, “Literature and Art for the Masses and the Use of Traditional Forms,” Yu-shih Chen, tr., in Kirk Denton, ed., Modern Chinese Literary Thought, p. 433; Mao Dun, “Dazhonghua yu liyong jiu xingshi,” Wenyi zhendi 1.4 ( June 1, 1938). out of the ashes 15 and artists more sensitive to the issue of aesthetic form. As Steven Day observes: The core problematic of the debates does not, strictly speaking, represent anything entirely new in terms of issues. . . . In the wartime context, how- ever, such imperatives for mobilization and contact with local and regional cultures resulting from the displacement of cultural centers during the war brought the ideological implications of aesthetic forms to the fore with a sense of greater actual urgency.41 As a result of this sense of urgency, many artists and writers self- consciously experimented with popular forms, often in combination with various Westernized and urban cultural forms. In an attempt to produce “national forms of cartoon” (manhua de minzu xingshi 漫画的民族形式), Ye Qianyu, for example, created experimental sketch-cartoons that incorporated traditional ink-wash painting. Ye Qianyu’s fellow wartime cartoonists, including Ding Cong 丁聪 (1916–2009), Zhang Guangyu 张光宇 (1900–65), and Liao Bingxiong 廖冰兄 (1915–2006), also theorized about the question and produced artwork that combined the cartoon with traditional forms such as the hand scroll and traditional decorative art.42 Similarly, wartime dramatists mixed regional drama with Beijing opera and modern Western drama. In his wartime writings on the reform of Beijing opera, drama reformer Ouyang Yuqian 欧阳予倩 (1889–1962) argued that Beijing opera should appropriate elements from modern Western drama and from forms of traditional opera, including Beijing and Guangdong opera.43 During his stay in Guilin, Ouyang attempted to introduce a modern director system into Guilin opera, and to infuse local opera with new types of modern music, dancing, lighting, costumes, and makeup. Likewise, the 1944 Southwest Drama Exhibition (Xinan juzhan 西南剧展) that he organized together with Tian Han 田汉 (1898–1968) featured a wide variety of regional drama, Beijing opera, Westernized spo- ken drama, and film.44

41 Steven Day, “Heroes without a Battlefield,” p. 37. 42 For further discussion of Ding Cong, Liao Bingxiong, and Zhang Guangyu’s cross- generic formal experimentation, see Chapter Two of this study. 43 See Ouyang Yuqian, “Gaige Guiju de buzhou” 改革桂剧的步骤 (The Steps to Reforming Guiju),” in Ouyang Yuqian quanji 欧阳予倩全集 (The Complete Works of Ouyang Yuqian), 6 vols. (Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi, 1990), V: 41–45. 44 See Qiu Zhensheng 丘振声, Wu Chenhai 吴辰海, and Tang Guoying 唐国英, eds., Xinan juzhan 西南剧展, 2 vols. (Southwest Drama Exhibition; Nanning: Lijiang, 1984); Pan Qixu 潘其旭, ed., Guilin wenhuacheng jishi 桂林文化城记事 (Record of Events in Guilin Cultural City; Nanning: Lijiang, 1984); and Tian Han 田汉, “Report on Theater Reform 16 introduction

The interests of wartime intellectuals who sought to promote the war effort, such as Ye Qianyu and Ouyang Yuqian, were in some ways very different from those of university intellectuals like Shen Congwen and Mu Dan. Whereas writers and artists working with popular culture were concerned with the issue of popularization, those writing for elite audiences focused on the question of how to best capture the realities of the tumultuous war period in art and literature. Nevertheless, many university intellectuals also theorized about popular forms. While Zhu wrote about oral ballads and folk songs in “Poetry and the Building of the Nation,” Mu Dan penned a review in praise of popular poet Ai Qing’s 艾青 (1910–96) works, titled “He Died the Second Time” (Ta si zai di er ci 他死在第二次),45 and Lianda scholar and poet Wen Yiduo’s 闻一多 (1899–1946) praised Ai Qing and Tian Jian 田间 (1916–85) in his war- time lectures as the “drum of the age.”46 Ping-kwan Leung describes the close connections between popular poets at Yan’an and intellectuals at Lianda: There was no obvious antagonism between the Yan’an group and the Kun- ming [Lianda] group. Bian [Zhilin 卞之琳 (1910–2000)] visited Yan’an from 1938 to 1939, lived with the army and taught at Lu Xun Arts Institute before he went to Kunming and served as a link between Yan’an and Kunming. Other poets in Yan’an such as Ai Qing and He Qifang [何其芳 (1912–77)] were greatly admired by the young poets in Kunming.47 The war period thus witnessed a blurring of boundaries between elite and popular culture, and between cultural productions in Nationalist- and CCP-controlled regions. Although Mu Dan experimented with a diverse array of poetic forms, at the same time he adopted an oratorical style of poetry in his attempts to promote the war effort. Likewise, even though Ye Qianyu initially sought to create a national form of cartoon as a means of reaching a mass audience, he appropriated elements drawn from the traditional painter Zhang Daqian’s 张大千 (1889–1993) copies of

during the War of Resistance” (Guanyu kangzhan xiju gaige de baogao” 关於抗战戏剧改 革的报告, in Tian Han quanji 田汉全集 (Tian Han’s Complete Works), 20 vols. (Shijia­ zhuang: Huashan wenyi, 2000), XV: 379–435. 45 Mu Dan’s review of Ai Qing’s poem “Ta si zai di er ci” appeared in Dagong bao, April 28, 1940. 46 Wen Yiduo’s lectures on Ai Qing and Tian Jian were given in Southwest Associated University and collected in Wen Yiduo, Wen Yiduo quanji 闻一多全集 (The Complete Works of Wen Yiduo), 4 vols. (Beijing: Shenghuo dushu, 1948), IV: 223–38. 47 Ping-kwan Leung, “Literary Modernity in Chinese Poetry,” in Wai-lim Yip, ed. Lyrics from Shelters: Modern Chinese Poetry, 1930–1950 (New York: Garland Publishing, 1992), p. 49. out of the ashes 17

Dunhuang wall art in his cartoons and artwork during the latter part of the war. Regardless of whether they sought to promote the war through popularization or to better represent chaotic wartime realities in fiction and poetry, writers shared a common preoccupation with the issue of form, more specifically with the need to produce hybrid, cross-generic forms in the context of wartime conditions.

From May Fourth to July Seventh

Paralleling the focus on traditional popular culture in the Nationalist inte- rior and at Yan’an, Edward Gunn has observed that writers and artists in the occupied cities of Shanghai and Beijing appropriated heavily from tra- ditional forms.48 Commenting on this trend, he concludes that during the war period it “might have seemed that the Qing dynasty [1649–1911] had never ended and no May Fourth Movement [1915–21]49 had ever taken place”: The war years saw the persistence of many works imitative of traditional forms. In the first year of the war, Huanzhu Louzhu’s [还珠楼主] novel of supernatural knight-errantry, Shushan jianxia zhuan [蜀山剑侠传] (Swords- man of the Hills of Shu),50 was published in book form after its serialization in a Tianjin newspaper to enthusiastic reception throughout China. During the war, swashbuckling tales continued to find a wide audience. A more sober attempt at the indigenous novel form [zhanghui xiaoshuo 章回小说] was Zhang Hong’s [张鸿] historical roman-a-clef Xu Niehaihua [续孽海 花] (Sequel to Flower on an Ocean of Sin), published in the Beijing journal Zhonghe [中和] (Equilibrium and Harmony: The Sino-Japanese Monthly). Aside from fiction, there was a continued practice of poetry in classical styles, notably in the Nanjing periodical Tongsheng [同声] (Accord); the posthumous publication of Zheng Xiaoxu’s [鄭孝胥 (1860–1938)] verse in Haicang loushi [海藏楼诗] (Poems from Haicang’s Villa); and many essays in wenyan [文言 classical Chinese]. Classical theater remained very active

48 See Chang-tai Hung’s discussion of historical plays and traditional dramas in his War and Popular Culture, pp. 78–92. Also see Chapter Three, “The Resurgence of Tradition: Modern Drama,” pp. 109–50 and Chapter Four, “The Resurgence of Tradition: The Familiar Essay,” in Edward Gunn, Unwelcome Muse, pp. 151–92. 49 The May Fourth Movement or New Culture Movement refers to the cultural and political movement formed in connection with student demonstrations in Beijing on May 4, 1919 to protest the government’s response to the Treaty of Versailles. This move- ment launched an attack on traditional values and culture and promoted a new focus on science and modernization. 50 For the sake of consistency, instances of non-pinyin romanization of Chinese will be converted to pinyin. 18 introduction

despite the retirement of such figures as Mei Lanfang [梅兰芳; 1894–1961]. But for an occasional allusion or turn of phrase, in all this literature it might have seemed that the Qing dynasty had never ended and no May Fourth movement had ever taken place.51 Indeed, the war period witnessed a resurgence of tradition, and modernist works discussed in this study draw heavily from traditional culture, albeit in combination with a variety of modern forms. Mu Dan intermixes tradi- tional regulated verse with free verse in his wartime poetry; Wang Zengqi incorporates Daoist philosophy, traditional poetics, and the traditional essay into his short stories; Ye Qianyu interweaves elements drawn from the Dunhuang murals, regional Miao artwork, and traditional ink-and- wash painting; Fei Mu introduces traditional drama, art, and poetry in his postwar film; and Fei Ming interweaves conventional historiography, philosophy, and Buddhist, Confucian, and Daoist thought in his postwar novel. With their heavy appropriation of tradition, the wartime modernists followed in the footsteps of earlier prewar neo-traditionalists of the Bei- jing School (jingpai 京派) such as Fei Ming, Zhou Zuoren (1885–1967), Ling Shuhua 凌叔华 (1900–90), and Xiao Qian 萧乾 (1910–99), who had all attempted to bring traditional culture and thought into dialogue with Western modernism. Known as the Beijing School since they were mostly associated with intellectual circles at Peking University, these writers are often contrasted with the Shanghai modernists (haipai 海派), who are seen as more overtly Westernized. In her study of Chinese modernism, Shu-mei Shih describes the ethos of the Beijing School neo-traditionalists as characterized by an effort to subvert “binary and essentialist concep- tions of cultural difference”52 between East and West, and thereby “extend the scope of modernity.”53 In his writings from the 1920s, Zhou Zuoren, for example, advocated the need to combine traditional and modern, as well as Chinese and Western thought and aesthetics, in what he referred to as the “eclectic school” (zapai 杂派), or the “ancient/modern/Chinese/ foreign school” (gujin zhongwai pai 古今中外派).54

51 Gunn, The Unwelcome Muse, p. 109. 52 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 192. For an in-depth discussion of the Beijing School, see part two of Lure of the Modern, “Rethinking the Modern: The Beijing School,” pp. 151–230. 53 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 192. 54 Zhou Zuoren, “Gujin zhongwai pai,” in Zhang Juxiang 张菊香, ed., Zhou Zuoren daibiaozuo 周作人代表作 (Representative Works of Zhou Zuoren; Zhengzhou: Huanghe wenyi, 1987), p. 58. out of the ashes 19

Particularly in the wake of World War I, many Chinese intellectuals began to question the May Fourth Movement’s total rejection of tradi- tion and embrace of Westernized modernity, and instead sought to revive traditional culture. Following his trip to Europe in 1919, during which he saw the devastation left behind in the wake of World War I, Liang Qichao 梁启超 (1873–1929) concluded in his Record of Impressions of Travels in Europe (Ouyou xinying lu 欧游心影录; 1921) that Western theories of individualism and evolutionary theory were to blame for violence and militarism in Western culture: In the mid-nineteenth century, two extremely persuasive schools of thought generated the flourishing of economic liberalism and industrialism: one was biological evolutionism and the other was individualism . . . [Darwin’s survival of the fittest] doctrine, along with [ John Stuart] Mill’s [1806–73] utilitarianism and [ Jeremy] Bentham’s [1748–1832] happiness principle, became the cornerstones of English thought. In the meantime, Max Stirner [1806–56] and Soren Kierkegaard [1813–55] advocated individualism, their problematic theory extending to [Friedrich] Nietzsche [1844–1900] who saw altruism as slave mentality and saw the defeat of the weak to be the mandate of the strong and a necessity for social evolution. . . . Therefore, on the individual level, it came to be considered natural for people to wor- ship power and money; on the national level, the most fashionable policy became militarism and imperialism. The source of this current world war lies in this, and it is also the source of future class wars in nations.55 Convinced of the bankruptcy of Western culture, Liang Qichao rejected the Enlightenment concept of a universal time frame characterized by moder- nity as progress and promoted the renewed study of Chinese history, or a “new historiography.”56 Liang’s critique of the evils of Western moder- nity in the wake of World War I prefigured similar sentiments expressed by many intellectuals during and after World War II.57 In fact, in the

55 Shu-mei Shih’s translation in Lure of the Modern, p. 160; for the original Chinese, see Liang Qichao, Ouyou xinying lu, in Chen Song 陈松, ed., Wusi qianhou dongxi wenhua wenti lunzhan wenxuan 五四前后东西文化问题论战文选 (Selected Essays from the Debate on the Question of Eastern and Western Culture during the May Fourth Period; Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue 1989), p. 359. 56 See Xiaobing Tang’s analysis of the “spatial logic” of Liang Qichao’s thought in his Global Space and the Nationalist Discourse of Modernity: The Historical Thinking of Liang Qichao (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996), pp. 185–223. 57 Most people consider that World War II did not officially begin until 1939, two years after the outbreak of the War of Resistance against Japan. Nonetheless, I sometimes use this term in my study, particularly when discussing parallels between trends in Chinese and European culture during the WWII or post-WWII period, or when making compari- sons between the WWI and WWII periods. My decision to use this term stems from the 20 introduction context of full-scale war, such views became particularly prevalent. As will be discussed in Chapter Five, Fei Ming critiqued Western militarism and theories of evolutionism and advocated a return to traditional philosophy and morality. Also, Wang Zengqi’s short story “Revenge,” which espouses Daoist pacifist themes, was written partly in reaction against the pres- ence of American troops in Kunming. Likewise, in Spring in a Small Town, Fei Mu depicts a Westernized doctor Zhichen who is unable to cure his friend’s tuberculosis, thereby implying the limits of Western science and modernity in curing the ills of modern China. Furthermore, wartime intellectuals became increasingly critical in their adoption of Western cultural forms. Wang Zengqi and other writers’ rejection of over-developed plots in fiction was directed against the West- ern short story,58 just as Eileen Chang’s dismissal of H.G. Wells’ (1866– 1946) Outline of History as “too rationalized” to “stand as proper history,” reflected her dissatisfaction with Western historiography. Similarly, Gunn describes a trend of “antiromanticism” in literature from the occupied regions, which he argues was rooted in “modern disillusionment in the West with what were considered the excesses of romanticism and roman- tic ideals of the nineteenth century.”59 Disillusioned with the West, intellectuals instead sought to redefine Chinese modernism in terms of native traditions and thereby reconstruct a collective memory in the wake of wartime devastation. In his study On Collective Memory, Maurice Halbwachs writes that whereas history is a “record of changes,” in contrast, “What strikes us about [collective] memory . . . is that resemblances are paramount. When it considers its own past, the group feels strongly that it has remained the same and becomes conscious of its identity through time.”60 Yet scholars also argue that it is precisely when such a sense of continuity and identity is imperiled by dramatic social change and trauma that a focus on memory

fact that the War of Resistance was part of a global conflict that erupted during World War II. My usage thus coincides with my effort to contextualize the study of Chinese modern- ism within a broader framework that explores linkages between the world wars and the development of modernism. The Pacific War or Asia-Pacific War are other terms used to refer to parts of World War II that took place in Asia. However, it is generally considered that the Pacific War began on December 7/8, 1941 with the Japanese attack on Pearl Har- bor and invasion of Thailand. 58 Lu Xun’s “Madman’s Diary; 1918” is often considered to be the first modern Chinese short story. 59 Edward Gunn, Unwelcome Muse, p. 272. 60 Maurice Halbwachs, On Collective Memory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), pp. 85–86. out of the ashes 21 becomes most prevalent. As Pierre Nora comments with regards to the outpouring of studies of collective memory in contemporary cultural stud- ies, “we speak so much of memory because so little is left.”61 In keeping with Nora’s theories, by immersing itself in “swashbuckling tales” about knight-errantry, along with Ming and Qing chapter novels, and classical- style poetry, the Chinese public was attempting to hold onto a collective identity and cultural traditions, even in the midst of wartime occupation and bombing. In a similar fashion, through their appropriation of material from traditional popular culture or “national forms,” writers and artists in the Nationalist interior and at Yan’an bolstered a strong sense of shared national culture. Yet another manifestation of these intellectuals’ efforts to reconnect with collective memory is the prevalence of the theme of rural return in wartime culture. Mu Dan appropriated elements from traditional poet Tao Yuanming 陶渊明 (365–427) when he envisioned his displacement to the southwest as a kind of homecoming to the land of his ancestors, away from the “net” of the city. Also, Ye Qianyu imagined himself journey- ing towards the past and to the roots of Chinese culture during his trip to a Miao village where he painted regional minority people. Similarly, several of Wang Zengqi’s wartime short stories focus on the narrator’s native region of Gaoyou, and Fei Ming’s postwar novel After Mr. Neverwas Takes a Plane deals with Fei Ming’s wartime displacement to Huangmei 黄梅, where he witnesses bombing wreaked upon his home region. Like- wise, Fei Mu’s postwar film Spring in a Small Town is based on film writer Li Tianji’s 李天济 (1921–95) script about his trip home at the end of the war. However, Fei Mu adapted Li’s script to focus on the portrayal of bombed ruins. Thus although wartime destruction fueled nostalgia for collective and personal memories tied to the countryside, writers and art- ists frequently portrayed the impossibility of returning to a past destroyed by war. As other scholars have noted, the theme of rural return is also found in “native-soil” (xiangtu 乡土) literature from the early Republican-era, and a genealogy of writings about the native land can be traced back to early

61 Pierre Nora, “Between Memory and History: Les lieux de mémoire,” Marc Roudebush, tr., Representations 26 (Spring 1989): 7. Regarding the centrality of memory to group and individual identity, John Gillis comments that “the core meaning of any individual or group identity, namely, a sense of sameness over time and space, is sustained by remember- ing.” See John Gillis, “Memory and Identity: The History of a Relationship,” in John Gillis, ed., Commemorations: The Politics of National Identity (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), p. 3. 22 introduction roots in pre-modern literature.62 Nonetheless, the war period witnessed an outpouring of writing and art on rural themes. This trend reflected both intellectuals’ yearning for collective memories linked to the country- side and widespread wartime dislocation from cities to the rural interior. Similarly, a focus on rural themes was central to Mao’s wartime speeches, in which he compared the city to “what is foreign and reactionary” and the countryside with what is “truly national and revolutionary.”63 In his study of wartime popular culture, Hung describes what he refers to as the “ruralization” of Chinese culture during this period, a trend that he links to the influence of regional popular culture: The widespread influence of popular culture in wartime China changed the attitudes of many conservative intellectuals towards this formerly ignored field and established popular culture as a valuable source for understanding popular behavior. More important, it caused the rapid fading of the urban, elitist character of Chinese culture and shifted the nation’s attention to the countryside. This “ruralization” of Chinese culture was crucial to the success of the Communists following the war, for it helped to make their call for a rural revolution appealing and convincing.64 Indeed, both widespread displacement and the growing importance of traditional popular culture helped to shift the focus away from the urban culture of the previous decades. While this change made the CCP’s call for rural revolution “appealing and convincing,” it also fostered the develop- ment of new forms of modernism dealing with non-urban subjects and themes. Rejecting the urban culture of earlier decades as decadent and out of tune with wartime realities, many modernists sought instead to ­produce works that were tied to traditional culture and to larger historical and

62 For a genealogy of writings about the native land in pre-modern and modern lit- erature, see Xiaobing Tang, “Beyond Homesickness: An Intimate Reading of Lu Xun’s ‘My Native Land,’ ” in his Chinese Modern, pp. 74–76. For a genealogy of native-soil writings in modern and contemporary literature, see David Wang, “Imaginary Nostalgia: Shen Cong- wen, Song Zelai, Mo Yan, and Li Yongping,” in Ellen Widmer and David Wang, eds., From May Fourth to June Fourth: Fiction and Film in Twentieth-Century China (Cambridge: Har- vard University Press, 1993), pp. 107–32. 63 This quote comes from Paul Pickowicz’s translation of Mao’s “Talks at the Yan’an Forum of Art and Literature,” in Kirk Denton, ed., Modern Chinese Literary Thought: Writ- ings on Literature, 1893–1945 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996), p. 480. The earli- est publication of this essay is “Zai Yan’an wenyi zuotanhui shang de jianghua” 在延安 文艺座谈会上的讲话 (Talks at the Yan’an Forum of Art and Literature), Jiefang ribao, Oct. 19, 1943. Pickowicz’s translation is based on the earlier translation in Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, 4 vols. (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1975), III: 69–98. 64 Hung, War and Popular Culture, p. 14. out of the ashes 23 social realities. Following the War of Resistance, former Beijing School modernist Fei Ming criticized his prewar fiction as excessively removed from social and political realities. He wrote, “I now only like reality. I don’t like to imagine. . . . I definitely cannot write another piece of fiction.”65 However, the following year he began to write the highly exper- imental, semi-autobiographical novel, After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, which he claimed was an historical account of the war period. Likewise, in his modernist short stories from the postwar period, Wang Zengqi appropriated regional language and wrote about the lives of ordinary people in the countryside, although he continued to employ a stream-of- consciousness technique and an essay-like style inspired by the traditional essay. In a similar fashion, Mu Dan wrote that his formally experimental poems were intended to portray wartime “experience,” and that he hoped to make his poetic imagery “closer to modern life” (xiandai shenghuohua 现代生活化).66 While Fei Ming’s postwar novel is emblematic of the change in style of a former Beijing School writer, wartime modernism’s concern with larger historical realities also departs from prewar works by Shang- hai writers such as Shi Zhecun 施蛰存 (1905–2003) and Mu Shiying 穆时英 (1912–40). In his Buglers on the Home Front, Yunzhong Shu ana- lyzes how July Group writer A Long’s 阿珑 (1907–67) Nanjing Blood Sacrifice (Nanjing xueji 南京血祭; 1947) diverges from the work of early Shanghai modernists, despite parallels in terms of his imagistic style: Here [in A Long’s Nanjing Blood Sacrifice] the concatenation of images reminds one of the imagistic style employed by the New Perceptionists [Xin ganjuepai 新感觉派], particularly Liu Na’ou 刘呐鸥 [1905–45] and Mu Shiying, in some of their stories about the fast-moving urban life in Shang- hai. But what distinguishes A Long is not just the chronotope of a fallen city but his approach to the subject matter. Whereas Liu Na’ou and Mu Shiying are not unattracted by modernity, in their case exemplified by the bewilder- ing pace of life in a contemporary metropolis, A Long here shows the most barbaric aspect of modernity.67

65 Fei Ming, “Sanwen” 散文 (Essay), in Feng Jiannan 冯健男, ed., Fei Ming sanwen xuanji 废名散文选集 (Selection of Fei Ming’s Essays; Tianjin: Baihuawenyi, 1990), p. 90. 66 See Yao Dan, 姚丹, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong 西南联 大历史情境中的文学活动 (Literary Activities in the Historical Setting of Xinan Lianda; Guilin: Guangxi shifan daxue, 2000), p. 249. 67 Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front, p. 75. For further analysis of formal innovations in works by July School fiction and reportage writers, see Kirk Denton, The Problematic of Self in Modern Chinese Literature: Hu Feng and Lu Ling (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998). 24 introduction

In contrast to A Long’s portrayal of the “most barbaric aspect of moder- nity” during the Japanese attack on Nanjing, Shu-mei Shih has observed that Shanghai modernists from the 1920s and 1930s tended to emphasize the fantastic and reject the prewar realities of semi-colonialism. Describ- ing Mu Shiying’s fiction, Shih comments that his “practices of intertextual- ity, metafiction, and self-reflexivity show Mu Shiying so obsessed with his craft that he would breathe life into his fictional world and willfully sub- stitute the world of reality with that of textuality” as a means to “displace naked confrontation with the reality of semi-colonialism and imperialism, and to avoid questions of politics and nationalism.”68 However, unlike the New Perceptionists, most wartime modernists were not particularly attracted by modernity and the “bewildering pace” of modern life. Nor were they able to easily displace the reality of imperialism in the midst of widespread bombing and devastation, even though many wartime writ- ers like A Long continued to reflect the influence of the earlier Shanghai modernists. Instead, as already discussed, in the context of war intellectuals became deeply concerned with the cause of national salvation and with the fate of the collective. As a result of this shift, many scholars have viewed the war period as marking an end to the Westernized modernity of the previous decades. In his study of realism, Marston Anderson argues that the need to popularize the war and the promotion of “national forms” forced mod- ernists to reject some of the leading imperatives of May Fourth culture: In 1938, however, in the context of the wartime effort to mobilize the masses through the arts, a much more aggressive effort, supported by Commu- nist party theorists such as Zhou Yang [周扬 (1908–89)], Ai Siqi [艾思奇 (1910–66)], and Chen Boda [陈伯达 (1904–89)], was made to advance the slogan “National forms.” This time the slogan clearly entailed the rejection of certain May Fourth values, particularly the cosmopolitanism and criti- cal independence that May Fourth authors had employed to divorce them- selves from tradition.69

68 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 332. As Lydia Liu has shown, Shi Zhecun’s mod- ernist fiction was also partly driven by an effort to legitimize “(pseudo-scientific) psycho- logical and psychoanalytical discourse.” See Lydia Liu, Translingual Practice, p. 129. Also, see Liu’s analysis of Shi’s “psychologizing” of the fantastic, pp. 133–43. Nonetheless, Shi’s fiction from the 1920s and 1930s evinces little interest in larger social realities. 69 Marston Anderson, Limits of Realism: Chinese Fiction in the Revolutionary Period (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), p. 70. out of the ashes 25

Linking the end of May Fourth’s emphasis on critical independence with what he refers to as the “eruption of the crowd” in socialist realism,70 Anderson traces wartime writers’ changing relationship to the masses in terms of the shifting relationship between the I-narrator of realist fiction and the “crowd”: . . . Chinese writers acknowledged a new imperative: they began erasing the distinction between “I” and “they”—between the self and society—that had been an indispensable basis for the practice of critical realism, subsuming both in a collective “we.”71 Anderson’s analysis of works of socialist realism by writers such as Ding Ling 丁玲 (1904–86) sheds light on how the exigencies of war changed intellectuals’ deictic relationship to the masses and led many writers and artists to reject earlier forms of modernism from the 1920s and 1930s. However, my readings of wartime culture will show that although many intellectuals sought to merge the individual ego with the national collec- tive and distance themselves from their ties to Westernized cosmopoli- tanism, they were often unsuccessful in their attempts to do so. Rather, narrators and speakers in wartime modernist fiction experience an unsta- ble deictic relationship with the masses and are frequently portrayed as detached observers within the crowd. These shifting narrators bear a resemblance to narrators in May Fourth Era fiction by writers such as Lu Xun 鲁迅 (1881–1936). As Shu-mei Shih observes, Lu Xun’s narrators are characterized by an “interplay between collectivism and individualism.”72 Similarly, Lydia Liu has written about the awkward deictic position of May Fourth writers, stemming from their efforts to “negotiate a subject position for themselves even as they spoke in a ‘borrowed’ voice,” or what she refers to as a “deictic impasse—I being non-I even as it tries to capture some genuine forms of historical experience in the flux of translingual

70 See Chapter Five, “Beyond Realism: The Eruption of the Crowd,” in ibid., pp. 180–202. 71 ibid., p. 202. 72 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 83. Also, Leo Lee comments on the “impasse between hope and despair” in Lu Xun’s works, in particular in his collection of poetry Wild Grass (Yecao 野草). See Chapter Five, “Wild Grass: The Impasse Between Hope and Despair,” in Leo Lee, Voices from the Iron House: A Study of Lu Xun (Purdue: Indiana University Press, 1987), pp. 89–109. In addition, Marston Anderson writes that Lu Xun’s narrators waver “between disillusionment and hope.” See Marston Anderson, Limits of Realism, p. 92. 26 introduction practice.”73 Yet, in comparison to Lu Xun and other May Fourth writers, wartime modernists portray even more fluid and unstable narrators and speakers who vacillate between a wide array of singular and plural nar- rative perspectives—reflecting the efforts of intellectuals to grapple with rapidly shifting roles in wartime society, and mirroring the displacement of many writers and artists during this period. Wartime culture should thus be understood as a maturation of, rather than an end to, the Westernized cosmopolitanism of the previous decades. By reinventing modernism in the context of native traditions and writ- ing on the theme of rural return, wartime writers and artists followed in the footsteps of their predecessors. However, they achieved a new level of aesthetic looseness when they intermixed modernist forms with a wide array of traditional forms, many drawn from regional popular cul- ture. The aesthetics of dissolution that characterized their works subverts “the either/or binarism of the Nationalist discourse,” and undermines any neat division between modernism and realism, and between Western and Chinese culture, high and low art, and divergent genres, styles, and narra- tive points of view. In part, the fluidity of wartime modernism bespeaks intellectuals’ efforts to portray new non-urban subjects and reach out to different audiences during the war period. In addition, it reflects their endeavor to redefine the relationship between tradition and modernity as well as between the self and the nation in the midst of unprecedented wartime destruction.

Outline of Chapters

The bulk of this study focuses on a series of close readings. These read- ings are arranged partly according to different genres. Chapter One looks at Mu Dan’s poetry; Chapter Two discusses Ye Qianyu’s visual artwork and cartoons; Chapter Three analyzes Wang Zengqi’s short stories; Chap- ter Four examines Fei Mu’s postwar film Spring in a Small Town; and Chapter Five provides an interpretation of Fei Ming’s postwar novel After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane. The organization of this book is also roughly chronological both across and within chapters. The first chapter starts with Mu Dan’s poem “Walk- ing in the Wilderness” (Yuanye shang zoulu 原野上走路) about his journey on foot to Kunming with fellow Lianda students and professors

73 Lydia Liu, Translingual Practice, p. 155. out of the ashes 27 in 1938,74 and the last chapter of the book ends with a consideration of Fei Ming’s postwar novel After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, which was serial- ized in 1947–48. Nonetheless, the book is not arranged according to strict chronology. While Chapter Two focuses on cartoon-sketches and paint- ings produced from 1935 to 1948, Chapter Three looks at stories written by Wang Zengqi between the years 1944 and 1948, Chapter Four analyzes Fei Mu’s 1948 film Spring in a Small Town, and Chapter Five examines Fei Ming’s postwar novel, which was serialized between June 1947 and November 1948. By looking at works created at different periods of the war, ranging from the early years of the War of Resistance to the postwar years of the ensuing Chinese Civil War, I seek to better understand shifts that took place over the course of the conflict. In the early years of war, many intel- lectuals were hopeful of a swift victory, and some, such as poet Mu Dan, saw the conflict as an opportunity for China to produce a new modern culture. However, as the long years of protracted war drew on, many intel- lectuals throughout China increasingly voiced a loss of faith in the heroic narratives that had proliferated at the outset of war. Such disillusionment only intensified in the wake of World War II. Yet it was at this time, in the midst of growing civil war, that many writers and artists produced some of their most thoughtful and inspired theoretical writings and artis- tic works. To some extent, the organization of chapters also mirrors the geographic routes taken by intellectuals during the war period. While the first chapter begins with Mu Dan’s poem about his journey to Kunming, the next chap- ter on Ye Qianyu traces his wartime travels to Wuhan, Chongqing, Hong Kong, Chengdu, and other cities. Finally, the last three chapters deal with works by Wang Zengqi, Fei Mu, and Fei Ming that were published or pro- duced after the war in Shanghai and Beijing. By returning to these cities, I follow the paths of many wartime intellectuals who traveled back to these cities following the War of Resistance. Yet, none of these works have an urban setting. Whereas Wang’s stories are situated in Kunming and in his hometown of Gaoyou in Jiangsu, Fei Mu’s film was filmed in Songjiang 松江, a small town one hour outside Shanghai, and Fei Ming’s novel deals with his wartime displacement to Huangmei in Hubei province.

74 Although it was not published until 1940, it was most likely written several years earlier during or after his journey on foot to Kunming with fellow Southwest Associated University students and professors in 1938. 28 introduction

Chapter One focuses on a selection of Mu Dan’s wartime works, includ- ing several poems from his 1945 collection Exploration Team (Tanxian dui 探险队; 1945). In these works, Mu Dan sought to produce what he described as “non-poetic” poetry, or a “third route for lyricism” that would convey “experience” rather than “emotions” and “scenery.”75 In an effort to achieve this goal, Mu Dan wrote formally loose, essay-like poems about such conventionally non-poetic topics as hiding out in an air-raid shelter, taking part in demonstrations, and grappling with corruption and disillu- sionment. In addition, he borrowed from many different forms and styles, including traditional regulated verse, free verse, the satirical essay (zawen 杂文; literally, “miscellaneous essay”), the sonnet, T.S. Eliot’s modernist poetry, and an oratorical style inspired by Walt Whitman (1819–92). Chapter Two analyzes the wartime artwork of cartoonist Ye Qianyu. Fol- lowing a background sketch of the activities of the wartime Cartoon Pro- paganda Corps led by Ye, this chapter examines three series of Ye’s hybrid sketch-cartoons, Wartime Chongqing (Zhanshi Chongqing 战时重庆; 1940), Escape from Hong Kong (Taochu Xianggang 逃出香港; 1942), and Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian (Zhang Daqian liu xiang 张大千六相; 1945). In addition, it provides interpretations of Ye’s Chinese paintings of Indian dancers, which he produced during his stay with traditional painter Zhang Daqian in Chengdu in 1945. During the early years of the War of Resis- tance, Ye mostly produced cartoons intended as propaganda to stir up resistance to the Japanese. However, as he attempted to reach out to audi- ences in the interior, portray new subjects, and collaborate with artists from around the country, he experimented with a wide variety of materi- als and techniques, including sketching, cartooning, traditional painting, regional minority artwork, and Buddhist Dunhuang wall art. Chapter Three analyzes Wang Zengqi’s 1948 collection of eight short stories, Collection of Chance Encounters, in dialogue with his 1947 post- war essay, “The Essence of the Short Story,” in which he critiques Virginia Woolf ’s 1924 modernist manifesto, “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown.” Chart- ing the development of Wang’s aesthetic theories in his wartime stories, I show how he moves away from a more overtly Western modernist style focused on interiority in his early stories. Instead, in his later stories, Wang begins to write about common people and to adopt a style reminiscent in many ways of his teacher Shen Congwen. Nonetheless, all his short stories from this collection embody a wide array of Chinese and Western

75 See Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 249. out of the ashes 29 influences and are the product of his border-crossing experiments with the short story and a variety of genres, including poetry, essay, drama, art, music, painting, native-soil fiction, and the popular martial arts story. Chapter Four provides a close reading of Fei Mu’s 1948 modernist clas- sic Spring in a Small Town. Hailed by many critics as the best Chinese film of all time, Fei Mu’s postwar film is characterized by experimenta- tion with long takes, dissolves, low camera angles, voiceover narration, and play with light and shadow. In this chapter, my interpretation of the film is contextualized within a discussion of Fei Mu’s theoretical writ- ings on film, the memoir of the film’s script-writer Li Tianji, and Su Shi’s 苏轼 (1037–1101) song lyric (ci 词), “A Spring Scene” (Chun jing 春景), which Fei Mu recited to Li Tianji after reading his script. In addition, I analyze Fei Mu’s artistry in dialogue with Eileen Chang’s writings about wartime “desolation” (huangliang 荒凉) as “a form of revelation” char- acterized by “equivocal contrasts” (cenci duizhao 参差的对照).76 Draw- ing from Chang’s theories, I argue that Fei Mu’s film portrays postwar desolation by dramatizing the liminal grey area between tradition and modernity, the lost past and the present scene of ruins, as well as between divergent narrative and temporal frames and styles. Chapter Five looks at Fei Ming’s postwar novel After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane. Although Fei Ming claimed that his novel was “completely truthful,” and intended as a national history, in this work he crosses many generic boundaries between fiction, non-fiction, autobiography, biogra- phy, philosophy, history, the traditional essay, and a variety of traditional genres, such as “talks on poetry” (shihua 诗话). Moreover, his novel draws from a diverse combination of ideologies including Marxism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Daoism. While Fei Ming’s adoption of Marxism is rep- resentative of many intellectuals who increasingly moved leftward dur- ing the Chinese Civil War, this novel’s high level of both ideological and aesthetic fluidity is emblematic of the dramatic historical changes taking place in China on the eve of the Communist Revolution. In the epilogue, I explore the post-Mao critical response to and influ- ence of works by Mu Dan, Ye Qianyu, Wang Zengqi, Fei Mu, and Fei Ming. In doing so, I point out that the war period is crucial to delineating a

76 Eileen Chang, “Writing of One’s Own,” in Written on Water, p. 17; Zhang Ailing, “Ziji de wenzhang” 自己的文章 (Writing of One’s Own), in Qian Liqun, ed., Ershi shiji Zhong- guo xiaoshuo lilun ziliao, p. 285. 30 introduction genealogy of Chinese modernism and to understanding the emergent postmodern. The early post-Mao years witnessed a massive importation of Western culture and nostalgia for the Republican Era, and the wartime works discussed in this study also experienced a resurgence of popularity. Contemporary intellectuals initially became interested in wartime art and literature as they searched for cultural roots in the wake of the Cultural Revolution. In addition, they viewed earlier modernisms as alternatives to socialist realism and to what Li Tuo has described as “Maoist discourse” (Mao wenti 毛文体). More recently, the fragmentation of postsocialist society that has come about in the wake of globalization and marketiza- tion has some parallels with the decentralization of culture that occurred during the War of Resistance. Wartime intellectuals’ experimentation with highly destabilized nar- rative and temporal perspectives, along with their intermixing of high and low cultural forms, and portrayal of the ruins of modernity have thus resonated with postmodern artists and writers seeking to depict similarly “scattered” and “unsystematic” realities. Indeed, the wartime aesthetics of dissolution presages the postmodern in its formal looseness. Moreover, as a rapidly modernizing nation, which has at the same time been deeply influenced by global postmodernity, China’s postsocialist culture is char- acterized by a complex mix of postmodern and modern aesthetics. In sum, through providing interpretations of works drawn from a vari- ety of genres and geographic locations around China, and contextualized within the chaotic history of the War of Resistance and the Chinese Civil War, this study traces the evolution of Chinese modernism during this period. Though I argue that wartime culture should be understood as a continuation and maturation of the previous decades, at the same time I show that this period’s modernism is not characterized by a single mono- lithic movement tied to a particular urban area. Rather it is comprised of a proliferation of different “modernisms” produced through the cross- generic and cross-cultural experimentation of displaced intellectuals liv- ing in different regions of wartime China. Although the aesthetic fluidity of this period’s culture reflects on chaotic realities within China, more broadly, it is also tied to the cataclysmic violence of world war. This study thus not only historicizes late Chinese modernism in the context of chaos and displacement within China. In addition, it explores linkages between the study of Chinese wartime art and literature and scholarly inquiry into questions of how displacement and war, in particular World War II, have shaped modern culture and creativity. CHAPTER ONE

A SONNET IN AN AIR-RAID SHELTER: MU DAN AND THE NEW LYRICISM

Maybe on the road to exile, the scenic landscape you have not seen before will make you shout out in amazement. However, the extent and scale of the magnitude and ferocity of this war have repeatedly stifled our interest in being lyrical. One always feels that although the scenery is so rich in lyri- cal fragrance, none of this makes any sense. In this heavily bombed region, many people have been bombed to death. What is more, lyricism itself has been bombed to death. Yet, poetry, which cannot be bombed to death, has a responsibility to describe our spirit—a spirit that refuses to die from the bombing.1 Fleeing from massive wartime bombing and destruction as they made their way to the interior, refugees were greeted with panoramic vistas of the rugged mountains and steep terraced fields of southwest China. Yet, despite the beauty of the scenery, in the words of poet Xu Chi 徐迟 (1914–96), it was as though “lyricism itself had been bombed to death” (zhasi le shuqing 炸死了抒情), and the sheer magnitude of the war had “stifled” any attempt to write poetry. In the midst of the dehumanizing destruction wrought by mechanized warfare, it suddenly seemed ridicu- lous to write about the “lyrical fragrance” of the countryside or revisit the romantic themes that had been popular among urban poets in Shanghai and Beijing prior to the war.2 Over the course of the long war, as intel- lectuals were forced to deal with government corruption, inflation, hun- ger, and poverty, their disenchantment with what they saw as the banal clichés of both traditional poetry and Western-inspired romantic poetry only deepened.

1 See Xu Chi, “Shuqing de fangzhu” 抒情的放逐 (The Exile of Lyricism), Dingdian 1.1 (July 10, 1939): 50–51; quoted in Qian Liqun 钱理群, Wen Rumin 温儒敏, and Wu Fuhui 吴福辉, Zhongguo xiandai wenxue sanshi nian 中国现代文学三十年 (Thirty Years of Modern Chinese Literature; Beijing: Beijing daxue, 1998), p. 567. 2 See Jiayan Mi’s discussion of prewar “decadent” poetry by Li Jinfa and Guo Moruo in his Self-Fashioning and Reflexive Modernity in Modern Chinese Poetry, 1919–1949 (Lewiston: Edwin Mellon Press, 2004). 32 chapter one

In their attempts to express the fragmentation and grinding daily reali- ties of war, many poets experimented with a looser style, and Li Guang- tian, Zhu Ziqing, and others advocated the “prosification” or “essayization” (sanwenhua 散文化) of poetry.3 In the words used by Li Guangtian to open his 1943 book The Art of Poetry (Shi de yishu 诗的艺术), “Our age is an age of prose.”4 Similarly, in the first issue of the Lianda student journal Literary Gathering (Wenju 文聚) published in 1941, both Zhu Ziqing and Shen Congwen provided articles about the need for poets to move beyond traditional conventions and create a new “prose-like” poetry.5 These poets’ interest in creating looser poetic forms also grew out of their efforts to popularize the war by producing “recitation poetry” (lang- song shi 朗诵诗).6 During the war, poets traveled throughout the rural hinterland where they read their work aloud in poetry recitals and per- formed together with other dramatists and musicians. In 1940, poets in Chongqing joined together to form the Poetry Recitation Team (Shige langsong dui 诗歌朗诵队), and recitation groups were also formed in Wuhan and Guangzhou, where local poets published the journal China Poetry Forum (Zhongguo shitan 中国诗坛).7 Likewise, recitation poetry was popular on university campuses, and Chinese literature professor

3 See Zhu Ziqing, Xinshi zahua, p. 3; Li Guangtian, Shi de yishu, p. 1; and Yuan Kejia 袁可嘉, Lun xinshi xiandaihua 论新诗现代化 (A Discussion of the Modernization of the New Poetry; Beijing; Sanlian shudian, 1988), p. 66. The term sanwen 散文 could be trans- lated as either “prose” or “essay.” By calling for poetry modeled on sanwen, intellectuals advocated a style of poetry closer to prose. Yet, they also promoted a looser style, similar to that employed in the traditional essay. 4 Li Guangtian, Shi de yishu, p. 1. 5 For the first issue of the student journal Wenju, published in October 1941 by the student literary group “Literary Gathering Association” (Wenju she 文聚社), Zhu Ziqing contributed a piece advocating the need for poets to move beyond traditional conven- tions and create a “prose-like” poetry. Shen Congwen’s and Li Guangtian’s essays on the prosification of poetry and Mu Dan’s poem “Praise” (Zanmei 赞美) also appeared in this issue. Wenju is held at the Peking University archive’s “Wenxue guan” 文学馆 (Literary Building). 6 For a discussion of recitation poetry in wartime China, see Chapter Three, “Inventing Recitation: Poetry and the Idea of the Sounding Voice during the War of Resistance,” in John A. Crespi, Voices in Revolution: Poetry and the Auditory Imagination in Modern China (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2009), pp. 69–100. See also Wu Xiaodong 吴晓东, “Kangzhan shiqi Zhongguo shige de lishi liuxiang” 抗战时期中国诗歌的历史流向 (The Historical Direction Taken by Chinese Poetry during the War of Resistance), in his Jiyi de shenhua 记忆的神话 (The Mythology of Memory; Beijing: Xin shijie, 2001), pp. 296–327. 7 For a discussion of wartime poetry recitals, see “Wartime Recitals and the Consolida- tion of a Genre,” in John A. Crespi, Voices in Revolution: Poetry and the Auditory Imagina- tion in Modern China (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2009), pp. 101–29. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 33

Fig. 1.1. Photograph of Wen Yiduo listening to a student reciting poetry during a February 1945 field trip to the town of Lunan. Photograph from Lianda: A Chinese University in War and Revolution, by John Israel. Copyright © 1999 by the Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Jr. University.

Wen Yiduo frequently worked with students at Lianda to organize read- ings in nearby towns (Fig. 1.1). Nonetheless, despite their efforts to popularize the war, poets disagreed about how wartime recitation poetry should be written, and many com- plained that it was “un-poetic” and lacking in quality, or, in Shen Congwen’s words, “formally retrograde” (xingshi luowu 形式落伍).8 As discussed in the introduction, in his “Poetry and Building of the Nation,” Zhu Ziqing advocated a new kind of patriotic prose poetry that would promote the war effort and yet at the same time convey “modern man’s complicated feelings and thoughts.”9 Similarly, in his “The Prose Aesthetic of Poetry” (Shi de sanwen mei 诗的散文美; 1939), popular poet Ai Qing promoted a “prose aesthetic” or “essay aesthetic” (sanwen mei 散文美) characterized

8 Shen Congwen, “Tan langsong shi” 谈朗诵诗 (On Recitation Poetry), in Zhang Zha- ohe 张兆和, ed., Shen Congwen quanji 沈从文全集 (Complete Works of Shen Congwen; Taiyuan: Beiyue, 2001), XVII: 246; quoted in Crespi, Voices in Revolution, p. 64. For a discus- sion of Bian Zhilin’s critique of the sloganistic nature of wartime poetry, see Ping-kwan Leung, “Literary Modernity in Chinese Poetry,” p. 63. 9 Zhu Ziqing, “Shi yu jianguo,” in ibid., pp. 38–45. 34 chapter one by formal freedom and a style of language close to that of the masses. However, at the same time Ai Qing argued that wartime poetry ought to emulate the musicality and exquisite imagery found in Tang dynasty (618–907) and Song dynasty (960–1279) lyric poetry.10 Lianda poet Wang Zuoliang 王佐良 (1916–95) recalled the impassioned debates on poetic form conducted by younger poets during the war years: “With a sense of great enthusiasm and urgency, young writers discussed the details of liter- ary techniques. They argued loudly, often until late at night.”11 Lianda poet Mu Dan’s wartime works provides a particularly eloquent example of the “prose-like” poetry produced during this period, which strove to express both patriotism and “modern man’s complicated feelings and thoughts.” In contrast to Western romantic poetry and traditional Chinese poetry, or the “old lyricism” (jiu de shuqing 旧的抒情) focused on “scenery” (fengjing 风景) and “mood” (qingxu 情绪), Mu Dan stated that he hoped to create a “new lyricism” (xin de shuqing 新的抒情), or what he described as a “third route for lyricism” (di san tiao shuqing de lu 第三条抒情的路), that would convey “experience” (jingyan 经验).12 In a 1975 letter to his friend Guo Baowei, Mu Dan explained the modernist impulse behind his wartime poetry, focusing on his 1940 poem “Effect of Returning to the Wilderness” (Huanye zuoyong 还野作用): This poem [Effect of Returning to the Wilderness] borrowed from foreign modernism, and it does not portray wind, flowers, snow, or the moon [feng, hua, xue, yue 风花雪月], nor was it written using old and clichéd images or a vague and romantic artistic conception. Rather, I used “non-poetic” [fei shiyi 非诗意] language to write this poem. The difficult aspect of this kind of poem is that it cannot make use of ready-made materials; the poet must search for a new image to express the thought of each poem. Expressed in this manner, thoughts appear fresh and new, but can also be disturbing. You

10 Ai Qing, “Shi de sanwen mei,” Dingdian 1.1 (July 10, 1939): 43–44. 11 Wang Zuoliang 王佐良, “A Chinese Poet,” Life and Letters ( June 1946): 200. This essay was republished the following year in Chinese as Wang Zuoliang, “Yige Zhongguo shiren” 一个中国诗人 (A Chinese Poet), Wenxue zazhi (July, 1947). The Chinese version is cited in Li Fang 李方, ed., Mu Dan shi quanji 穆旦诗全集 (Complete Poems of Mu Dan; Beijing: Zhongguo wenxue, 1996), p. 373. 12 See Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, pp. 247–48. See also Mu Dan, “Cong kangzhan zhong chansheng xin Zhongguo” 从抗战中产生新中国 (Creating a New China Amidst the War of Resistance), Dagong bao, March 14, 1938; and his “Ta si zai di er ci” 他死在第二次 (He Died the Second Time), Dagong bao, March 3, 1938. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 35

have to think even harder to make sense out of this disordered combination of words—otherwise you won’t understand the poem.13 In the place of traditional lyricism and what he viewed as its clichés of “flowers, wind, snow, and moon,” and “vague and romantic artis- tic conceptions,” Mu Dan drew inspiration from Western modernism and employed a “disordered combination of words” so as to force his readers to “think even harder.” In addition, he experimented with a wide variety of forms, including traditional regulated verse, free verse, the son- net form, and varying lengths of rhymed verse, such as three, four, five, and six-line verse. Yet, the “new lyricism” that Mu Dan advocated was more than simply a formally experimental style of poetry that would require his readers to think more deeply. In addition, it was a poetry that would sing the praises of a nation reborn in the crucible of war and express “a kind of extensive and profound emotion” (yizhong boda yu shenhou de qinggan 一种博大 与深厚的情感) experienced by the poet in relation to larger historical realities.14 As Mu Dan wrote in a 1940 review of Bian Zhilin’s poetry col- lection Letters of Comfort (Weilao xinji 慰劳信集; 1939), wartime poetry should be filled with “intense rhythm, grand tempo, and a happy melody” expressive of a new and reinvigorated China: In order to represent the universal progress of society or the individual towards illumination, in order to create a grand harmony of spirit between poetry and the age, we need a “new lyricism.” This new lyricism should encourage man by rational means to strive for that which is glorious . . . through the use of intense rhythm, grand tempo, and a happy melody. This is how the New China is. The “new lyricism” should naturally also be made in its image.15 Mu Dan’s wartime poems are emblematic of the ambivalent combina- tion of self-conscious formal experimentation and deep concern for the

13 Guo Baowei 郭保卫, “Shuxin jin youzai, shiren hechu xun” 书信今犹在诗人何处寻 (The Letter Remains Here Today, But Where Shall We Look for the Poet?), in Du Yunxie 杜 运燮, Yuan Kejia 袁可嘉, and Zhou Yuliang 周与良, eds., Yige minzu yijing qilai: Huainian shiren, fanyijia Mu Dan 一个民族已经起来怀念诗人翻译家穆旦 (A People has Already Risen up: Commemorating Poet and Translator, Mu Dan; Nantong: Jiangsu renmin, 1987), p. 179. For the poem, see Li Fang, ed., Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 85. 14 Mu Dan, “Ta si zai di er ci”; cited in Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 248. 15 Mu Dan, “Weilao xinji shuping—cong ‘Yumu ji’ shuoqi” 慰劳信集书评从鱼目集说起 (Review of Letters of Comfort—Beginning from “Collection of Fish Eyes”), Da gongbao, April 28, 1940. 36 chapter one national crisis found in modernist works from this period by poets such as Bian Zhilin, Feng Zhi 冯至 (1905–93), He Qifang, Hang Yuehe 杭约 赫 (1917–95), Zheng Min 郑敏 (1920–), Du Yunxie 杜运燮 (1915–2002), Tang Shi 唐湜 (1920–2005), Tang Qi 唐祈 (1920–90), Xin Di 辛笛 (1912– 2004), Yuan Kejia 袁可嘉 (1921–), Chen Jingrong 陈敬容 (1917–89), and Dai Wangshu 戴望舒 (1905–50).16 As discussed in the introduction, close connections existed between popular poets at Yan’an and modernist poets based at Lianda. While popular poets like Ai Qing and He Qifang were admired by young poets in Kunming, modernist poets such as Bian Zhilin and Hang Yuehe journeyed to Yan’an.17 Like Bian Zhilin and Hang Yuehe, Mu Dan traveled extensively during the war, writing and reciting poetry as he journeyed from Beijing to Changsha, and later to Kunming and on to Burma. In order to better contextualize Mu Dan’s poetry within the tumultu- ous history of the war period, this chapter charts the travels of himself and his companions inland to Kunming where they subsequently encoun- tered various wartime “experiences,” including seeking refuge from bomb- ing and taking part in demonstrations. In the first section, I analyze Mu Dan’s oratorical-style poem “Walking in the Wilderness—Traversing Three Thousand Li on Foot, Part II” (Yuanye shang zoulu-sanqianli bux- ing zhi er 原野上走路三千里步行之二; 1940), which deals with his displacement and journey on foot to the interior. Next, I compare Mu

16 For a study in English of wartime modernist poetry, see Ping-kwan Leung, “Aesthet- ics of Opposition: A Study of the Modernist Generation of Chinese Poets, 1936–1949,” Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, San Diego, 1984. For a study in Chinese, see Xie Zhixi 解志熙, “Baofengyu zhong de hangyin: Kangzhan ji 40 niandai xinshichao xulun 暴风雨中的行吟抗战及 40 年代新诗潮叙论 (Chanting in the Wind and Rain: A Dis- cussion of a Collection of New Poetry from the War of Resistance and the 40s), in his Modeng yu xiandai: Zhongguo xiandai wenxue de shicun fenxi 摩登与现代中国现代文学 的实存分析 (The Modern and the Modern Era: An Analysis of Existentialism in Modern Literature; Beijing: Qinghua daxue, 2006), pp. 1–95. See also Chapter Two and Chapter Three on modernist poetry from the 1930s and ’40s in Wang Jianzhao 王剑钊, Ershi shiji Zhongguo xiandaizhuyi shige 二十世纪中国现代主义诗歌 (Twentieth-Century Modern- ist Chinese Poetry; Beijing: Wenhua yishu chubanshe, 2006), pp. 49–140. In addition, see Chapter Three in Luo Zhenya 罗振亚, Zhongguo xiandai zhuyi shige shilun 中国现代主 义诗歌史论 (An Historical Commentary on Chinese Modernist Poetry; Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian, 2001), pp. 123–56. 17 In his dissertation, Kuan observes that Hang Yuehe studied at the Lu Xun Art Insti- tute at Yan’an prior to producing modernist poems such as “The Rejuvenated Earth” (Fuhuo de tudi 复活的土地; 1949). See Ping-kwan, “Aesthetics of Opposition,” p. 120. As Ping-kwan Leung writes, “In this generation of Chinese poets, though they may display metaphysical, rhetorical or temporal discontinuity, they rarely profess absolute aesthetic discontinuity—defined by Spears as the complete break between the art world and the real world.” See ibid., p. 129. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 37

Dan’s wartime poetry to his early poetry produced in Tianjin and Bei- jing, and discuss how his wartime works intermix Western modernism, traditional lyricism, and a traditional oratorical style. In the third sec- tion, I provide a reading of his poem “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shel- ter” (Fangkongdong li de shuqingshi 防空洞里的抒情诗; 1939) and discuss his efforts to write “non-poetic poetry” about bombing raids and life in the interior. In the fourth section, I interpret Mu Dan’s poems “1939 Torchlit Procession in Kunming” (Yijiu sanjiu nian huoju hanglie zai Kunming 一九三九年火炬行列在昆明) and “May” (Wuyue 五月; 1940), both of which deal with May Fourth parades held in Kunming in 1939 and 1940.

Walking in the Wilderness

On February 20, 1938, Tsing-hua University student Mu Dan set out on foot with around 240 other male students and a dozen faculty members from Tsing-hua, Peking, and Nankai Universities to traverse the moun- tainous and bandit-infested regions of Hunan en route to Kunming in the distant province of Yunnan (Figs. 1.2–1.3).

Fig. 1.2. Photograph of Lianda students and teachers marching to Kunming. Photograph from Lianda: A Chinese University in War and Revolution, by John Israel. Copyright © 1999 by the Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Jr. University. 38 chapter one

Fig. 1.3. National Changsha Temporary University Hunan—Guizhou-Sichuan Traveling Corps arrives in the city of Kunming.

At first, many students were unwilling to leave Changsha, where Lianda had initially been relocated to. Rather, they felt that they should remain to face the Japanese army and die there as martyrs. In his essay, “Xinan Lianda since the War of Resistance” (Kangzhan yilai de Xinan Lianda 抗战 以来的西南联大), Mu Dan describes how many students saw the choice they faced in terms of a stark dichotomy—“Save the country, or go to school?” This was reformulated as “Stay in Changsha, or go to Kunming?”18 In order to persuade the students to accept the government’s mandate, Nationalist General Chen Cheng 陈诚 (1898–1965) visited Hunan and addressed the students. “You are China’s last drop of blood,” her “national treasure,” Chen told his audience, using impassioned rhetoric. Citing argu- ments earlier used by Chen Duxiu 陈独秀 (1879–1942), Guo Moruo 郭 沫若 (1892–1978), and Zhou Enlai 周恩来 (1898–1976), he reminded the students that as educated youths from China’s premier universities, they had a responsibility to their country. While China had plenty of soldiers, he argued, it lacked highly educated citizens.19

18 Zha Liangzheng, “Kangzhan yilai de Xinan Lianda,” in Zha Liangzheng, ed., Kang- zhan yilai zhi gaodeng jiaoyu 抗战以来之高等教育 (Higher Education since the War of Resistance; Hong Kong: Longmen shudian, 1996), pp. 1–3. This work is a reprint of Jiaoyu zazhi 教育杂志 (Chinese Educational Review) 31.1 (Jan. 10, 1941). 19 Quoted in Zha Liangzheng, Kangzhan yilai zhi gaodeng jiaoyu, p. 1. See also John Israel’s discussion in his Lianda, pp. 28–29. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 39

Won over by the general’s words, the students changed their minds and embarked on the long journey to Kunming.20 Along the way, they slept in the homes of peasant villagers and were greeted by central Hunan’s rural scenery, consisting of “gently terraced hills, flooded paddies, fresh roadside grasses and flowers, stands of bamboo, slopes of dark green tea bushes interlaced with pine groves, and neatly cultivated plots of vegetables.”21 In addition, they collected folk songs, wrote poems, and lis- tened to Professor Wen Yiduo reciting poetry under the stars.22 Traveling with this group, Mu Dan decided to work on improving his English. After memorizing each page of his English dictionary he tore it out, impressing his classmates with a pair of empty book covers when they at last arrived in Kunming.23 Although Mu Dan ended up staying in school, he was determined to take concrete action to help save his country. In 1942, two years after his graduation, he joined the Chinese Expedition Force for Burma where he worked as a translator for the British forces.24 Also, he began com- posing recitation poetry intended to inspire his audience with patriotic ardor for their homeland in its time of need. Poems written at this time include “Praise” (Zanmei 赞美; 1941), “I See” (Wo kan 我看; 1938), “Gar- den” (Yuan 园; 1938), “Two Stanzas of Choral Song” (Hechang erzhang 合唱二章; 1939), “Departure—Traversing Three Thousand Li on Foot, Part I” (Chufa—Sanqianli buxing zhi yi 出发三千里步行之一; 1940), and “Walking in the Wilderness—Traversing Three Thousand Li on Foot, Part II” (Yuanye shang zoulu—sanqianli buxing zhi er 原野上走路三千 里步行之二; 1940).25 These works all feature a poetic speaker passing through wide swathes of countryside and expressing a newfound sense of connection with the common people. In “Praise,” for example, the speaker

20 Most of Lianda’s 800 students made the journey to Kunming by railroad, automobile, or boat. 21 See Qian Nengxin 钱能欣, Xinan sanqianwubai li 西南三千五百里 (3,500 Li through Southwest China; Kunming: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1939), pp. 9–10; cited in Israel, Lianda, p. 35. 22 ibid. 23 See Du Yunxie 杜运燮, “Mu Dan zhuyi de beihou” 穆旦著译的背后 (Behind Mu Dan, the Translator), in Yige minzu yijing qilai, p. 112. Cai Xiaomin, “Jiu lai xingchu hao zhu- ixun” 久来兴初好追寻 (Fond of Pursuing the Early Excitement of Long Ago), Qinghua xiaoyou tongxun 清华校友通讯 (Communications from Tsing-hua Alumni) 62 (January 1978): 17; cited in Israel, Lianda, p. 48. 24 Du Yunxie 杜运燮, “Eleven Poems by Mu Dan,” Pang Bingjun, tr., Renditions 21 (1984): 252. 25 Li Fang, ed., Mu Dan shi quanji, pp. 134–36, 39, 41, 45, 81, and 83. Three thousand li 里 is roughly equivalent to 1200 miles. 40 chapter one witnesses “a people [that] has already risen up” ( yi ge minzu yijing qilai 一个民族已经起来)26 and subsequently attempts to “embrace” ( yong- bao 拥抱) the people: “I will embrace you with everything, you,/ The people I see everywhere, Ah!” (我要以一切拥抱你, 你, /我到处看见的 人民呵).27 Mu Dan’s two-part poem “Walking in the Wilderness—Traversing Three Thousand Li on Foot” tells the story of his experiences on the trek to Kunming. Although this poem was not published until October 1940, the date of its composition is unknown.28 Most likely, it was written several years earlier and published on Lianda’s “wall newspaper” (bibao 壁报).29 Mu Dan’s second poem in the sequence, “Walking in the Wilderness— Traversing Three Thousand Li on Foot, Part II”, is reproduced here: Walking in the Wilderness—Traversing 3,000 Li on Foot, Part II Finally, we have left the fishnet of the city, That suffocating, dry, and empty grid. Ah, that city, which continually drags30 us down towards despair! And today, this free and vast open wilderness From the boundless horizon embraces us; We can simply drift on the richly fragrant green sea. We swim into the blue sea, the orange and yellow sea, the brown and red sea . . . Oh! We see the translucent sea embracing China, A round glass mirror reflecting a fresh and inviting fruit, A village resting on the half arc of its sweet and refreshing skin, Revolving in the light of the sun, revolving beneath the feet of a colony of ants. They walk everywhere, listening closely to the moving song of spring! Listen! Their blood is conversing with the heart of the wilderness. (This fresh new sound that never existed before, what is it saying?) Oh! We can’t say what it is (we are so young). Endless joy flows out of our blood.

26 Ibid., p. 134. 27 Ibid., p. 135. 28 Ibid., pp. 81 and 374–75. 29 According to Mu Dan’s classmate Wang Zuoliang 王佐良 (1916–95), many of his works were printed on Lianda’s wall newspapers. See Wang Zuoliang 王佐良, “Mu Dan: Youlai yu guisu” 穆旦由来与归宿 (Mu Dan: Starting Point and Return Destination), in Du Yunxie, Yuan Kejia, and Zhou Yuliang, eds., Yige minzu yijing qilai, p. 2. 30 In this line, “drags down” is my translation of lao 捞. More literally, lao means “to fish with a net” and expands the metaphor introduced in the first line of the poem of the city as a fishnet. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 41

We rise and fall on wave upon wave of glossy, green fields. A soft red band is cast into yet another band, Another long wide path that wraps around another piece of our mother- land. The encompassing scenery slowly winnows us in and out, And the rhythm of our march is always in unison As the soles of our feet beat against the soft, loose red earth. We walk on the paths which were walked by our beloved ancestors; For so many years it has all been the same endless wilderness. (Oh! Blue sea, orange and yellow sea, brown and red sea . . . .) Ah, for so many years this wilderness of fertile harvests has been surging forward. Today it is you who unfurls the same enticing design, Waiting for our brute strength to hurl it into motion. So we walk. How can we resist? Oh, we cannot resist That hope, which once burned in the hearts of countless generations of ancestors. This inestimable hope is so stubborn and persistent. Ah, China’s road is so free and vast . . . . October 25, 194031 原野上走路—三千里步行之二 我们终于离开了渔网似的城市, 那以窒息的、干燥的、空虚的格子 不断地捞我们到绝望去的城市呵! 而今天, 这片自由阔大的原野 从茫茫的天边把我们拥抱了, 我们简直可以在浓郁的绿海上浮游。 (我们泳进了蓝色的海, 橙黄的海, 棕赤的海。。。 ) 呕! 我们看见透明的大海拥抱着中国, 一面玻璃圆镜对著鲜艳的水果; 一个半弧形的甘美的皮肤上憩息着村庄, 转动在阳光里, 转动在一队蚂蚁的脚下, 到处他们走着, 倾听着春天激动的歌唱! 听! 他们的血液在和原野的心胸交谈, (这从未有过的清新的声音说些什么呢?) 呕! 我们说不出是为什么 (我们这样年青) 在我们的血里流泻着不尽的欢畅。 我们起伏在波动又波动的油绿的田野, 一条柔软的红色带子投进了另外一条 系著另外一片祖国土地的宽长道路,

31 All translations of Mu Dan’s poetry are mine unless otherwise stated. 42 chapter one

圈圈风景把我们缓缓地簸进又簸出, 而我们总是以同一的进行的节奏, 把脚掌拍打着松软赤红的泥土。 我们走在热爱的祖先走过的道路上, 多少年来都是一样的无际的原野, (呕! 蓝色的海, 橙黄的海, 棕赤的海。。。) 多少年来都澎湃着丰盛收获的原野呵, 如今是你, 展开了同样的诱惑的图案 等待我们的野力来翻滚。所以我们走着 我们怎能抗拒呢? 呕! 我们不能抗拒 那曾在无数代祖先心中燃烧着的希望。 这不可测知的希望是多么固执而悠久, 中国的道路又是多么自由和辽远呵。。。 1940年10月25日32 Like many other wartime intellectuals, Mu Dan enthusiastically portrayed his journey to the interior as a kind of rural return to the bosom of the common people and to the collective memories of the past.33 While the feet of Mu Dan’s speaker beat against the “soft, loose red earth” that his ancestors walked on, in his heart he experiences the same “burning hope” that “burned in the hearts of countless generations of ancestors.” The speaker and his fellow travelers experience a connection to one another embodied through their blood, a conduit for “endless joy”—blood which in turn converses with the “heart of the wilderness.” In turn, this shared past is constructed as the site of China’s future when the journey of the poet and his fellow travelers to Kunming is troped as “China’s road” that is “free and vast.” Here the speaker is greeted by the broad open vistas of the “boundless horizon” as he listens closely to the “moving song of spring.” In the first part of the poem, “Departure—Traversing 3,000 Li on Foot,” Mu Dan creates a comparable embodied depiction of nature when he writes that the Yuan River flows through “the heart of the homeland” (zuguo de xinzang 祖国的心脏).34 The theme Mu Dan portrays in this lyrical portrayal of the poet’s rural return is an ancient one in Chinese literature. For example, his depiction of the travelers’ escape from the “net” of the city is a reference to Tao Yuanming’s “Returning to Dwell in Gardens and Fields I” (Gui yuantian ju

32 Li Fang, ed., Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 83. 33 On intellectuals’ portrayal of their journeys to Kunming during the early years of the war, see Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 265. 34 See Li Fang, ed., Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 83. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 43 qi yi 归园田居其一), in which the speaker relinquishes the “dusty net” (chenwang 尘网) of the world for a life amid nature.35 Likewise, Mu Dan’s description of the hikers “swimming” through the multicolored “sea” of the open wilderness is an allusion to the Daoist idea of fish swimming in open water without being caught in the “net” of the world. However, Mu Dan’s treatment of the theme of rural return is also shaped by his reading of Western literature, in particular the works of the American poet Walt Whitman. His conceit of the blood that connects the travelers to one another and to their ancestors, as well as to the body of the Chinese nation, reflects Whitman’s preoccupation with blood as a primitive force running through the American people. In “I Sing of the Body Electric,” Whitman writes: Within there runs blood, The same old blood! The same red-running blood! There swells and jets a heart, there all passions, desires, reachings, aspira- tions, (Do you think they are not there because they are not express’d in parlors and lecture-rooms? . . . .)36 As Mu Dan’s classmate Wang Zuoliang recalls, after negotiating China’s backwaters, including dangerous areas of Hunan, Lianda students now understood the “roughness” and primitive vitality of Whitman to be “a kind of virtue.”37 Renouncing their earlier appropriation of English roman- tics like Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1882), they shifted their attention to American romantic poetry by authors such as Whitman and Ralph Waldo

35 See Cao Minggang 曹明刚, ed., Tao Yuanming quanji fu Xie Lingyun ji 陶渊明全集 附谢灵运集 (The Complete Works of Tao Yuanming with an Added Collection by Xie Lingyun; Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1998), p. 7. For Stephen Owen’s translation of this poem, see Stephen Owen, tr. and ed., An Anthology of Chinese Literature: Beginnings to 1911 (New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1996), p. 316. Owen translates “chenwang” 尘网 (lit. dusty net) as “snares of dust.” 36 Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass: The First (1855) Edition, Malcolm Cowley, ed. (New York: Viking Press, 1959), p. 121. 37 Wang Zuoliang 王佐良, “You ‘piao’ xiangqi de” 由飘想起的 (Thoughts Provoked by “Drifting”), Shenghuo daobao 生活导报 53 (January 30, 1944); cited in Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 246. Whitman was also popular among May Fourth poets, in particular Guo Moruo. For a discussion of Whitman’s impact on modern Chinese literature, see Guiyou Huang, “Passage to China: Whitmanism and Twentieth-Century Chinese Literature,” in his Whitmanism, Imagism, and Modernism in China and America (London: Associated University Press, 1997), pp. 37–54. See also Wang Ning, “Modernity and Whitman’s Reception in Chinese Literature,” in Ed Folsom, ed., Whitman East and West: New Contexts for Reading Walt Whitman (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2002), pp. 197–207. 44 chapter one

Emerson (1803–82).38 In Mu Dan’s case, his classmates recall that he would recite from Whitman’s collection Leaves of Grass (1855) in the mornings along the lakeshore in Kunming.39 More broadly, the Lianda students’ pre- occupation with Whitman reflected a trend throughout China during the war period when poets like Ai Qing and Xu Chi produced work inspired by Whitman, and many new translations of his works appeared.40 In addition to appreciating the American poet’s rough vitality and evocative nature imagery, wartime poets were inspired by the oratorical style in which he performed his work to public gatherings while traveling throughout the U.S. during the Civil War (1861–65).41 In her study Lan- guage and Style in Leaves of Grass, C. Carroll Hollis describes how Whit- man’s background in journalism and his early aspirations to become an orator left an indelible imprint on his poetry: But he [Whitman] did use oratory (or oratorical techniques) in his prophetic (or programmatic) poetry: he uses speech acts; involves “you,” the audience explicitly; employs negations, rhetorical questions, parallelism, repetitive devices, and lists and catalogs—all of these easily derived from oratory or the rhetoricians who wrote about oratory.42 In a similar fashion, John Crespi observes in his Voices in Revolution: Poetry and the Auditory Imagination in Modern China that wartime reci- tation poetry sought to “voice sound, making them texts that privilege auditory poetry of the ear over silent poetry of the eye.”43 Reflecting his attempt to reach out to a listening audience, Mu Dan deploys a variety of oratorical techniques in “Walking in the Wilderness,” reminiscent of those found in Whitman’s poetry. In the following line, Mu Dan addresses his audience directly and employs rhetorical questions: “Listen! Their blood is conversing with the heart of the wilderness/ (This fresh new sound that never existed before, what is it saying?).” In addition, he employs

38 See Wang Zuoliang, “Mu Dan: Youlai yu guisu,” p. 4. 39 Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 240. 40 On the impact of Walt Whitman on wartime poetry and on Ai Qing’s very popular poem, “The Great Yan River—My Nanny” (Da Yanhe—wo de baomu 大堰河我的保姆; 1935), see Guiyou Huang, “Walt Whitman in China,” in Gay Wilson Allen and Ed Folsom, eds., Walt Whitman and the World (Iowa City: Iowa University Press, 1995), pp. 406–22. 41 See Chapter One, “The Oratorical Impulse,” in C. Carroll Hollis, Language and Style in Leaves of Grass (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1983), pp. 1–27. For information on Whitman’s background in journalism, refer to Chapter Six of this work, “The Journalistic Background,” pp. 204–32. 42 C. Carroll Hollis, Language and Style in Leaves of Grass, p. 17. 43 John Crespi, Voices in Revolution, p. 70. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 45 repetition, making the verse more rhythmic: “We swim into the blue sea, the orange and yellow sea, the brown and red sea. . . .” (emphasis added). In the second-to-last stanza, this line is repeated with slight variations: “Oh! Blue sea, orange and yellow sea, brown and red sea . . .” (emphasis added). He also uses negation, here combined with repetition: “This fresh new sound that never existed before, what is it saying? Oh! We can’t say what it is saying.” In one example of his employment of parallelism he repeats the phrase “for so many years”: For so many years it has all been the same endless wilderness. (Oh! Blue sea, orange and yellow sea, brown and red sea . . . .) Ah, for so many years this wilderness of fertile harvests has been surging forward. The aural nature of Mu Dan’s poetry is apparent as well in his use of vivid aural imagery; examples are: the “rhythm of our march” as the soles of the travelers’ feet “beat against the soft and loose red earth,” “the moving song of spring,” and the sound of the travelers’ blood “conversing with the heart of the wilderness.” Moreover, he deploys loose rhymes in the third stanza between guo 国 (country) and 果 guo (fruit), and between zhuang 庄 (village), chang 唱 (to sing), and chang 畅 (free), and lastly, in the fourth stanza between lu 路 (road) and tu 土 (earth). Yet while Mu Dan’s poem is written in an oratorical style intended for a listening audience, at the same time he deploys a modernist aesthetic featuring dense imagery and complex grammatical structures. For exam- ple, in “Walking in the Wilderness,” the poet frequently uses the adjecti- val modifier de 的 and the adverbial modifier de 地 to create suggestive images, such as in “that city, which continually drags us down towards despair” (不断地捞我们到绝望去的城市) and “a village resting on the half arc of its sweet and refreshing skin” (一个半弧形的甘美的皮肤上 憩息着村庄). In the latter image, the phrase “sweet and refreshing skin” refers to the image of a “fresh and inviting fruit” in the previous line, a metaphor for the “revolving” earth that moves “in the light of the sun,” underneath the travelers’ tramping feet and “beneath a colony of ants.” In some respects, Mu Dan’s imagery bears the imprint of scientific discourse. Apart from focusing on the embodied image of blood as a conductor for the poet’s connection with China’s long history and previous generations, he conceives of the poet as walking on a moving planet. As well as reflecting the influence of Whitman, Mu Dan’s imagery was inspired in part by the English poet W.H. Auden (1907–73) whose poems, including “Spain, 1937,” he read while studying with Cambridge’s 46 chapter one

­heterodox and Communist professor Lord William Empson (1906–84) at Lianda in the fall of 1937.44 After Auden traveled to China in 1938 and wrote Journey to War (1939), students at Lianda became very interested in his work.45 Discarding their former view of the poet as an alienated and dismembered figure, literature students at Lianda instead held up Auden as an example of a traveling poet who was also a public figure, involved and concerned with the plight of the people. This image of Auden was given weight by his trips to Spain during the Spanish Civil War in 1937 and to China during World War II, and by his poetry and diaries which recorded the suffering of the common people in both countries.46 Poet Du Yunxie recollects in his introduction to a translation of 10 poems by Mu Dan, the latter was always a big fan of Auden, and even “in his last years he [Mu Dan] used to say, ‘Auden, particularly in his earliest years, is still the one I like best.’ ”47 Specifically, Mu Dan’s depiction of a “brightly colored fruit,” revolving beneath a village and the travelers passing by resembles Auden’s compari- son of the galaxy to a revolving and “enormous biscuit” in his free-verse “Commentary” in Journey to War: Season inherits legally from dying season; Protected by the wide peace of the sun, the planets Continue their circulations; and the galaxy Is free for ever to revolve like an enormous biscuit: With all his engines round him and the summer flowers, Little upon his little earth, man contemplates . . . .48 As a further point of comparison, Mu Dan’s long adjectival modifiers recall Auden’s use of similar phraseology, as in “With all his engines round him and the summer flowers, / Little upon his little earth” in reference to “man.” Likewise reminiscent of Auden, who writes about “little man” from the detached perspective of watching the galaxies revolve, Mu Dan adopts

44 See Li Fang, Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 371. Wang Zuoliang also comments on Auden’s impact on Mu Dan’s poetry, which he claims seems often like a “translation” of Auden’s works. See Wang, “Mu Dan: Youlai yu guisu,” p. 2. For a discussion of Lord Empson’s career following his banishment from Cambridge, see John Haffenden, William Empson: Volume I: Among the Mandarins (London: Oxford University Press, 2005). Empson’s biographer characterizes him as an erudite scholar who was sympathetic to the Maoist revolution and very interested in Buddhism. 45 W.H. Auden and Christopher Isherwood, Journey to War (New York: Random House, 1939). 46 Wang Zuoliang, “Mu Dan: Youlai yu guisu,” p. 2. 47 See Du Yunxie, “Eleven Poems by Mu Dan,” p. 253. 48 W.H. Auden and Christopher Isherwood, Journey to War, p. 289. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 47 a position of distance when he depicts the hikers traversing a revolving earth.49 In this example, Mu Dan briefly switches from the first-person plural, which he deploys throughout most of the poem, to third-person plural: “Revolving in the light of the sun, revolving beneath the feet of a colony of ants/ They walk everywhere, listening closely to the moving song of spring!/ Listen! Their blood is conversing with the heart of the wil- derness.” In a similar fashion, in “Praise,” Mu Dan shifts between a variety of deictic positions with respect to “the people.” Although the speaker refers to the people as “you” when he claims “I will embrace you with everything,” at other times he views the common man as an abstract fig- ure seen from a perspective of distance: He is the son of a woman, the father of many children. So many dynasties have risen and fallen next to his body . . . 他是一个女人的孩子, 许多孩子的父亲, 多少朝代在他的身边升起又降落了 . . . 50 In this regard, Mu Dan’s poem also bears a resemblance to Walt Whitman’s “I Sing of the Body Electric, in which Whitman writes: “This is not only one man, this the father of those who shall be fathers in their turns,/ In him the start of populous states and rich republics.”51 Nonetheless, despite the efforts of Mu Dan’s speakers to at times main- tain a certain distance from their environment and fellow countrymen, they also find themselves connected to the surrounding landscape. In some respects, Mu Dan’s portrayal of the poetic speaker in harmony with the natural world draws from traditional poetics, in particular from the aes- thetic conception of “the fusion of scene and emotion” (qingjing jiaorong 情景交融). In his treatise on literary criticism, The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons (Wenxin diaolong 文心雕龙; 6th cent.), Liu Xie刘勰 (465–520) describes the “spirit journeys” (shen you 神游) undertaken by the poet in nature, characterized by a resonance between the poet’s emo- tions or affections (qing 情) and his environment. “When spirit thought is set in motion, ten thousand paths sprout before it . . . If one climbs a mountain, one’s affections are filled by the mountain; if one contemplates

49 For Yao Dan’s analysis of Mu Dan’s relationship to the peasantry in “Praise” see Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 262. Yao Dan argues that both Mu Dan’s and Auden’s speakers look down on or “overlook” ( fukan 俯瞰) the peasant from a distance. 50 Li Fang, Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 135. 51 Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, p. 125. 48 chapter one the sea, one’s concepts [yi 意] are brought to brimming over by the sea.”52 In a way similar to the poet described by Liu Xie, Mu Dan’s speaker “drifts” (fuyou 浮游) on the “richly fragrant” green fields of the countryside. However, unlike Liu Xie’s poet who creates a mountain and “ten thou- sand” paths by setting his spirit in motion, Mu Dan’s speaker does not appear as powerful or in control of his environment. Although he escapes from the city, where he has been captured like a fish in a net, he then finds himself “winnowed” by the surrounding landforms as the earth moves beneath him. In this context, Mu Dan also provides a notable contrast to Whitman, whose poems are predominantly written in the first-person singular and emphasize the figure of the lone poet as the creator of his own destiny. The stylistic and formal diversity of “Walking in the Wilderness,” which incorporates elements of traditional aesthetics, American romanti- cism, and modernism, serves as testament to the cosmopolitan milieu at Lianda, where students studied a wide range of traditional and modern literatures from around the world. Describing the atmosphere at Lianda, Wang Zuoliang recalled: The library was even smaller in the early years of the war, but the few books it had, especially the precious new books from abroad[,] had been devoured with the hunger and consequent lack of table manners of a Dr. Johnson. There they still lie—dog eared, crumpled all over, often with the title pages gone. But the young poets of Lianda have not read their Eliot and Auden in vain. Perhaps the Western world will find its own ignorance of the cul- tural East shocking when the truth is told of how, with what gusto and what dreamy eyes, these two poets are being read in distant China.53 Moreover, the complexity of Mu Dan’s poem reveals his ambivalence about his relationship to the national collective and his new self-designated role as an oratorical poet. Although Mu Dan developed a Whitmanesque style

52 Stephen Owen’s translation in his Readings in Chinese Literary Thought (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1992), p. 205. Owen also includes the original Chi- nese alongside his translation. The above quote is from Chapter 26, “Spirit Thought” (Shen si 神思), in ibid., pp. 201–10. For a more detailed discussion on Liu Xie’s conception of man’s relationship to nature, see Owen’s translation of Chapter 46, “The Sensuous Colors of Physical Things” (Wuse 物色), in ibid., pp. 277–86. Liu asks rhetorically, “All the sen- suous colors of physical things call to one another, and how amid all this may man find stillness?” 53 Wang Zuoliang, “A Chinese Poet,” Life and Letters, June 1949: 200; cited in Ping-kwan Leung, “Literary Modernity in Chinese Poetry,” p. 50. In this article, Wang also praises Mu Dan for breaking away from the classical tradition and for his bravery in combat in Burma, where he nearly died before escaping to India. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 49 of poetry intended to be read to public audiences, at the same time he uses modernist imagery that could not be readily grasped by the masses. While his fictional speaker attempts to connect with his fellow travelers and with the nation, he also stands back to take a more detached perspec- tive on his countrymen. Moreover, “Walking in the Wilderness” reflects Mu Dan’s contradictory stance towards traditional culture. Despite his vocal rejection of traditional poetry and its emphasis on emotion and suppos- edly clichéd nature imagery, his own poem is nonetheless concerned with the deployment of nature imagery to convey emotions. In fact, the entire poem can be read a kind of “poetic scene” (jingjie 境界), characterized by the use of bright colors, rhythm, and motion, which uses nature imagery to convey the excitement and joy of the speaker and his companions. Yet at the same time, the poem portrays the travelers as being at the mercy of larger historical and natural forces when they are engulfed within “waves” of wilderness that “surge” around them.

The Exiled Wanderer

Mu Dan’s recitation poetry, composed during the early years of war, in many ways represented a departure from his prewar works written in Tianjin and Beijing. “The Wanderer” (Liulangren 流浪人; 1933) portrays an alienated and aimless walking figure and is emblematic of his work from this earlier period. The Wanderer Hunger— My good friend; It constantly follows me In these vagrant streets. Wearily, The two heavy legs of the wanderer, One step, two steps, three steps . . . On what corner of this earth? Without purpose. But always Shuffling these two exhausted feet, One step, two steps . . . wanderer. As though flowers were blooming before one’s eyes, Ten million stars fly by, like ravens. Head dazed, heart bitter; Body burning with fire, melting— Like cotton, gathered into a ball, 50 chapter one

But still with these weak legs One step, two steps, three steps . . . April 15 (evening), 1933 流浪人 饿— 我底好友, 它老是缠着我 在这流浪的街头。

软软地, 是流浪人底两只沉重的腿, 一步, 一步, 一步。。。 天涯的什么地方? 没有目的。可老是 疲倦的两只脚运动着, 一步, 一步流浪人。 仿佛眼睛开了花 飞过了千万颗星点, 像乌鸦。 昏沉着的头, 苦的心； 火般热的身子, 熔化了— 棉花似地堆成一团 可仍是带着软的腿 一步, 一步, 一步。。。 1933年4月15日晚54 In contrast to the speaker in “Walking in the Wilderness,” who achieves a significant connection with his fellow hikers and past generations of ancestors, Mu Dan’s wanderer appears as a lone figure, and in this poem Mu Dan employs predominantly the first-person singular as opposed to his use of the first-person plural in the later work. Nor does the body of Mu Dan’s wanderer coalesce into a meaningful whole as he walks the city streets; instead, it melts, burns, turns into cotton, and is barely held up by “these weak legs.” Unlike the joyous and purposeful motion of the hikers in “Walking in the Wilderness,” the wanderer cannot see what lies before him because his head is “dazed” and his vision is blurred; furthermore, he has no clear destination as he walks “without purpose” in an unknown “corner of this earth.” The speaker’s aimless movement is further echoed by the placement of the words on the page; the poem lacks a set number of syllables to each line or a specific number of lines per stanza. Since

54 Li Fang, ed., Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 3. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 51 many of the lines are not justified at the left margin, the words seem to drift aimlessly on the page and extend indefinitely outward, an impres- sion reinforced by the three dots heading toward the right-hand margin in the seventh and the last lines. Mu Dan’s portrayal of the weary and weak poetic speaker who moves aimlessly through the city streets bears a resemblance to portraits of sickly individuals walking down dark, unknown alleys in other modernist poems from the 1920s and 1930s. As Jiayan Mi shows in his Self-Fashioning and Reflexive Modernity in Modern Chinese Poetry, 1919–1949, prevalent motifs in modernist poetry from this period include the dismembered and weak body combined with the notion of pointless travel with no fixed destina- tion, a poetic nexus that he characterizes as “the crisis of powerlessness as an anticlimactic movement of energy.”55 Dai Wangshu’s poem “The Night- walker” (Ye xingzhe 夜行者; 1932) also portrays such a figure. The first stanza of this three-stanza poem reads: Here comes the night walker! His footsteps are resounding in the desolate street, From the dark fog, To the dark fog. The most intimate friend of the night . . . .56 这里他来了: 夜行者! 冷清清的街道有沉着的跫音, 从黑茫茫的雾, 到黑茫茫的雾 夜的最熟稔的朋友

Similarly, Li Jinfa’s 李金发 (1900–76) poem “Sagesse” (1925) portrays an exhausted speaker dragging his feet through the city streets. It reads in part: Ah, my leather shoes are clumsy and heavy, The feet are weak and powerless, Where is the Sagesse of love?57 吁, 我革履笨, 脚儿弱小无力, 何处是情爱之 Sagesse.

55 Jiayan Mi, Self-Fashioning and Reflexive Modernity in Modern Chinese Poetry, p. 94. 56 Jiayan Mi, tr., in ibid., pp. 165–66. Mi also reproduces the original Chinese text in ibid. For a similar poem, see Mi’s translation of Dai Wangshu’s poem, “Liulangren de yege” 流浪人的夜歌 (The Wanderer’s Night Song), in ibid., p. 151. 57 Ibid., p. 98. 52 chapter one

These representations of dejected urban walkers were inspired in part by the Chinese poets’ reading of the French symbolist Baudelaire.58 More- over, they were also influenced by the Chinese incarnation of the flâneur, the “fake foreign devil” (jia yangguizi 假洋鬼子). Used by Lu Xun in “The True Story of Ah Q” (Ah Q zhengzhuan 阿Q正传; 1922), this term invoked the image of a man with a top hat and tailcoat strolling through the city with a walking stick, and was popularized in the media through commercials such as the Johnny Walker Scotch whisky billboard adver- tisements.59 However, the agonized city walkers of modern Chinese poetry diverge both from the bon vivant image of the “fake foreign devil” as well as from real-life French flâneurs, who were even known to walk pet turtles to express their leisured status.60 In his essay series “The Painter of Modern Life” (1836), Baudelaire described his conception of the flâneur as a detached and observant “botanist of the sidewalk,” who finds himself “everywhere at home” and “at the center of the world”: For the perfect flâneur, for the passionate spectator, it is an immense joy to set up house in the heart of the multitude, amid the ebb and flow of movement, in the midst of the fugitive and the infinite. To be away from home and yet to feel oneself everywhere at home; to see the world, to be at the centre of the world, and yet to remain hidden from the world—such are a few of the slightest pleasures of those independent, passionate, impartial natures which the tongue can but clumsily define.61 Indeed, the “immense joy” of walking through the city at the center of the “ebb and flow” of urban life was something that could not be expe- rienced by Chinese poets living in the semi-colonial city and its foreign concessions, replete with notorious signs barring dogs and Chinese from

58 For a discussion of the figure of the flâneur in modern Chinese poetry and its ties to French symbolist poetry, see ibid., p. 94. 59 See Leo Lee’s analysis of the flâneur in his Shanghai Modern, p. 40. Jin Yi 金一, author of Nüjie zhong 女界钟 (A Bell to Awaken a Women’s World), envisioned an ideal- ized European as a flâneur with a walking stick in hand: “I dream about the white man of Europe, at this very moment of this very day, a cigar in his mouth, walking stick in hand, his slender wife and children by his side, strolling down the stately boulevards of London, Paris, and Washington. How happy and free he is! I only resent the fact that I cannot be there myself.” See Jin Yi, Nü jie zhong, in Jin Yi wenji 金一文集 (Jin Yi’s Collected Works; Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1964), pp. 48; quoted in Jing Jiang, “Racial Mimesis: Translation, Literature, and Self-fashioning in Modern China,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michi- gan, Ann Arbor, 2006, p. 99. 60 See James Werner, American Flaneur: The Cosmic Physiognomy of Edgar Allan Poe (New York: Routledge, 2004), p. 26. 61 Charles Baudelaire, “The Painter of Modern Life,” in Jonathan Mayne, tr., and ed., The Painter of Modern Life and Other Essays (London: Phaidon, 1964), p. 9. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 53 the parks. Rather, as Leo Lee describes, flâneurs in Chinese literature reflected more than anything else a posture or mimicry of Westernization, and their portrayal was more romanticized and sentimental than that of the sophisticated, detached figure found in Western literature: Instead of presenting a flâneur allegorizing the city with his deeply ambigu- ous gaze, the author’s portrait of the hero is tinged with romance (in the double sense of the word: a story about a romantic hero as well as a story in the genre of romance). His passivity, narcissism, and excessive sentimental- ity are the hallmarks of a bygone era—a derivation and a popularization of what I once called the “Wertherian” hero in May Fourth fiction.62 While Lee’s comments about the flâneur as derived from the Wertherian hero refer to the image of the flâneur in modern fiction, Michelle Yeh analyzes the recurrent figure of the narcissistic, tragic hero in modern Chi- nese poetry. As Yeh points out, this figure takes on various identities as “the shunned leprous man, the homeless drifter, the solitary night walker, and the despondent, suicidal lover.”63 Yeh argues further that the despon- dency exhibited by these figures more generally reflects the alienation of the poet in modern society, in which poets no longer served a public role as scholar-officials following the abolition of the civil service entrance examinations in 1905.64 Moreover, uncertainty over the audience for modern poetry, coupled with anxiety created by the abandonment of tra- ditional poetic forms and the imperative to study and emulate Western poetic models, contributed to the sense of crisis felt by modern poets. Although many early modern poets felt disenfranchised from soci- ety, this period also witnessed widespread attempts to make modern poetry more accessible to the masses. In his manifesto, “A Proposal for Literary Reform” (Wenxue gailiang zhuyi 文学改良主义; 1917), Hu Shi 胡适 (1891–1962), the so-called father of modern poetry, set out to create a new vernacular poetry (xin shi 新诗). Hu listed 8 tenets for the new poetry, including use of the vernacular, rejection of clichés and stock phrases in traditional poetry, avoidance of allusions, and the use of colloquialisms. In response to his call, many poets such as Guo Moruo 郭沫若 (1892–1978) and Wen Yiduo began to write vernacular poems. In 1930, a group of left- wing poets founded the China Poetry Society (Zhongguo shige hui 中国

62 Leo Lee, Shanghai Modern, p. 41. 63 Michelle Yeh, Modern Chinese Poetry: Theory and Practice since 1917 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991), p. 29. 64 See ibid., p. 13. 54 chapter one

诗歌会), which encouraged the writing and recitation of poetry employ- ing oral forms, such as folk melodies, which could be appreciated by the common man.65 Moreover, Japanese aggression in Manchuria inspired many poets to produce national resistance poetry geared towards a mass audience. In 1935, the popular poet Ren Jun 任钧 (1909–2003) encour- aged fellow writers to think of poetry as a kind of weapon: “Poets of China! Arise! Arise, let us prepare our bayonets and carry our special weapon— poetry—up to the heroic front lines of National Salvation[;] assume your post and hold it firm.”66 Following the outbreak of full-scale war, writers and artists attached increasing importance to the popularization of their art as essential for promoting the cause of resistance. In addition, wartime displacement forced many intellectuals to witness the suffering of ordinary people in the Nationalist interior at first hand and, as a result, many poets began to make a conscious effort to write poetry about and for the common people. In his 1937 poem “Clouds” (Yun 云), He Qifang describes how the sight of peasants made homeless by war changed his views on writing poetry: Clouds “I love clouds . . . the clouds which pass by . . .” I thought of myself as that man in Baudelaire’s prose poem Who raised his neck melancholily Looking into the distant sky I walked in the rural area. Peasants lost their land because they were honest, Their home reduced to a bundle of farming tools. In the daytime, they went to the fields to find odd jobs. At night, they slept on dry hard stone bridges. I walked into the city by the sea. Upon the tar streets of winter, Rows and rows of apartments stand. Like modern prostitutes upon sidewalks, Waiting for pleasures of summer, And pot-bellied lust and shamelessness. From now on, I will make loud comments:

65 See Crespi’s discussion of the activities of the China Poetry Society in his Voices in Revolution, pp. 58–60. 66 Crespi, tr., in ibid., p. 66. For the original, see Ren Jun 任钧, Xinshi zahua 新诗杂花 (Random Talks on the New Poetry; Shanghai: Guoji wenhua fuwushe, 1948), p. 178. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 55

I’d rather have a thatched roof; I don’t love clouds nor moon, Nor stars.67 “我爱那云, 那飘忽的云 ...... ” 我自以为是波德莱尔散文诗中 那个忧郁地偏起颈子 望着天空的远方人。 我走到乡下。 农民们因为诚实而失掉了土地。 他们的家缩小为一束农具。 白天他们到田野间去寻找零活, 夜间以干燥的石桥为床榻。 我走到海边的都市。 在冬天的柏油街上 一排一排的别墅站立着 像站立在街头的现代妓女, 等待着夏天的欢笑 和大腹贾的荒淫, 无耻。 从此我要叽叽喳喳发议论: 我情愿有一个茅草的屋顶, 不爱云, 不爱月, 也不爱星星。 68 In contrast to the ambulatory figures found in early modern works by Mu Dan, Dai Wangshu, and Li Jinfa, He Qifang’s walker finds himself in a rural landscape and, rather than dwelling on his own sense of alien- ation and weariness, the speaker focuses his attention on the suffering of peasants who have lost their land and homes. Rather than mimicking the pose of the Western flâneur, his speaker rejects Baudelaire. In particular, “Clouds” is written as a retort to Baudelaire’s poem “The Stranger.” In this poem, Baudelaire asserts, “I have neither father, nor mother, nor sister, nor brother,” claiming instead, “I love clouds.”69 In place of such roman- tic imaginings, the speaker concludes that he will no longer write about clouds, moon, or stars. Instead, he will aspire to practical things, such as the thatched roofs needed by himself and his fellow countrymen for sheer survival. Yet, despite the efforts of wartime poets to produce works about and for the masses, there was a gap between their artistic ideals and the realities

67 Ping-kwan Leung’s translation in Wai-lim Yip, ed., Lyrics from Shelters, p. 29. 68 He Qifang, Yuyan 预言 (Prophecy; Shanghai: Xin wenyi, 1957), pp. 89–90. 69 Charles Baudelaire, The Flowers of Evil and Paris Spleen: Poems by Charles Baudelaire, William H. Crosby, tr. (New York: Dover Publications, 2010), p. 77. 56 chapter one of wartime life in the Nationalist interior where most uneducated villag- ers were unable to appreciate poetry, regardless of whether it was written or recited. The audiences for poetry recitals, which villagers referred to as “drama without costumes” (bu huazhuang de xi 不化装的戏),70 were often mostly local militia members who were forced by their superiors to attend, and many wartime performances involving drama, music, and lectures did not feature poetry recitation. Nor did poetry recitals at Yan’an fare much better. The organizers of the first public performance in 1938, “An Evening of Poetry and Folk Song” (Shige min’ge yanchang wanhui 诗歌民歌演唱晚会), published a self-criticism in which they admitted that the event was “unanimously regarded as a failure.”71 As Crespi con- cludes, wartime recitation poetry was “still very much by and for an intel- lectual audience,”72 and wartime poets were “more at home organizing rural reproductions of urban literary symposia than when attempting through poetry to instill national awareness in rural dwellers.”73 Poems by Mu Dan and He Qifang about their displacement to the interior were also written by and for intellectuals. Just as peasant audi- ences in the interior would have been baffled by He Qifang’s allusions to Baudelaire, so too Mu Dan’s use of complex grammatical structures and modernist imagery inspired by Auden would have remained inaccessible to the masses. Although intellectuals yearned for cultural authenticity and connection to rural life, they were often unable to divorce themselves from the cosmopolitanism that had characterized early modern poetry. Nonetheless, they succeeded in producing new forms of modernist poetry, on non-urban themes, as they critically appropriated earlier modernist poetry and sought to create works more closely tied to the lives of ordi- nary people in the interior.

Non-Poetic Poetry As soon as there was an air-raid warning, everyone would retreat to the countryside. It was called “running from the air-raid alarm” [pao jingbao 跑警报]. If one really thinks about it, putting “run” and “air-raid alarm”

70 For Crespi’s discussion of the challenges experienced by wartime poets in their attempts to stage poetry recitals, see Crespi, “Rural Recitation and Countryside Cosmo- politanism,” in his Voices in Revolution, pp. 111–13. 71 ibid., p. 114. Also, see Crespi’s analysis of poetic recitation at Yan’an, “Poetry Recita- tion and Communist Culture at Yan’an,” in ibid., pp. 113–16. 72 ibid., p. 113. 73 ibid., p. 112. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 57

together in a single expression sounds a bit odd, since we were not in fact running from the air-raid alarm. It’s not as natural as saying “running a horse” or “running a business.” But that’s what everyone said, and every- body understood what was meant and felt that it was appropriate. Some people called it “escaping from the air-raid alarm” [tao jingbao 逃警报] or “hiding from the air-raid alarm,” [duo jingbao 躲警报] but neither of these expressions was as accurate as “running from the air-raid alarm.” “Escaping” sounds too passive and dispirited, and “hiding” makes it sound as if the situ- ation was contrived. The word “run,” which suggests casually escaping from some difficulty, is the most expressive and best captures the rich and vivid meaning implied.74 As the long years of protracted war dragged on, writers and artists, like everyone else, became increasingly worn down by the lack of adequate supplies and poor nutrition and the ongoing threat of Japanese bombing. The air-raids, which began in early 1939, eventually became so frequent that at Lianda professors reluctantly adjusted their class schedules to accommodate the afternoon retreat to the hillside where students went to escape the bombing.75 On October 13, 1939 more than a hundred bombs fell on the teacher’s college, damaging the facilities and leaving many stu- dents homeless. However, most of the bombing in Lianda did not cause as much destruction and, in some respects, it became a “normal” part of life for students on campus. Lianda student Li Zhongxiang 李忠祥 recalled that if the students “woke up to bright sunshine pouring through their windows, they knew that Japanese planes would be overhead by eleven. Some did not wait for the alarm, but simply took to the hills every sunny morning.”76 The experience of “running from the air-raid alarm” became the subject of poetry, essays, rumors, and stories. In one anecdote, Liu Wendian 刘文典 (1890–1958), a famous classical scholar, was running from an air-raid alarm together with the young modernist fiction writer Shen Congwen when “Liu turned and said, ‘I’m running to preserve the National Essence. The students are running to save the promise of the next generation. But why the hell are you running?’ ”77 The poet Feng Zhi

74 Wang Zengqi, “Pao jingbao,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, III: 394. 75 Zha Liangzheng, “Kangzhan yilai de Xinan Lianda,” p. 2; cited in John Israel, Lianda, p. 272. 76 See Li Zhongxiang, “Guoli Xi’nan lianhe daxue shimoji” 国立西南联合大学始末 记 (A Comprehensive Record of the National Southwest Associated University), Zhuanji wenxue 39.4 (October 1981): 86; cited in John Israel, Lianda, p. 272. 77 Zhang Qijun 张起钧, Rulin yihua 儒林逸话 (Anecdotes from the Forest of Scholars; Taibei: Xuehai, 1982), pp. 82–83. In addition to saving himself in order to preserve the “National Essence,” Liu urged some able-bodied students to carry the preeminent modern 58 chapter one explored the same experience of flight with deceptive lyricism in his son- net “We Came Outside the City” (我们来到郊外 Women lai dao jiao wai; 1941): Under the warm sun We came outside the city, Like many rivers flowing Into one harmonious ocean.78 和暖的阳光内 我们来到郊外, 像不同的河水. 融成一片大海。 79 In his 1939 poem “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter,” Mu Dan portrays the wartime experience of taking refuge during an air raid. This poem was published in Mu Dan’s first collection of wartime poetry, Exploration Team.80 Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter He turns to me and laughs: It’s actually cool in here, As I wipe off sweat and dirt from climbing the hill, As I look at his emaciated body, Trembling, in a faint draft of underground wind. He smiles: You should not miss this opportunity to amuse yourself: Here is the Shanghai Shenbao Newspaper. Hey, so much exciting news, Let’s go sit down—there’s a dim ray of yellow light over there. I think of those people running crazed in the street, Those pathetic people, in terror of death. Like swarms of insects, squeezing together into our cave. Who would have thought that farmers would have sown seeds on the floor? I was just sleeping in that tall building; one says, I was taking a shower. Do you think the price of goods these days will change? So where do you live? Oh I see, I’ll definitely stop by and visit you some day; recently I’ve been very busy. scholar of Tang history and Sanskrit, Chen Yingque 陈寅恪 (1890–1969), shouting “Pre- serve our national treasure!” See ibid., p. 83; quoted in John Israel, Lianda, p. 144. 78 Translation from John Israel, Lianda, p. 271. 79 For the full sonnet, see Liu Fuchun 刘福春, ed., Feng Zhi quanji 冯至全集 (The Complete Works of Feng Zhi), 12 vols. (Shijiazhuang: Hebei jiaoyu, 1999), I: 222. This poem was originally published in Wenyi yuekan 文艺月刊 (June 16, 1941). 80 Mu Dan, Tanxian dui (Kunming: Wenjushe, 1945), p. 14. Also, see reprint of “Fang- kongdong li de shuqingshi,” in Li Fang, ed., Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 48. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 59

Quiet. They seem to become aware of the lack of oxygen, Even though it is safe underground. They look at each other: Oh, what black faces, black bodies, black hands! Then I hear a strong wind outside in the sunshine That blows a soft call into everyone’s ear, From the rooftops, from the pages of his book, from in his blood. The alchemist lowers his heavy Eyelids, and unaware falls into a dream. Countless dark souls run out from hell, Hide quietly from the burning fires and peeling of flesh, As they hear him call out the hope of paradise. Oh look, in this ancient forest, At that stiff corpse, gradually freezing! I stand up, the air in here is too suffocating, I say, Everything’s over, let me get out! But he holds me back: Isn’t this your good friend? She got married in a hotel in Shanghai. Look, here’s the announcement! I’d already forgotten about picking a pure white lilac to put in the book, I’d already forgotten about waving a walking stick in the park, As we drifted under neon lights, listening to the broadcast of “LOVE PARADE.” Oh, I’d already forgotten about writing in pale violet ink, about putting lemon in my tea. After you lower your head, and raise it up again, You begin to see so many people before your eyes, You see all those people out in the wilderness, You see countless people that you will never see again. Then you feel that you will become stained with black, just like these people. The stiff corpse moves painfully. Softly, he gets up and lights the fire, In the dark night of the ancient forest. “Destroy, Destroy” a voice cries out, “You futile, old alchemist! You died in your dream! You will fall into your own bitterness! Let’s hear how sonorous your voice from heaven sounds!” We’ve won, he says; how many planes shot down? I laugh, I am myself. As people return home, wipe off the grass and mud, From the net woven by their heads, I walk alone up to that shelled building, And I discover I have died there, Frozen, my face wreathed in smiles, and tears, and sighs. 60 chapter one

April, 1939 防空洞里的抒情诗 他向我, 笑着, 这儿倒凉快, 当我擦著汗珠, 弹去爬山的土, 当我看见他的瘦弱的身体 战抖, 在地下一阵隐隐的风里。 他笑着, 你不应该放过这个消遣的时机, 这是上海的申报, 唉这五光十色的新闻, 让我们坐过去, 那里有一线暗黄的光。 我想起大街上疯狂的跑着的人们, 那些个残酷的, 为死亡恫吓的人们, 像是蜂踊的昆虫, 向我们的洞里挤。 谁知道农夫把什么种子洒在这地里? 我正在高楼上睡觉, 一个说, 我在洗澡。 你想最近的市价会有变动吗? 府上是? 哦哦, 改日一定拜访, 我最近很忙。 寂静。他们像觉到了氧气的缺乏, 虽然地下是安全的。互相观望着: O黑色的脸, 黑色的身子, 黑色的手! 这时候我听见大风在阳光里 附在每个人的耳边吹出细细的呼唤, 从他的屋檐, 从他的书页, 从他的血里。 炼丹的术士落下沉重的 眼睑, 不觉坠入了梦里, 无数个阴魂跑出了地狱, 悄悄收摄了, 火烧, 剥皮, 听他号出极乐园的声息。 O看, 在古代的大森林里, 那个渐渐冰冷了的僵尸! 我站起来, 这里的空气太窒息, 我说, 一切完了吧, 让我们出去! 但是他拉住我, 这是不是你的好友, 她在上海的饭店结了婚, 看看这启事! 我已经忘了摘一朵洁白的丁香花挟在书里, 我已经忘了在公园里摇一只手杖, 在霓虹灯下飘过, 听LOVE PARADE散播, Ｏ我忘了用淡紫的墨水, 在红茶里加一片柠檬。 当你低下头, 重又抬起, 你就看见眼前的这许多人, 你看见原野上的那许多人, 你看见你再也看不见的无数的人们, 于是觉得你染上了黑色, 和这些人们一样。 那个僵尸在痛苦的动转, 他轻轻地起来烧著炉丹, 在古代的森林漆黑的夜里, a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 61

“毁灭, 毁灭”一个声音喊, “你那枉然的古旧的炉丹。 死在梦里! 坠入你的苦难! 听你极乐的嗓子多么洪亮! ” 胜利了, 他说, 打下几架敌机? 我笑, 是我。 当人们回到家里, 弹去青草和泥土, 从他们头上所编织的大网里, 我是独自走上了被炸毁的楼, 而发见我自己死在那儿 僵硬的, 满脸上是欢笑, 眼泪, 和叹息. 1939年 4月 Whereas in Mu Dan’s earlier poem “Walking in the Wilderness,” the poetic speaker is presented as traversing China’s “vast and open” road to the heart- land of his country, here the speaker is trapped in a suffocating air-raid shelter with barely enough oxygen to breathe. Rather than being joyously reconnected with his fellow travelers and past generations of ancestors, he finds himself stuck underground with “countless people that [he] will not see again.” Taking refuge in the shelter, he reads an announcement in the newspaper about an old girlfriend’s marriage in Shanghai, and the loss of his old romance mirrors his abandonment of his former urban lifestyle. In contrast to the more oratorical, audience-focused stance of previous work, in this poem Mu Dan employs a modernist style characterized by abrupt shifts of speaker and time, as his speaker’s consciousness wavers between the present experience of sheltering underground and his memories of the city where he used to promenade with his former girlfriend, gazing at the neon lights and listening to the music of “LOVE PARADE.”81 To add to its complexity, the flow of Mu Dan’s predominantly free- verse poem is disrupted by the insertion of a sonnet that is itself divided into two sections of seven lines. Written in near iambic pentameter,82 the sonnet is set off from the rest of the poem through indentation and the use of rhyme. In both stanzas, lines 1–2 and lines 4–6 all rhyme or contain a near-rhyme (di 的, li 里, pi 皮, xi 息, and li 里 in the first stanza; and

81 Mu Dan also uses capitalized letters in the original Chinese poem. 82 Feng Zhi’s sonnets are mostly written in near iambic pentameter with 14 lines of usually nine or 10 syllables, or five “feet” (dun 顿, i.e. stressed beats). For Wen Yiduo’s analysis of dun, see his “Shi de gelü” 诗的格律 (The Metrical Pattern of Poetry), in Wen Yiduo quanji, III: 245–53. For Lloyd Haft’s explanation of dun, see his chapter on Feng Zhi, “Some Rhythmic Structures in Feng Zhi’s Sonnets,” in his The Chinese Sonnet: Meanings of a Form (Leiden: C.N.W.S. Publishing, 2000), pp. 109–36. 62 chapter one zhuan 转, dan 丹, han 喊, and nan 难 in the second stanza). The rhyme- scheme of the first stanza recurs in the free-verse sections of the poem (ti 体, ji 机, ji 挤, li 里, xi 息, and qi 起), suggesting that the sonnet and free-verse sections are formally interwoven, even though they are techni- cally distinct. Mu Dan’s decision to intersperse a sonnet in this poem was influenced by the work of his literature professor Feng Zhi and his well-known series of 27 sonnets, Collection of Sonnets (Shisi hang ji 十四行集; 1942).83 In addition, Mu Dan’s emphasis on the poetry of “experience” was inspired in part by Feng Zhi’s “reflexive poetry” (chensi shi 沉思诗), which strove to be more “rational” and less “emotional” than modernist poetry from the prewar period.84 In the spring of 1939, when Mu Dan wrote “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter,” he was taking Feng Zhi’s class on German mysticism.85 At this time, Feng Zhi had just begun composing his sonnet series, which featured pastoral imagery and philosophical musings about life and death. In Feng Zhi’s class, Mu Dan would most likely have studied the German sonnet and read Ranier Maria Rilke’s (1875–1926) Sonnets to Orpheus (1922).86 Feng Zhi had studied in Germany, and was an expert on Rilke, whose poetry had deeply influenced his own work. Like Rilke, who defined the “versatile poet” as someone who could travel “back and forth through the realms of life and death,”87 Feng Zhi conceived of the “double realm” (i.e., of the living and the dead) in the Orphic myth as a metaphor

83 For an analysis of Feng Zhi’s sonnets, see Chapter Three, “The Sonneteer,” in Domi- nic Cheung, Feng Chih (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1979), pp. 41–53. Feng Zhi’s 27 sonnets can be found in Feng Zhi quanji, I: 216–42. 84 See Qian Liqun, Wen Rumin, and Wu Fuhui, eds., Zhongguo xiandai wenxue sanshi nian, p. 580. For a more extensive analysis of Feng Zhi’s wartime poetry, see Xie Zhixi’s 解志熙, “Jingshen de Feng Zhi yu boda de Ai Qing-Zhongguo xiandai shi liang dajia shulun” 精深的冯至与博大的艾青-中国现代诗两大家叙论 (The Profound Feng Zhi and the Great Ai Qing—A Discussion of Two of China’s Great Modern Poets), in his Modeng yu xiandai: Zhongguo xiandai wenxue de shicun fenxi, pp. 96–142. 85 See Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 225. 86 For an English version of Rilke’s poem, see Edward Snow, tr., Sonnets to Orpheus (New York, North Point Press, 2004). 87 See Chapter Three, “The Sonneteer,” in Dominic Cheung, Feng Chih (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1979), pp. 41–53. Cheung shows how Feng’s philosophical poetry was inspired by Rilke. For Feng Zhi’s scholarship on Rilke, see his translation of Rilke’s Letter to a Young Poet as Gei yige qingnian shiren de shifeng xin 给一个青年诗人的十封信 (Ten Letters to a Young Poet), in Feng Zhi quanji, XI: 277–342. See also Feng Zhi’s comments on the impact of Rilke on his 1944 lyrical prose piece Wu Zixu 伍子胥 in his postscript to Wu Zixu, in Feng Zhi quanji, III: 426. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 63 for the creative process involved in writing poetry where the “material world [is used] to symbolize the abstract.”88 Disclosing echoes of Rilke’s Sonnets to Orpheus and of the mythologi- cal musician and poet Orpheus who travels to the underworld to save his wife Eurydice, Mu Dan’s sonnet features a figure with a “sonorous voice” who journeys to the underworld to save souls suffering there. Like Rilke’s Orpheus, Mu Dan’s “alchemist” falls asleep in an “ancient forest” before traveling to the underworld where he eventually dies. However, compared to Rilke’s sequence, Mu Dan’s version is more ironic and his alchemist has a divided psyche, as is made evident when a disembodied voice sud- denly laughs and pokes fun at him, calling him a “futile alchemist.” More- over, unlike Rilke’s “versatile poet,” Mu Dan’s first-person speaker, finding himself stuck in an underground shelter during an air raid, lacks the mys- tical powers that would allow him to travel between “the realms of life and death.” By juxtaposing the incongruous setting of an air-raid shelter with an Orphic sonnet, Mu Dan succeeds in drawing attention to the yawning aesthetic divide between German mystical poetry and Chinese wartime realities of fleeing from Japanese bombs. Rilke, on the one hand, deploys Greek mythology to create an abstract and symbolic poetic realm where the imagination of the poetic speaker roams as he searches for his for- mer love, the young dancer Vera. However, Mu Dan’s Orphic figure is not afforded the luxury of such romantic dreaming. Instead, his former lover has married someone else. Moreover, he finds himself in an underworld populated by burning and suffering figures, paralleling the experience of the first-person speaker who is in an underground bomb shelter sur- rounded by “emaciated” and “pathetic people.” Seen against this background, one way of interpreting Mu Dan’s poem is as a negative commentary on his teacher Feng Zhi’s Rilke-inspired Collec- tion of Sonnets as cut off from wartime realities. Indeed, by splicing a son- net into his free-verse poem, Mu Dan highlights the differences between himself and Feng Zhi, who envisioned a symbolic unity between the son- net form and the creative imagination of the poet. In his analysis of Feng

88 See Dominic Cheung, Feng Chih, pp. 44–45. Cheung also notes that Rilke defined the “versatile poet” as someone who could travel “back and forth through the realms of life and death.” See Dominic Cheung’s analysis of Rilke’s Orphic poetry in his Feng Chih, p. 48. In particular, Cheung discusses Rilke’s sonnet six, in which the speaker asks, “Does he belong here? [i.e. in the underworld],” to which he answers, “No, from both/ realms [life and death] his ample nature has grown.” 64 chapter one

Zhi’s sonnet 27, Dominic Cheung describes how Feng Zhi conceived of the sonnet as a form that manifests the interiority of the poet: In his last sonnet, Feng uses the image of the weather vane as a metaphor for the poetic form he has adopted. The movements of the mind, Feng implies, are as invisible as the wind. The vane, fluttering in the autumn wind, exists not to bring attention to itself but as a means of indicating the directions taken by the wind. By analogy, the sonnet form, in Feng’s hands, becomes simply an indicator of the imagination’s movement, a means whereby the poet’s inner thoughts are formalized and made manifest.89 In contrast to Feng Zhi’s pastoral poetry, Mu Dan’s spliced sonnet is used to reflect on the fragmentation of wartime life and the poet’s divided psyche. Rather than suggesting unity between the sonnet form and the imagination of the poet, “Lyric Poem in an Air-raid Shelter” could be inter- preted as Mu Dan’s commentary on his own troubled efforts to write lyric poetry in wartime. Viewed in this light, the poem can be understood as a metafictional portrayal of a speaker writing a sonnet in an air-raid shel- ter. This reading is suggested when the speaker refers to “the pages of his book” immediately before the sonnet section of the poem. Yet, even as the speaker is inspired to write a lyric poem about his experience, he laughs at himself and at the futility of his efforts. “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter” thus represents an example of what Yuan Kejia described as the “dramati- zation” (xijuhua 戏剧化) of lyricism during the war period.90 Nonetheless, despite Mu Dan’s ironic treatment of the sonnet form, he successfully uses Orphic imagery to portray the dark and dreary conditions in the shelter. In addition to the formal connection of rhyme between the free-verse and sonnet portions of the poem, Mu Dan creates resonances between the imagery used in both sections. While the “countless dark souls” fleeing hell mirror the “people running crazed in the street,” the “futile alchemist” in the underworld bears a resemblance to the trapped speaker. Moreover, the “stiff corpse” who is “gradually freezing” echoes the death of the poetic speaker at the end of the poem, when he emerges “frozen” from the shelter only to discover that “I have died there.” Thus, like his poetic mentor, Mu Dan deploys Orphic imagery to create a poetic scene that expresses the poet’s interiority. However, compared to the idyl- lic pastoral scene in “Walking in the Wilderness,” with its allusions to Tao

89 See ibid., p. 44. 90 Yuan Kejia, Lun xinshi xiandaihua, p. 67. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 65

Yuanming, here he creates a dystopic backdrop that mirrors the speaker’s entrapment and despair. Contrasts are evident at the syntactic level, too. As distinct from “Walk- ing in the Wilderness,” in which Mu Dan mostly deploys first-person plu- ral pronouns and verbs, here he shifts rapidly and abruptly between first, second, and third-person singular and plural narrative perspectives. In doing so, he draws attention to the speaker’s sense of disorientation as well as to his ambivalent relationship to the people crowded together with him in the shelter. The speaker appears to achieve a fleeting sense of camaraderie with his fellow refugees when he briefly employs the collec- tive “we” and becomes “stained with black, just like these people.” Yet, at other times he refers to his enforced companions as “they,” “he,” or “you,” and expresses disdain through his characterizations of them as “swarms of insects” and “pathetic people, in terror of death.” Paralleling the unstable deictic position of the speaker, Mu Dan’s poem vacillates between divergent literary styles. Although much of the poem is composed in a “writerly” style,91 the poem contains echoes of Mu Dan’s earlier oratorical, Whitmanesque poetry. For example, he deploys repeti- tion, combined with exclamations such as “Oh!” and “Ah!,” for rhetorical effect: Oh, what black faces, black bodies, black hands! Oh, what black faces, black bodies, black hands! In addition, he makes use of parallelism, as in the following couplet: I’d already forgotten about picking a pure white lilac to put in the book, I’d already forgotten about waving a walking stick in the park. As well as shifting between different styles and deictic perspectives, “Lyric Poem” shuttles between divergent temporal frames, wavering between the speaker’s inner thoughts, his memories of his past life in the city, and

91 My use of the term “writerly” here generally refers to a consciously literary style in opposition to the more auditory focus in Mu Dan’s recitation poems. I also draw from the English translation of Roland Barthes’ neologism “scritible,” which he uses to describe texts that violate the conventions of realism and thereby force the reader to write or make their own meaning out of the text. Barthes writes: “The writerly text is a perpetual pres- ent, upon which no consequent language (which would inevitably make it past) can be superimposed; the writerly text is ourselves writing, before the infinite play of the world (the world as function) is traversed, intersected, stopped, plasticized by some singular sys- tem (Ideology, Genus, Criticism) which reduces the plurality of entrances, the opening of networks, the infinity of languages.” See Roland Barthes, S/Z: An Essay, Richard Miller, tr. (New York: Hill and Wong, 1975), p. 5. 66 chapter one comments and conversations with nameless people in the shelter. Most of these shifts are made without any clear punctuation markers. In par- ticular, the speaker’s memories of his urban past continue to resurface even though he claims that he wants to forget his earlier life: “I’d already forgotten about waving a walking stick in the park,/ As we drifted under neon lights, listening to the broadcast of “LOVE PARADE.” This passage, with its reference to the soundtrack from the 1929 Hollywood film Love Parade, evokes images of the Westernized, urban lifestyle of the flâneur, reminiscent of the walking figure in “Wanderer.” In contrast to Mu Dan’s earlier poem about walking to Kunming and leaving behind the stultifying “fishnet” of the city for good, this poem mixes urban images of Shanghai with rural images of grass, mud, and farmers sowing seeds. In doing so, the poem suggests that the speaker can neither make a clean break with his former life in the city nor fully identify himself within the masses, as he had hoped to do when he set out on China’s “free and vast” road to the interior. In its dissonant deployment of various verb tenses and writing styles, and its portrayal of clashing cultures and disembodied voices, Mu Dan’s poem evinces the impact not only of Feng Zhi and Rilke, but also of T.S. Eliot, whose poetry he read in William Empson’s class at Lianda.92 Eliot’s “The Waste Land” was especially popular among students at Lianda, who could relate to Eliot’s post-World War I sense of disillusionment.93 In addi- tion, Mu Dan translated Eliot’s stream-of-consciousness poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” (1910).94 Reminiscent of both this poem and “The Waste Land,” Mu Dan’s poem alludes to a wide range of literatures and cultures, as well as evoking a cacophony of voices in the mind of the speaker, including the conversations of people around him. Viewed in the context of his deep yearning for connection with the people, “Lyric Poem in an Air-raid Shelter” expresses Mu Dan’s strong sense of disillusionment and deepened ambivalence about his role as a poet in wartime society. Read this way, the death of the poetic speaker in the cave at the end of the poem can be interpreted as the death of the speaker’s former ideals as expressed in “Walking in the Wilderness.”

92 See Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 239. 93 Guo Baowei, “Shuxin jin youzai, shiren hechu xun,” p. 180. 94 See Mu Dan, tr., “Fuduande Pulüfuluoke de qingge,” in Yuan Kejia 袁可嘉, Dong Hengxun 董衡巽, and Zheng Kelu 郑克鲁, eds., Waiguo xiandai pai zuopin xuan 外国 现代派作品选 (Selected Works of Foreign Modernism; Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi, 1980), pp. 74–87. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 67

Instead of forging links with the national collective and with “countless generations” of ancestors, the speaker discovers that wartime life is hope- lessly fragmented. Nonetheless, through his deployment of a wide array of divergent styles, voices, and literary influences, Mu Dan vividly represents the disorienting and suffocating experience of life in wartime China and its implications for the artist.

Torchlit Procession in May

One month after writing “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter,” Mu Dan attended a May Fourth celebration in Kunming. First, Lianda president Mei Yiqi 梅贻琦 (1889–1962) and many of the professors gave speeches. Later in the evening a torchlit procession was held through the city, in which Lianda students marched together with Kunming high school and elementary school students, joining with citizens of all ages who came together to celebrate and commemorate the May Fourth spirit.95 Shortly afterwards, Mu Dan wrote a poem titled “1939 Torchlit Procession in Kun- ming,” which he published on May 26 in Kunming’s China Daily (Zhong- yang ribao 中央日报).96 In this five-page poem, Mu Dan recounts the events of the May Fourth celebration and parade, starting at noon, continuing through the after- noon when the speaker watches a movie with other parade-goers, and ending with the evening torchlight parade. In contrast to being trapped inside a bomb shelter, here the speaker experiences a sense of unity with the other people in the procession, who feel an expansive sense of energy as their “heads push against the evening sky” (tou dingzhe yekong 头顶着 夜空). In contrast to the more contemplative and ironic mood of “Lyric Poem,” here Mu Dan returns to the oratorical style of “Walking in the Wilderness,” and the poem is pervaded with the sound of singing and the rumbling of bombs:

95 For a discussion of the event, see Shen Chen 沈沉, “Fuchou he huolong, ranqi le minzu de shuguang” 复仇和火龙，燃起了民族的曙光 (Revenge and Fiery Dragon Spark the Dawn of the People), Yunnan ribao, May 5, 1939; “Zuori quansheng qingnian jux- ing wusi guangda jinian” 昨日全省青年举行五四扩大纪念 (Yesterday Youth from the Entire Province Held a Great May 4th Commemoration), Yunnan ribao 云南日报, May 5, 1939; Li Guangrong 李光荣, “Xinan Lianda de wuyue siri” 西南联大的五月四日 (Xinan Lianda’s May Fourth), in Zhou Benzhen 周本贞, ed., Xinan Lianda yanjiu 西南联大研究 (Research on Xinan Lianda) 1 (Beijing: Zhongguo dabaikequanshu, 2005), p. 75. 96 For a reprint of the poem, see Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, pp. 299–303. 68 chapter one

The nation is singing, the nation’s fire is burning, A newly born wild energy is bursting from the smiling face of the nation. Rumble, Rumble, rumble, rumble—The city turns into ruins, the houses fall down, The old and weak die, the young have nothing. 祖国在歌唱, 祖国的火在燃烧, 新生的野力涌出了祖国的微笑, 轰隆, 轰隆, 轰隆, 轰隆——城池变做了废墟, 房屋在倒塌, 衰老的死去, 年轻的一无所有.97 Although Mu Dan describes scenes of destruction which disinherit old and young alike, he portrays a vitality and a “wild energy” emerging from the ruins of war. In particular, he depicts a breeze which blows through the scene, symbolizing the irrepressible energy of the people: The May wind is mingled with the grey sand, The May wind is flowing through the ditches, The May wind is pent inside the movie theater, The May wind is like an insect spreading malaria. 五月的春风夹在灰沙里, 五月的春风在地沟里流, 五月的春风关在影戏院, 五月的春风像疟虫的传播.98 Whereas in “Lyric Poem” a faint breeze blows above the ground, here the entire poem is pervaded by chanting, rumbling, and blowing sounds. Nonetheless, Mu Dan continues his use of striking modernist imagery, as in his comparison of the ubiquitous power of the people to a disease- spreading insect. Although the bulk of “1939 Torchlit Procession in Kunming” is written in free verse, Mu Dan includes a variety of verse forms. In the following excerpt, he uses indentation to demarcate an octave written in near iam- bic pentameter from other free-verse sections of the poem: We sit in the movie theater, we sit in the movie theater, You open the curtain, and see these bright eyes looking forward. However these black shadows, these black shadows Dissolve, dissolve into the yellow dusk, Hazy, like dream language in murky water, Buzzing, calling of birds, sounds of cursing and crying;

97 Ibid., p. 302. 98 Ibid., p. 299. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 69

Bringing an evil omen, the city rocks in the yellow dusk, Tells the nation of a hundred emotions, Drunk, trembling, delicate. Perhaps the next moment the wild wind will blow him away, The whole sky filled with grey ashes—who can know! And then I saw the nation beckon towards us, flexing her rough arm— You with a Guangdong accent, a Hunan accent, a Jiangbei accent, Dongbei accent, Henan accent, Beijing accent, Shanghai accent, Fuzhou accent, . . . . 我们坐在影戏院里, 我们坐在影戏院里, 你把幕帷拉开, 看见这些明亮的眼睛向前, 然而这些黑影, 这些黑影 消溶, 溶进了一个黄昏, 朦胧, 像混水里的梦呓, 嗡嘤着诅咒和哭泣； 带着恶兆, 城在黄昏里摇, 向祖国低诉着一百样心情, 沉醉的, 颤动的, 娇弱的。 也许下一刻狂风把他吹起, 满天灰烬—谁能知道! 于是我看见祖国向我们招手, 用她粗壮的手臂--- 你们广东音, 湖南音, 江北音, 东北音, 河南音, 北京音, 上海音, 福州音, 。。。。 99 In the first three lines, Mu Dan uses a prose-like style to describe the set- ting of the movie theater. Next, in the indented octave, he deploys rhyme (between yi 呓, qi 泣, and qi 起, and between yao 摇, zhao 兆, and dao 道), and uses aural imagery, as in “buzzing and calling of birds” (weng ying 嗡嘤) and “dream language in murky water.” Then, in the last three lines, Mu Dan returns to a more prose-like style in his description of “the nation beckoning towards us.” Apart from switching between different styles, the speaker alternates between first, second, and third-person, and the poem shifts in terms of setting between the outside setting with the wind blowing and the dark shadows in the movie theater. However, whereas in “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter” Mu Dan deploys contrast to portray the disjointed nature of wartime life, here he juxtaposes different settings in order to emphasize the power of the wind, which flows through all the scenes depicted in the poem. The following year on May Fourth, Kunming once again held a parade, although this time the marchers had to face rain and inclement weather. Nearly six months later in November, Mu Dan described the parade in a

99 Ibid., p. 301. 70 chapter one poem titled “May.” At the time the parade was held, Mu Dan was nearing his graduation from Lianda, and in the fall of 1940 when he wrote “May,” he had already begun to work at Lianda as an instructor. In contrast to the singing and exultant mood that runs through “1939 Torchlit Procession in Kunming,” in “May” Mu Dan adopts a more ironic tone. In this poem, he once again juxtaposes different forms—in this case interspersing free verse with traditional regulated verse, specifically the four-lined jueju 绝句 with seven characters in each line. May In May comes the fragrance of flowers and plants. Fond recollections of the cuckoo100 make one anxious. The myriad things grow; the heavens are bright and beautiful. The wanderer who travels far thinks of his hometown. Browning pistol, Mauser rifle, number three portable pistol, Or the revolver bullet that explodes as it enters human flesh— They can give me happiness after despair. Facing the pitch-black muzzle of a gun, all of you will be able to see that From the twisted bullet-path of history, I received a second birth. Endless conspiracy; the suffering of birth is yours. It is you that taught me Lu Xun’s satirical essay. The heartless lad and the loving maid By the lotus pond pledged their union. But now, as I lean alone and ponder on the railing, Falling flowers and drifting pollen fill the sky. But the dusk in May is so dim and hazy! After the chanting procession bearing torches had passed by, No one could see How those grandly complimented streets had spilled them out. After the talk published in the newspaper about preserving the people’s wel- fare, no one could see How those foolish people would plunge into the mud, And the murderers, singing triumphantly of the freedom of May, Hold firm the main switch controlling all that amorphous electric power. Spring flowers, autumn moon, when will it end? On the graves on the outskirts of town grass grows anew. From the days of old, those sufferers who came before Have already followed the gentle breeze and turned into dust.

100 The cuckoo symbolizes the coming of spring and also symbolizes a virtuous person. See C.M. Lai, “Messenger of Spring and Morality: Cuckoo Lore in Chinese Sources,” The Journal of the American Oriental Society 118 (1998): 530–43. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 71

Also, in May the dusk gently weaves a web of silver thread— Entices, dissolves, captures the memory of many years, Hanging on the tips of the willow branches, a strand of radiant imagina- tions Floating in the water rivulets in the air, stretching out passion . . . And then blowing out some foam, I sink to the depths, Peacefully held in your ancient prison, A feudalistic society trapped in a history of capitalism. A single skiff on an emerald river, Late red clouds mingled with cooking smoke— We drink together at this beautiful moment, You a glass and me a cup. However, I came to enjoy the sacrificial meal of May, In the shadows reflected from the gunfire. I exchanged an antagonistic glance, loudly talked and smiled Above you. I will be your master. I know that the sound of the court bell has already struck twelve. Because you know that in my bosom is hidden a small black thing, Rogue, cheat, gangster, villain, together we Walk on the chaotic streets— They dreamt that iron turned into the Immortal Li,101 That the ugly beggar was a celestial being Wandering all over the world with disgust for the dusty earth, Who, as soon as he flies, flies up to cloud nine. November 1940

五月 五月里来菜花香 布谷留恋催人忙 万物滋长天明媚 浪子远游思家乡 勃朗宁, 毛瑟, 三号手提式, 或是爆进人肉去的左轮, 它们能给我绝望后的快乐, 对着漆黑的枪口, 你们会看见 从历史的扭转的弹道里, 我是得到了二次的诞生。 无尽的阴谋；生产的痛楚是你们的, 是你们教了我鲁迅的杂文。

101 A reference to the Daoist legend “Eight immortals cross the sea” (八仙过海 Baxian guohai). This allusion refers to people who rely on their own special abilities to perform miracles. 72 chapter one

负心儿郎多情女 荷花池旁订誓盟 而今独自倚栏想 落花飞絮漫天空 而五月的黄昏是那样的朦胧, 在火炬的行列叫喊过去以后, 谁也不会看见的 被恭维的街道就把他们倾出, 在报上登过救济民生的谈话后谁也不会看见的 愚蠢的人们就扑进泥沼里, 而谋害者, 凯歌着五月的自由, 紧握一切无形电力的总枢纽。 春花秋月何时了 郊外墓草又一新 昔日前来痛苦者 已随轻风化灰尘 还有五月的黄昏轻网着银丝, 诱惑, 溶化, 捉捕多年的记忆, 挂在柳梢头, 一串光明的联想 ...... 浮在空气的水溪里, 把热情拉长 ...... 于是吹出些泡沫, 我沉到底, 安心守住你们古老的监狱, 一个封建社会搁浅在资本主义的历史里。 一叶扁舟碧江上 晚霞炊烟不分明 良辰美景共饮酒 你一杯来我一盅 而我是来飨宴五月的晚餐, 在炮火映出的影子里, 有我交换着敌视, 大声谈笑, 我要在你们之上, 做一个主人, 知道提审的钟声敲过了十二点。 因为你们知道的, 在我的怀里藏着一个黑色小东西, 流氓, 骗子, 匪棍, 我们一起, 在混乱的街上走—— 他们梦见铁拐李 丑陋乞丐是仙人 游遍天下厌尘世 一飞飞上九层云 1940年11月102

102 Li Fang, ed., Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 87. This poem was first published in Mu Dan, Tanxian dui, p. 19. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 73

As with “1939 Torchlit Procession in Kunming,” here Mu Dan depicts a “dim and hazy” evening in May and a “chanting procession bearing torches.” This time, however, it is raining, and water appears on the branches of the trees: “Hanging on the tips of the willow branches, a strand of radi- ant imaginations/Floating in the water rivulets.” Mirroring the gloomy weather, a darker mood pervades Mu Dan’s poem. Rather than being enthusiastically caught up in the marching, a disillusioned speaker reflects on his former idealism and naiveté: “No one could see” that in fact the “murderers” were “singing triumphantly of the freedom of May.” Whereas Mu Dan’s earlier poems portray the enemy as foreign aggressors who are bombing the people and attacking the Chinese nation, here the “murder- ers” are apparently leaders in the government or perhaps at Lianda, who hypocritically celebrate the freedom of May and issue false promises in the newspapers to preserve “the people’s welfare.” More generally, Mu Dan’s poem indicts the Chinese nation as a “feu- dalistic society trapped in a history of capitalism.” Through his comment, “I came to enjoy the sacrificial meal of May,” the speaker implicitly alludes to Lu Xun’s short story “Madman’s Diary” (Kuangren riji 狂人日记) and to his condemnation of Chinese history as cannibalistic. As the speaker comments, addressing an unspecified audience, “It is you [plural] that taught me Lu Xun’s satirical essay.” In fact, Mu Dan’s poem can be read as a kind of “satirical essay” in the tradition of Lu Xun, who used this form to critique social ills.103 Indeed, it is not only in the critical stance adopted by Mu Dan’s speaker, but also in its formal diversity that the poem resem- bles a satirical essay. Describing the eclectic “catch-all” nature of Lu Xun’s satirical essays, which borrow elements from a variety of modern and traditional essay forms, including the Ming dynasty (1368–1644) essay (xiaopinwen 小品文), the “ancient” prose of the Six dynasties (220–589), unofficial histories, “miscellaneous thoughts” (zagan 杂感), and “miscel- laneous discussions” (zatan 杂谈),104 Leo Lee writes: In the broadest sense, therefore, Lu Xun’s zawen [satirical essay] is not a generic term, but a ‘catch-all name for all kinds of prose pieces written over a certain period of time and placed between two covers.’ In this broad def- inition, his scholarly treatise, prose poetry, and reminiscences, as well as essays of various kinds, can all be included in his zawen.105

103 For Wang Zuoliang’s comments on the prevalence of biting satire in Mu Dan’s works, see his “Mu Dan: Youlai yu guisu,” p. 3. 104 Leo Lee, Voices from the Iron House, p. 111. 105 Ibid. In this quote Lee cites David Pollard’s essay, “Lu Xun’s Zawen,” in Leo Lee, ed., Lu Xun and His Legacy, pp. 54–55. 74 chapter one

In a similar fashion, Mu Dan’s poem is formally diverse, recalling the essay form but also mixing traditional regulated verse with free verse. Specifi- cally, the first, third, fifth, seventh, and ninth stanzas of the poem are written in four-lined regulated verse with seven syllables in each line, while the second, fourth, sixth, and eight stanzas are in free verse. Through set- ting up this formal contrast, Mu Dan juxtaposes stock images from tradi- tional poetry—such as a “single skiff on an emerald river” and “bright and beautiful” heavens—with modern images of violence, such as a “Browning pistol, Mauser rifle, number three portable pistol,” and the “revolver bullet that explodes as it enters human flesh.” As Ping-kwan Leung comments in his analysis of the poem, “The stock images in the banal love song contrast sharply with the vernacular language and its syntax which, though less lyrical, enable the poet to relate to broader issues.”106 In fact, the syntax of Mu Dan’s modernist imagery is not necessarily tied to vernacular forms, but is quite complex and convoluted, characterized by the use of adjec- tival modifiers and the passive voice (bei 被.) Examples of such imag- ery include: “those grandly complimented streets had spilled them out” (bei gongwei de jiedao jiu ba tamen qingchu 被恭维的街道就把他们倾出), and “the twisted bullet-path of history” (lishi de niuzhuan de dandao 历史 的扭转的弹道). In addition to these formal contrasts, the poem emphasizes the dispar- ity between present and past in lines such as “happiness after despair”; “after the chanting procession bearing torches had passed by, No one could see . . .”; and “after the talk published in the newspaper about pre- serving the people’s welfare, no one could see . . .” By juxtaposing what the speaker now knows with what he could not see before, the poem con- veys the theme of disillusionment. In particular, the violent and disturb- ing images in “May” provide a jarring contrast to the hope expressed in Mu Dan’s earlier poem about the May parade. Leung observes that “May” conjures up images of the May Fourth Movement in 1919, the May 30th Event that led to the National Strike in 1925, and May Day as International Labor Day, events traditionally associated with large-scale demonstrations and youthful idealism.107 Similarly, the title “May” alludes implicitly to Mu Dan’s earlier poem, “1939 Torchlit Procession in Kunming,” and to the previous year’s parade. In contrast to this former idealism, the speaker once again finds himself entrapped. However, this time he is not stuck in

106 Ping-kwan Leung, “Literary Modernity in Chinese Poetry,” p. 52. 107 Ibid. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 75 an air-raid shelter, but rather is caught within the “twisted bullet-path of history” and the “ancient prison” of feudal society. Although “May” is organized around a series of formal and thematic juxtapositions, Mu Dan creates parallels between the free verse and regu- lated verse sections of the poem. For example, the portrayal of “graves on the outskirts of town” mirrors the images of guns and death, and antici- pates the death of the speaker who is “reborn” through violence. The “drifting pollen” that “fills the sky” anticipates the “dim and hazy street in May.” Likewise, the “sacrificial meal of May” depicted in the fourth sec- tion of free verse recalls the “red clouds mingled with cooking smoke” in the fourth section of regulated verse. Through creating such connections between the different sections, Mu Dan adds an eerie tinge of foreboding to the stock imagery of springtime. Unknowingly, the young “lad and the loving maid” who enjoy a cup of wine and a meal out on the “emerald river” may be involved in a kind of cannibalistic feast. While a “gentle breeze” drifts above the new grass that covers the graves on the outskirts of town, those who died met violent deaths by shooting. Thus, despite Mu Dan’s critique of the “old lyricism” and its conven- tional images of “wind, flowers, snow, and the moon,” he successfully uti- lizes such stock imagery in combination with unconventional modernist imagery to create a vivid poetic landscape. However, here nature imagery is deployed to suggest the “young lad’s” hedonistic enjoyment of the beau- ties of nature, while the nation is expending its energies in full-scale war. One way of interpreting Mu Dan’s poem is to see it as a critique of student life in Kunming during the war. While privileged students enjoy the beau- tiful spring scenery in Yunnan and make romantic excursions to Kunming Lake, all around them the common people are suffering and dying. In the penultimate line, the reference to the Daoist Immortal Li, “wandering all over the world with disgust for the dusty earth,” could be read as a com- mentary on the academic staff at Lianda, immersing themselves in the study of classical literature and Daoist philosophy even as others fight to save the nation. Read in dialogue with Mu Dan’s poems celebrating the beauties of nature, such as “Praise,” “Garden,” and “Walking in the Wilderness,” Mu Dan’s portrayal in “May” of students enjoying natural scenery in the midst of war could also be interpreted as a rejection of his own nature poetry as naïve and cut off from violent wartime realities. Interpreted in this light, the poem expresses Mu Dan’s regret over his response to General Chen Cheng’s exhortation to travel to the interior with the Lianda staff and students, and perhaps over his decision to join the faculty in the fall 76 chapter one of 1940. It seems that the students have been lied to by the authorities. Yet through their willing acceptance of such lies, they have allowed them- selves to be transformed into “cannibals.” As Mu Dan’s speaker comments, “I came to enjoy the sacrificial meal of May,” suggesting that he is a “can- nibal” himself. In addition, Mu Dan uses the first-person “I” (wo 我) and the term “self ” (zi 自) in his description of the young couple’s feasting and drinking on the “emerald river,” thereby implying that the poetic speaker has participated in the enjoyment of spring described in the regulated verse section of the poem.

Loner in the Crowd

Mu Dan’s poem contains many echoes of Lu Xun’s writings, alluding not only to his satirical essays and his indictment of Chinese history as can- nibalistic, but also to themes of entrapment found in his work. In ways reminiscent of Lu Xun, who envisioned himself as trapped within the “iron house” (tie wu 铁屋) of China’s “feudal” society,108 Mu Dan’s speaker find himself locked within China’s “ancient prison.” Likewise, just as Lu Xun remarked that he frequently used his literary scalpel to dissect himself,109 Mu Dan’s irony is self-directed, frequently falling on his poetic speakers. Moreover, like Lu Xun, who wavers “between disillusionment and hope,”110 Mu Dan’s speakers alternate between ebullient expressions of hope for the besieged nation and despair over their sense of entrap- ment and futility. Echoing Lu Xun’s lone I-narrators who indict the masses according to the paradigm of the “loner versus the crowd” identified by Leo Lee,111 Mu Dan’s first-person speaker in “May” lashes out against a collective audi- ence whom he refers to in the second-person plural. However, whereas

108 See Lu Xun, “Nahan xuyan,” 呐喊序言 (Preface to Call to Arms), in Lu Xun quanji 鲁迅全集 (The Complete Works of Lu Xun), 16 vols. (Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1981), I: 416. 109 Lu Xun, “Xie zai Fen houmian” 写在坟后面 (Postscript to The Grave), in Lu Xun quanji, I: 284. 110 Marston Anderson, Limits of Realism, p. 92. 111 See Leo Lee, Voices from the Iron House, p. 70. Lee observes that “Lu Xun’s anti- traditional rhetoric seems to rise above the May Fourth polemic, as it also contains a larger ‘philosophical’ conceptualization: the juxtaposition of ‘ego-mania’ and ‘collective mania,” of a very small number of eccentric individuals who are intellectual originators and the large majority of the ‘masses’ who are noisy mediocrities. This archetypal configuration of the loner vs. the crowd lies at the conceptual basis of his fiction as well.” See also Chapter Four, “The Stories, II: The Loner and the Crowd,” in ibid., pp. 69–88. a sonnet in an air-raid shelter 77

Lu Xun’s I-narrators attempt to maintain a critical distance from the masses, Mu Dan’s speaker in “May” at times appears to merge with the people on the street, whom he addresses in the first-person plural: “Rogue, cheat, gangster, villain, together we [emphasis added]/ Walk on the cha- otic streets.” Mu Dan’s speaker thus evinces an ambivalent relationship with the marching crowd. Even though the speaker looks down on his fel- low marchers as “those foolish people,” many little better than criminals, he still imagines that they form part of a collective “we.” In a similar fash- ion, so too does the speaker in “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter” become “stained with black, just like these people” in the shelter whom he refers to as “pathetic people” and “swarms of insects, squeezing together . . . .” Throughout the war years, Mu Dan repeatedly expressed a yearning to sublimate himself within the national collective. Just as he hoped “to create a grand harmony of spirit between poetry and the age,” he argued in several wartime essays that the poetic “I” should be expanded by the exigencies of war so as to contain or embrace the epoch in which the poet lives.112 Yet, even though his poetic speakers are sometimes successful in achieving this longed-for unity with the masses and with the nation, they evince a fragmented and unstable conception of the self and an uncer- tainty with respect to the larger collective. If Lu Xun’s I-narrators relate to the people antagonistically, according to the paradigm of “the loner versus the crowd,” in contrast Mu Dan’s speakers thus appear as “loners in the crowd.” Moreover, Mu Dan’s shifting and ambivalent speakers mirror the jag- ged and fragmented forms of his poetry, which dramatizes the plight of modern poets searching for appropriate forms to represent wartime realities. In this regard, they serve as testament to what Wai-lim Yip has described as the “self-agonizing quest” of modern Chinese poets for new poetic forms in order to “regenerate a vigorous China” in modern poetry. They [modern poets] were proud of the high culture of China but at the same time disdainful of China’s corruptive, unself-reflexive institutions. They hated the hegemonic aggression of the Western powers which had brought China to the brink of extinction but could not help embracing Mr. Democracy and Mr. Science as if these two could indeed help resur- rect China. But exactly where could they locate the truly cohesive form (hermeneutical and explanatory framework) for the beaten and beat China?

112 Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, p. 259. 78 chapter one

What kind of cohesive form could they borrow from the West (if indeed there were such a thing!) to regenerate a vigorous China?113 In ways similar to other modern poets, Mu Dan placed great faith in the power of poetic form to “regenerate a vigorous China.” Yet, even though he borrowed heavily from Western literature, Mu Dan did not simply look to the West to find a “cohesive form” to supplant traditional poet- ics. Rather, he experimented with a heterogeneous mix of traditional and modern forms as he closely examined the relationship between poetic form and the turbulent and shocking evocative experience that he sought to convey. In doing so, Mu Dan succeeded in writing evocative lyric poetry about such “non-poetic” subjects as taking refuge in an air-raid shelter. More importantly, he gave voice to the feelings of hope and excitement for the future of the Chinese nation experienced by many displaced intel- lectuals, along with their sense of frustration and entrapment during the protracted years of war.

113 Wai-lim Yip, “Modernism in Cross-Cultural Context,” in his Lyrics from Shelters, p. 13. CHAPTER TWO

INTERSECTIONS BETWEEN CARTOON AND NATIONAL ART: YE QIANYU’S SEARCH FOR THE SINICIZED CARTOON

In his autobiography, A Detailed Account of Life’s Transformations: A Record of the Passing Years (Xixu cangsang ji liunian 细叙沧桑记流年; 1992), cartoonist Ye Qianyu recalls that he organized a team of cartoon artists to carry out propaganda work in China’s wartime interior after the out- break of war.1 Together with a small group of cartoonists from Shang- hai, including well-known artists Zhang Leping 张乐平 (1910–92), Lu Zhixiang 陆志庠 (1910–93), Te Wei 特伟 (1915–2010), and Hu Kao 胡考 (1912–94), he formed the “National Salvation Cartoon Propaganda Corps” ( Jiuwang manhua xuanchuan dui 救亡漫画宣传队). Given funding from the Nationalist Government’s Third Section of the Military Affairs Commission headed by Guo Moruo 郭沫若 (1892–1978), the corps left Shanghai to spread anti-Japanese propaganda in the cities of the south- west interior. Although Shanghai had served as the center for cartoonists’ cultural activities prior to the outbreak of war, cartoon magazines began to spring up all over China as practitioners journeyed inland. Working together with woodblock artists, dramatists, and other artists from around China, cartoonists sought to spread the message of resistance by producing street murals and exhibitions (Figs. 2.1–2.2). Viewing their mission as a dual one of recording the atrocities of war and encouraging the Chinese people, these artists became aware of the power of simple visual images to stir up patriotism, especially in rural areas among China’s predominantly illiter- ate masses. Describing the shifting role of wartime cartoons, Ye Qianyu wrote in 1948: “During the war . . . cartoons moved from magazines to ban- ners and street walls and from printed matter to street exhibitions.”2

1 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian 细叙沧桑记流年 (A Detailed Account of Life’s Transformations: A Record of the Passing Years; Beijing: Qunyan, 1992), pp. 102–104. Shanghai cartoonists also published the journal Jiuwang manhua 救亡漫画 (National Salvation Cartoons) following the Battle of Shanghai in August 1937. 2 Ye Qianyu, “Lüetan Zhongguo de manhua yishu 略谈中国的漫画艺术” (A Brief Dis- cussion of the Art of Chinese Comics), Renwen yikan (December 12, 1948): 30. 80 chapter two

Fig. 2.1. National Cartoon Propaganda Corps member Zhang Leping painting a wall mural of soldiers (1938).

Fig. 2.2. Truck covered in cartoon propaganda, used to accompany dramatic performances promoting the cause of resistance (1938).

As they traveled inland, Ye and his fellow cartoonists conceived of their wartime displacement as a kind of rural return to the roots of Chinese culture. In an attempt to create art about and for the masses, they increas- ingly appropriated elements from traditional art forms. Blending the Westernized cartoon with a variety of native forms and styles, such as Chinese ink-and-wash painting and the woodblock, they created what intersections between cartoon and national art 81 they referred to as “national forms of cartoon” or “sinicized cartoons” (Zhongguohua manhua 中国化漫画). In addition, Ye and other cartoon- ists began producing “national paintings” in hopes of better representing the spirit of the folk. Ye himself took a step further: following a 1942 trip to a Miao village in Guizhou, he made the decision to stop drawing cartoons since he felt that this medium could not adequately represent the beauty and grace inherent in the common people. Subsequently, he decided to study with renowned artist Zhang Daqian, who had recently completed a series of copies (linmo 临摹) of wall art from the historic cultural center of Dunhuang in Western China. The exigencies of war thus left a profound mark on Ye, leading him to reach out to new audiences in the interior, portray new subjects, and col- laborate with artists from around the country working in different genres of popular and elite art. As Ye struggled to fulfill a variety of new roles as a wartime artist, he experimented with a wide array of forms, including sketching, cartooning, and painting, as well as with many different materi- als and techniques, such as Chinese ink-and-brush painting and Guizhou leather paper. His formally diverse artwork, which appropriated elements from regional art and features representations of wartime life in many dif- ferent locations around China, sheds light on how physical displacement and dislocation shaped the wartime aesthetics of dissolution. Moreover, Ye’s formal experiments in pursuit of the sinicized cartoon draw atten- tion to the linkages between artists’ efforts to popularize the war and the development of new forms of modernism. Following a brief introduction to the activities of the Cartoon Propa- ganda Corps led by Ye, in this chapter I first examine Ye’s cartoons from the early years of the War of Resistance against Japan (1935–39). Next, I analyze his hybrid sketch-cartoon series, Wartime Chongqing (1940) and Escape from Hong Kong (1942). In the third section, I discuss Ye’s visit to Guizhou and examine his painting Cockfight (Dou ji 斗鸡; 1942) and his autobiographical sketch-cartoon “In a Miao Village in Guizhou” (Zai Guizhou Miaoxiang 在贵州苗乡; 1942). In the fourth section, I turn my attention to several paintings that Ye produced during his stay at Zhang’s residence in Chengdu from the fall of 1944 until the summer of 1945. Some of these works remained uncompleted until after the war, includ- ing Indian Dance (Yindu wu 印度舞; 1945), Indian Dance Pose (Yindu wuzi; 1948), and Dance of the Offering of Flowers (Xianhua wu 献花舞; 1949). Finally, I offer interpretations of Ye’s sketch-cartoon series Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian (1945), in which he depicts Zhang at work in his studio. 82 chapter two

Resistance Cartoons Go to the People

Arriving in Nanjing in late September 1937, the Cartoon Propaganda Corps worked at breakneck speed to create propaganda posters to hang in train stations and on street corners. They also organized an exhibition in a Nanjing movie theater.3 For this show, Ye produced a large 54” × 72” poster titled “Four Heroes of the Air Force” (Hangkongjun si yongshi 航空 军四勇士; Fig. 2.3) based on a newspaper photograph of fighter pilot Yue Yiqin 乐以琴 (1914–37).4 Several months later, when the loss of the capital to the Japanese became imminent, the corps received government orders to retreat to Wuhan. Here they painted murals and produced a series of 20 color post- ers, which they printed copies of and posted on street corners around the city.5 They also collaborated with Wuhan’s resident drama troupes to hold a parade. Led by a drummer and marchers carrying a Chinese flag, the parade featured a car covered with propaganda posters and loud- speakers playing patriotic music. In addition, the artists’ group published the biweekly cartoon periodical Resistance Cartoons (Kangzhan manhua 抗战漫画) for which Ye Qianyu served as editor.6 In publishing this journal, the corps took advantage of the favorable printing resources in Wuhan after the Shanghai Printing Company and other printing presses had moved there to escape Japanese occupation of Shanghai. Anxious to spread the message of resistance to as large an audience as possible, Ye and his fellow propaganda corps members experimented with a wide variety of artistic forms and media, including posters and wall art, sketches, photography, cartoon strips, pen-and-ink drawings, paint- ings using a traditional Chinese brush, flyers, and watercolor paintings. The need to spread their propaganda as effectively as possible inspired Ye to theorize the role of these diverse art forms in reaching out to different sectors of the population. In his article, “The Problem of the Massifica- tion of Art under Wartime Conditions: Part I—The Content and Form of Picture-Story Drawings” (Zhanshi huihua de dazhonghua wenti di yi,

3 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, pp. 102–107. 4 Ibid., p. 107. By chance Yue visited the exhibition, where he had his photo taken with Ye Qianyu (Fig. 2.3). The photograph was mailed to Ye almost 50 years later by a family member of Yue’s who told him that the airman had died in battle shortly after visiting the exhibition. For a different photograph of the same propaganda poster as part of the Nan- jing exhibition, see Kangzhan manhua 抗战漫画 (Resistance Cartoons), January 15, 1938. 5 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, pp. 109–11. 6 See Ye Qianyu, ed., Kangzhan manhua, Shanghai: Shanghai shehuikexueyuan, 2005. intersections between cartoon and national art 83

Fig. 2.3. Photograph of Ye Qianyu (left) with Yue Yiqin (right) in front of the propaganda poster, “Four Heroes of the Air Force.” lianhuan tuhua de neirong he xingshi 战时绘画的大众化问题 第一, 连环图画的内容和形式), published in Resistance Cartoons in 1938, Ye argued that wartime cartoonists needed to employ a variety of forms in order to appeal to three kinds of audiences—peasants and soldiers, Chi- nese intellectuals, and foreigners.7 Cartoon magazines such as Resistance Cartoons were intended for a predominantly educated audience. Posters and “picture books” (lianhuan tuhua 连环图画 or lianhuanhua 连环画, literally “linked drawings”), a form of illustrated booklet found in China since the nineteenth century, were geared to reach the illiterate masses.8 As for foreigners, flyers written in Japanese, and published later in the same month in Resistance Cartoons, were intended to persuade Japanese soldiers to defect. In addition, Ye’s collection of 51 drawings of wartime Chongqing, published with English commentary and titled China Today: In Art Draw- ings, was intended for English-speaking audiences.9 Apart from serving as editor of Resistance Cartoons, Ye produced many cartoons for the journal. One example of Ye’s early wartime works is the

7 Ye Qianyu, “Zhanshi huihua de dazhonghua wenti di yi, lianhuan tuhua de neirong he xingshi,” Kangzhan manhua, Jan. 15, 1938. 8 For a discussion of lianhuanhua in modern China, see Kuiyi Shen, “Lianhuanhua and Manhua—Picture Books and Comics in Old Shanghai,” in John Lent, ed., Illustrating Asia: Comics, Humor Magazines, and Picture Books (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2002), pp. 100–20. As Shen observes, the subjects of picture books in prewar Republican Shang- hai included novels and current events. See ibid., p. 101. 9 See Ye Qianyu, China Today: In Art Drawings (Calcutta: Book Emporium, 1944). 84 chapter two angry face of a soldier, which he drew for the cover of the first issue in January 1938 (Fig. 2.4). Through this close-up depiction of a soldier, Ye produced an example of what Hu Feng 胡风 (1902–85) described as “real- ist heroes” (xianshi de yingxiong 现实的英雄) of the war, just as he had done in his patriotic poster of Yue Yiqin.10 As Ye noted in “The Problem of the Massification of Art under Wartime Conditions,” the job of car- toon artists during wartime was to promote the war effort by making the people understand that “heroes are produced from among them.”11 In this early caricature of a soldier, Ye imitated the style of a wood- block print. During the war period, many woodblock artists in the interior worked with cartoonists to produce a form often referred to as “cartoons and woodblock” (manmu 漫木). This practice was the result of a lack of adequate printing presses, making it necessary to use woodblocks as printing templates. As many Shanghai printing presses moved to Wuhan following the outbreak of war, Resistance Cartoons did not face this par- ticular problem. Nevertheless, Ye sought to create what he saw as a more native style of art, a trend that became very prevalent in wartime cartoons. In his article, “National Forms of Cartoons” (Manhua de minzu xingshi 漫画的民族形式; 1941), Ye commented that whereas before the war over 95 percent of cartoons had been inspired by Western models, in response to the war artists had increasingly developed a Chinese style, a trend he encouraged them to develop further.12 Although by adopting a native style Ye and his colleagues ostensibly hoped to reach out to the masses in a form that they could readily under- stand, Resistance Cartoons was in fact primarily intended for an audience of intellectuals and artists. Nonetheless, the efforts of Ye and other car- toonists to employ national forms of art served as the impetus for formal experimentation with cartoon and a variety of traditional styles and tech- niques. For his illustration for the first issue of Resistance Cartoons, Ye employed a drawing style based on woodblock prints and an exaggerated cartoon style to draw the large eyes and nose of the soldier.

10 Ye Qianyu, “Zhanshi huihua de dazhonghua wenti di yi, lianhuan tuhua de neirong he xingshi.” 11 Ibid. 12 Ye Qianyu, “Manhua de minzu xingshi,” Huashang bao, October 1, 1941. intersections between cartoon and national art 85

Fig. 2.4. Ye Qianyu, illustrated cover of first edition of Resistance Cartoons, January 1938.

Yet another example of Ye’s early wartime cartoons is “Living for Hatred” (Wei chouhen er sheng 为仇恨而生), which was featured on the cover of Resistance Cartoons on March 15, 1938 (Fig. 2.5, Plate Section). In this work, Ye portrays a mother running with her children from Japanese planes that fly menacingly overhead. To highlight the battle between the invading Japanese and their innocent victims who bleed and run from their attackers, Ye used a dramatic contrast in color between red, black, and white, as well as between light and shadow. The fierce, angry glare of the mother and the shocked expression of her child convey a strong mes- sage of resistance, reminiscent of the resolute gaze of a soldier on the first cover of Resistance Cartoons. Ye’s appropriation of traditional styles and techniques in his early wartime artwork represented a departure from his prewar works, which 86 chapter two were heavily influenced by the Western cartoon and art. Prior to the war, Ye served as the editor of the comic journal Shanghai Sketch (Shang- hai manhua 上海漫画) but was best known for his regular cartoon strip Mr. Wang (Wang xiansheng 王先生), inspired by Irish-American cartoonist George McManus’s (1884–1954) Bringing up Father (Fig. 2.6). Like McManus’s strip, which was hugely popular in both the United States and China,13 Mr. Wang was very well received by the Sketch’s readers and, according to Ye, his comic strip served as the inspiration for no fewer than 11 films.14 Similar in some ways to Bringing up Father, a satire about an immi- grant Irishman and his buddies in Chicago, Mr. Wang is a satirical take on gambling, cronyism, and government corruption in Shanghai. Addi- tionally, and again reminiscent of Bringing up Father, which according to Ye is “about a man who is afraid of his wife,”15 Mr. Wang featured fights between Mr. and Mrs. Wang. In “Quitting Alcohol” (Jie jiu 戒酒; Fig. 2.7), Mr. Wang scolds his wife for playing mahjong while Mrs. Wang admon- ishes her husband for drinking. Although they both agree to give up their respective vices, in the end the two characters simply switch places: Mr. Wang starts playing mahjong, while his spouse takes up drinking. Apart from Mr. Wang, Ye created many other cartoons on a wide vari- ety of themes and topics, including government corruption, Shanghai city life, Japanese imperialism, and the dangers of female sexuality.16 In 1936,

13 Bringing up Father ran in American newspapers from 1913 to 2000. For information about the comic strip, see Herb Galewitz, ed., Bringing up Father: Starring Maggie and Jiggs (New York: Bonanza Books, 1973). 14 According to Ye Qianyu, the 11 films are: Mr. Wang (Wang xiansheng 王先生; 1934); Mr. Wang’s Secret (Wang xiansheng de mimi 王先生的秘密; 1934); Mr. Wang Celebrates New Year (Wang xiansheng guonian 王先生过年; 1935); Mr. Wang Visits the Countryside (Wang xiansheng dao nongcun qu 王先生到农村去; 1935); The Biography of the Won- derful Knight Mr. Wang (Wang xiansheng qixia zhuan 王先生奇侠传; 1936); Mr. Wang’s Route to Making a Fortune (Wang xiansheng sheng cai you dao 王先生生财有道; 1937); It’s Hard for Mr. Wang to Make a Living (Wang xiansheng chifan nan 王先生吃饭难; 1939); Mr. Wang and The Deputy Landlord (Wang xiansheng yu er fangdong 王先生与二房东; 1939); Mr. Wang and the Three Tenants (Wang xiansheng yu san fangke 王先生与三房客; 1939); Mr. Wang Celebrates a Birthday (Wang xiansheng zuo shou 王先生做寿; 1940); Mr. Wang Visits a Funeral Parlor at Night (Wang xiansheng ye tan binyiguan 王先生夜探 殡仪馆; 1940). See Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, pp. 60–61. 15 Ibid., p. 29. 16 For a selection of Ye’s cartoon images published in Shanghai manhua, see Ellen John- ston Laing, “Shanghai Manhua, the Neo-Sensationist School of Literature, and Scenes of Urban Life,” MCLC Resource Center, Sept. 2010, accessed June 4, 2012, http://mclc.osu. edu/rc/pubs/laing.htm. For examples of Ye’s cartoons published in Shidai manhua 时代 漫画 (Modern Sketch), see John Crespi, “China’s Modern Sketch—1: The Golden Era of intersections between cartoon and national art 87

Fig. 2.6. George McManus, “Bringing up Father,” Feb. 10, 1935. © 1935 KING FEATURES SYNDICATE, INC. he produced the cartoon strip The Alternative History of Little Chen in the Capital (Xiao Chen liu Jing waishi 小陈留京外史), and in 1937 he pro- vided illustrations for a new edition of Lu Xun’s “The True Story of Ah Q.” Like Ye, the work of other Shanghai cartoonists also reflected a wide vari- ety of Western artistic influences. As John Crespi observes with respect to the diverse, eclectic nature of work produced in Shanghai in this medium, “cartoonists picked and chose from among modern-art movements like cubism, surrealism, fauvism, and dada. Few rules applied to the young, almost totally uninstitutionalized art of Chinese cartooning. . . .”17 Apart from his artwork as a cartoonist, Ye painted theater sets, drew illustrations for advertisements, and worked as a fashion designer and photographer. He also published two series of sketches, Sketches of Travels (Lüxing suxie 旅行速写; 1936) and A Collection of Sketches by Qianyu (Qianyu suxieji 浅予速写集; 1936). These drawings were inspired by a 1934 exhibition in Shanghai of works by the Mexican painter and

Cartoon Art, 1934–1937,” MIT Visualizing Cultures, accessed May 30, 2012, http://ocw.mit. edu/ans7870/21f/21f.027/modern_sketch/index.html. 17 John Crespi, “China’s Modern Sketch: The Golden Era of Cartoon Art, 1934– 1937,” Visualizing Cultures website, MIT, accessed May 30, 2012, http://ocw.mit.edu/ ans7870/21f/21f.027/modern_sketch_02/ms_visnav08.html. For a discussion of Shanghai Sketch’s ties to modernist literature, see Ellen Johnston Laing, “Shanghai Manhua, the Neo-Sensationist School of Literature, and Scenes of Urban Life,” MCLC Resource Center, accessed January 1, 2013, http://mclc.osu.edu/rc/pubs/laing.htm. 88 chapter two

Fig. 2.7. Ye Qianyu, “Quitting Alcohol,” from his cartoon strip Mr. Wang. intersections between cartoon and national art 89 caricaturist Miguel Covarrubias (1904–1957).18 After seeing Covarrubias’ show, Ye began drawing sketches in and around Shanghai, and in 1935 made a trip to Beijing to produce sketches there. Of his experience sketch- ing in these cities, he wrote: “In society there were weaknesses and contra- dictions everywhere. If we simply paid attention and looked around, we would never feel that the raw material for cartoons had dried up.”19 Paralleling Ye’s shifting focus during the war period towards traditional Chinese art, his efforts to represent “realist heroes” constituted a change from his previous attempts to satirize the “weaknesses and contradic- tions” of society. His cartoon “Abandon the Civilian Life, Join the Army” (Qiwen jiuwu 弃文就武; 1939) can be interpreted as a representation of this shifting role of art and the artist in wartime. In this piece, Ye depicts the transformation of his popular, satirical character Mr. Wang from a petty urbanite traditionalist into a patriotic soldier who heads off to war, complete with rifle and military outfit (Fig. 2.8). Arguably, this cartoon reflects the artist himself—a man in the process of abandoning his for- mer identity as a well-known Shanghai cartoonist and identifying him- self with the patriotic cause of resistance to the Japanese. In addition, this cartoon serves to encourage the viewer by showing how an ordinary man can become a hero in the context of the war. In contrast to Ye’s ear- lier cartoons of Mr. Wang, this drawing no longer features speech balloons and dialogue. Rather, Ye resorts to traditional Chinese brush and ink and writes the title in calligraphic script, while retaining a cartoon style in his depiction of Mr. Wang’s dot eyes, long nose, and clenched fist. Once again, Ye’s drawing represents a hybrid of Western and native styles, in this case a mixture of cartoon, traditional Chinese brushwork, calligraphy, and propaganda art. In some respects, the aesthetic fluidity of Ye’s wartime work can be seen as a continuation of his prewar experiments with cartoon, sketch, photography, and other art forms. In wider perspective, the formal inno- vations pioneered by Ye and other wartime cartoonists that produced the sinicized cartoon followed in the footsteps of cartoonists who had experi- mented with a variety of traditional Chinese and Western techniques prior

18 Ye Qianyu, Wo de manhua shenghuo 我的漫画生活 (My Life in Cartoons; Beijing: Zhongguo luyou, 2007), p. 25. Ye refers to Covarrubias as “Kefoluopisi” 柯佛罗皮斯. On Covarrubias’s trip to Shanghai and his influence on Chinese cartoonists, see Michael Sullivan, Art and Artists of Twentieth-Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), p. 121. 19 Ye Qianyu, Wo de manhua shenghuo, p. 25. 90 chapter two

Fig. 2.8. Ye Qianyu, “Abandon the Civilian Life, Join the Army,” Xin dongxiang 2.10 (30 June 1939). to the war. For example, Feng Zikai’s 丰子恺 (1898–1975) early series Zikai Cartoons (Zikai manhua 子恺漫画; 1926) combines traditional ink and brush painting with Western-style cartooning.20 However, in the context of total war, cartoonists increasingly began to theorize about national forms of cartoon and self-consciously appropri- ated elements from indigenous styles with the aim of producing modern forms of cartoon art closely tied to native traditions. Art critic Huang Mao 黄茅 (1917–), for example, argued that the sinicized cartoon should “retain the marvels of brush and ink of Chinese art,” combining Chinese art forms

20 Apart from Feng, other Shanghai cartoonists appropriated elements from works of traditional popular literature such as The Romance of the Three Kingdoms. See Kuiyi Shen’s discussion in “Lianhuanhua and Manhua,” pp. 100–20. intersections between cartoon and national art 91 with “Western perspective devices and the art of human anatomy.”21 Simi- larly, many cartoonists crossed generic and cultural divides as they sought to borrow from native forms and create their own versions of sinicized car- toons. Liao Bingxiong integrated folk art, Cantonese rhymes and idioms, and the woodcut into his wartime cartoons, as in his series The Annals of the Cat Kingdom (Maoguo chunqiu 猫国春秋; 1945).22 Ding Cong made use of the traditional hand scroll format in his work.23 Zhang Guangyu blended traditional Chinese decorative art with the cartoon in his series Journey to the West (Xiyou manji 西游漫记; 1945).24 For these artists, as for Ye, what began as a search for national forms in order to better com- municate with the uneducated masses and promote the war effort evolved into a search for cultural identity as Chinese artists—a search that served as the impetus for the production of new forms of modern art.

Sketching the Hinterland

Following the fall of Wuhan at the end of 1938, the Cartoon Propaganda Corps was forced to move again, this time to Changsha in Hunan, where they continued their activities.25 Subsequently, they moved to Guilin and eventually to Chongqing. In total, they published 15 issues of Resistance Cartoons before the corps was eventually dissolved after the government discontinued funding.26 Ye left the group in the summer of 1938 when he was transferred by the government to Hong Kong. Here he was commissioned to produce a

21 Huang Mao, Manhua yishu jianghua 漫画艺术讲话 (Lectures on Cartoon Art; Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1947), p. 64. See also Huang Mao, “Huihua Zhongguohua tanxie” 绘画中国化谈屑 (Remarks on the Sinicization of Painting), Jiuwang ribao, May 12, 1940. In addition, see Feng Zikai’s theoretical writings on the cartoon in his Manhua de miaofa 漫画的描法 (Cartooning Methods), 4 vols. (Shanghai: Kaiming shudian, 1948). 22 Liao Bingxiong, Liao Bingxiong juan 廖冰兄卷 (Volume on Liao Bingxiong; Shijiaz- huang: Hebei jiaoju, 1994). 23 See Ding Cong, Ding Cong manhua xuan 丁聪漫画选 (Selection of Ding Cong’s Cartoons; Tianjin: Tianjin renmin, 1982). Michael Sullivan observes with respect to Ding Cong’s wartime cartoons: “Ding Cong is another artist who stretched the meaning of the word ‘cartoon’ to include ambitious satirical paintings that can be regarded as works of art in their own right.” See Michael Sullivan, Art and Artists of Twentieth-Century China, pp. 121–22. 24 For Chang-tai Hung on the wartime sinicization of cartoons, see his War and Popular Culture, pp. 126–27. 25 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, pp. 115–19. 26 See Kuiyi Shen, “Lianhuanhua and Manhua,” p. 118. 92 chapter two series of photographs exposing Japanese atrocities, titled A True Record of Japanese Atrocities (Rikou baoxing shilu 日寇暴行实录). However, these photographs were destroyed by a 1938 fire in Changsha before they had a chance to be published. Also, Ye was placed in charge of editing the offi- cial journal of the Nationalist government published in Hong Kong, China Today (Jinri Zhongguo 今日中国). Frustrated by constant restrictions placed on the publication by government censors, Ye eventually left China Today and moved to the wartime capital of Chongqing in 1940. From there, Ye returned to Hong Kong before its fall in December 1941 and continued his travels throughout Guizhou, Guangxi, and Vietnam. Then in 1943, he worked as a wartime correspondent in India, where he was hired tempo- rarily to report on the joint Chinese-American training camp and work for the United States General Joseph Stillwell (1883–1946).27 As the war dragged on, Ye thus focused increasingly on his role as a reporter and wartime correspondent.28 During this period, he produced many sketches of scenes of China at war—an activity that he linked to his work as a reporter, recording scenes of wartime life in order to pro- vide his audience with information about the conflict.29 During his stay in Chongqing, Ye drew around 200 sketches of the city, collectively titled Wartime Chongqing. In 1942, he produced another series dealing with his flight from occupied Hong Kong, Escape from Hong Kong, and completed a third series about his trip to a Miao village in Guizhou, Life in a Miao Village (Miaoxiang shenghuo 苗乡生活).30 During his time in India, Ye created sketches that he showcased in his 1943 show, An Exhibition of Drawings of Travels through India (Lü Yin huazhan 旅印画展).31 Follow- ing the end of the war in 1945, Ye wrote a diary accompanied by sketches about his trip to Tibet, titled Dajianlu Diary (Dajianlu riji 打箭炉日记).32

27 Ibid., pp. 146–49. 28 See ibid. 29 See Ye Qianyu, “Guanyu suxie” 关于速写 (On Sketching), in his Hua yu lunyi 画 与论艺 (Drawings and Discussions about Art; Tianjin: Tianjin Yangliu qinghuashe, 1991), pp. 109–13. 30 Some of Ye’s sketches of a Miao village were later included in Zai Dahoufang 在大 后方 (In the Great Interior; Changsha: Hunan meishu, 1983). 31 These sketches were later included in Yindu fengqing 印度风情 (Indian Customs; Changsha: Hunan meishu, 1983). 32 Dajianlu riji 打箭炉日记 (Dajianlu [a region of Tibet] Diary) is included in Ye Qianyu, Lücheng huayan 旅程画眼 (A Guide to Drawing Eyes; Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi, 1989), pp. 1–65. intersections between cartoon and national art 93

Discussing his series Wartime Chongqing in his 1979 article “Cartoons and Sketching,” (Manhua he suxie 漫画和速写), Ye asserted that these works were based in “realism” and added that he would have failed in his responsibility as an artist had he not produced this record of wartime conditions in the nation’s temporary capital.33 Ye wrote: These drawings [in Wartime Chongqing] had deep allegorical meaning, but they also represented something of my sense of humor in response to the war. Had I used other forms of expression, such as national painting or oil painting, I’m afraid it wouldn’t have been easy to encourage people to adopt an optimistic attitude towards the war. Some people claimed that this group of drawings was based on “cartoonism” [manhuazhuyi 漫画主义], but in my view they were based on “realism” [xianshizhuyi 现实主义].34 According to Ye Qianyu, his formal innovations with the sketch-cartoon were thus an outgrowth of his dissatisfaction with “other forms of expres- sion,” and represented his attempt to achieve a variety of different goals with his artwork. In order to promote the war effort, he hoped to “encour- age people to adopt an optimistic attitude towards the war,” although at the same time he felt an obligation to report truthfully on the situation in the interior through the use of realism. Finally, as a cartoonist, he sought to infuse his work with satire and “humor in response to the war.” One example of Ye’s cross-generic sketch-cartoons from this series is “Stage Set” (Wutai mian 舞台面). This work portrays a scene Ye describes in his autobiography as one he had personally witnessed—an apartment building with the roof and front section destroyed by bombing (Fig. 2.9). On the top floor, one family has hung up a sheet of cloth as a temporary ceiling, while other residents have set up umbrellas as a kind of makeshift roof. Undaunted by the bombing, they are carrying on with their daily activities of eating, reading, sleeping, writing, and working. Nor are they concerned about the rain that freely enters the building. One man uses

33 Ye Qianyu, Wo de manhua shenghuo, pp. 235–36. 34 Ibid. In addition, Amiya Chakravarty comments in his introduction to China Today: In Art Drawings, a collection of 51 of Ye’s drawings of wartime Chongqing, that the draw- ings in Wartime Chongqing helped to make Ye’s audiences more “sensitive to reality.” He writes, “These cartoons make us laugh, helping us to bear a weight of sorrow which might otherwise overwhelm us, and we know that we can never let ourselves be paralyzed by circumstance. Music and art, dance and poetry bring power while they make us sensitive to reality; indeed, confrontation with full reality always brings us strength.” See Amiya Chakravarty, “Introduction,” Ye Qianyu, China Today: In Art Drawings (Calcutta: Book Emporium, 1944), pp. v–vi. 94 chapter two

Fig. 2.9. Ye Qianyu, “Stage Set,” from the 1940 sketch-cartoon series Wartime Chongqing. water coming in from the roof to brush his teeth, while a woman takes advantage of the water blowing into the building to do her washing. Even the dogs are resourceful and sniff around for food amongst the debris. In contrast to Ye’s earlier cartoons of soldiers and war heroes, “Stage Set” reflects a shift away from wartime heroics towards a focus on everyday life. Nonetheless, the humorous vignettes depicted here express the hero- ism of ordinary people, and “Stage Set” could be interpreted as a form of propaganda art that encouraged people to take an “optimistic attitude towards the war.” In keeping with Ye’s assertion that he intended that this series should embody “deep allegorical meaning,” the bombed-out build- ing serves as a symbol of the besieged Chinese nation, while the residents embody the perseverance and courage of the Chinese people in the face of protracted full-scale war. In addition to this “allegorical” reading, “Stage Set” serves as a realistic record of a scene Ye claims to have witnessed at first hand, and also functions as a cartoon that evokes laughter through its portrayal of humorous scenes, such as a man brushing his teeth with rain water. “Stage Set” thus brings together Ye’s roles as reporter, cartoonist, and propaganda artist promoting the cause of national salvation. As a further layer, “Stage Set” also represents an example of the sinicized cartoon. Accompanying his use of traditional Chinese brush and ink, in intersections between cartoon and national art 95 this work Ye employs “earth paper” (tuzhi 土纸), a coarse paper made from old fishing nets or other raw materials used in traditional art dating back to 105 AD.35 In addition, he places a traditional seal in the upper right-hand corner. Ye’s drawing thus not only serves a variety of different functions, but also incorporates an eclectic mixture of sketch, cartoon, traditional ink drawing, and materials used in traditional painting. “The Artery of Transportation in the Hinterland” (Zai houfang de jiao- tong dongmai 在后方的交通动脉) is another sinicized sketch-cartoon from Ye’s series Wartime Chongqing. It was made using traditional Chinese brush and ink work, and has a traditional seal in the bottom right-hand corner (Fig. 2.10). Once again, Ye’s drawing is intended to depict the per- severance of the Chinese people in the face of adversity, in this case as they flee in their cars to the interior amidst the chaos created by large- scale displacement. In a manner reminiscent of Xu Chi, who is greeted by scenery “rich in lyrical fragrance” as he travels on the “road to exile,” Ye depicts the beautiful panoramic vistas seen by travelers en route to the hinterland. Yet whereas Xu Chi laments the fact that lyricism itself has been destroyed by the bombing, Ye uses humor to show how the lyric beauty of the countryside has been transformed by a traffic jam. With its portrayal of pointed peaks covered with trees and swirling clouds in the distance, Ye’s drawing resembles a traditional landscape painting, and the small pagoda nestled amid the mountains suggests the traditional Chinese motif of the mountain retreat of the recluse.36 Further, the disparity in size between pagoda and mountains draws attention to the expansiveness of nature, and echoes themes found in traditional painting of the harmony between man and nature. Unlike “Stage Set,” in which Ye employs detailed brushwork to depict life inside a bombed building, here he uses the traditional technique of ink-wash painting (shuimo hua 水墨 画), involving the application of a wash of dark ink that extends diago- nally across the bottom of the painting. In so doing, he creates an impres- sionistic representation of a forest and follows the traditional aesthetic principles of “expressing the meaning” (xieyi 写意) and finding “likeness

35 Ye Qianyu, Wo de manhua shenghuo, p. 47. For information about “earth paper,” see “Tuzhi,” http://baike.baidu.com/view/344327.htm, accessed June 17, 2011. 36 See, for example, Yuan dynasty painter (1271–1368) Wang Meng’s portrayal of the “eremitic ideal” in his The Simple Retreat (Suyan tu 素庵图), reproduced in Maxwell K. Hearn, ed., How to Read Chinese Paintings (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008), p. 114. Also, see the reproduction of Yan Ciyu’s Hermitage by a Pine-Covered Bluff (Songhe louyin tu 松壑楼隐图), in ibid., pp. 62–63. 96 chapter two

Fig. 2.10. Ye Qianyu, “The Artery of Transportation in the Hinterland,” from Wartime Chongqing. in unlikeness” (busi zhi si 不似之似) rather than adhering closely to the strictures of realism.37 However, at the same time, Ye undercuts his portrayal of this peace- ful landscape scene through his depiction of roads blocked with traffic, or what he refers to as the “artery of transportation in the hinterland.”

37 For a discussion of the traditional aesthetic concept of “likeness in unlikeness,” see Li Wenmin, “Reaching Likeness through Unlikeness: The Interpretation and Application of busi zhi si in Contemporary Drawing,” Ph.D. Dissertation, University of New South Wales, 2009, pp. 5–21. intersections between cartoon and national art 97

Fig. 2.11. Ye Qianyu, “After Exhaustive Bombing,” from Wartime Chongqing.

In making this choice of subject, he transforms his painting—on one level, at least—into a satirical commentary on road conditions in war- time. In addition, he subverts the themes of reclusion and harmony with nature by showing how an influx of people from urban areas has trans- formed this once tranquil and idyllic scene. In a way that recalls Mu Dan’s cross-generic formal experiments with regulated verse and free verse, Ye Qianyu’s cartoonized landscape emphasizes the gap between traditional art forms and life in wartime. Also, as with Mu Dan poems, many of Ye’s cartoon-sketches contain an autobiographical element and reflect the artist’s responses to a variety of everyday wartime experiences. For instance, in “After Exhaustive Bomb- ing” (Pilao hongzha zhi hou 疲劳轰炸之后), Ye portrays himself leaving a bomb shelter after an air-raid together with other Chongqing residents (Fig. 2.11). Standing at left in the drawing, Ye looks exhausted, with tired eyes and an unshaven face after the long wait in the shelter. Next to him, a man smiles and attempts to strike up a conversation with him while, behind the artist, crowds of people are emerging from the shelter and making their way back down to the city carrying luggage, holding their children, and conversing with fellow residents. Once again, the inhabit- ants of Chongqing are shown exhibiting an optimistic spirit in the face of adversity; many have smiles of relief on their faces as they emerge from the shelter chatting and laughing. Reminiscent of similar pieces by Ye, “After Exhaustive Bombing” is a vehicle for a variety of techniques and messages. On the one hand, it can be viewed as a realistic depiction of wartime conditions in Chongqing, 98 chapter two where many cave-like bomb shelters were carved into the mountain- side. As shown in the drawing, residents needed to walk down from the mountain to return to the city following an air-raid. In order to depict this movement, Ye uses the Western technique of perspective, depicting a line of people leaving the shelter that narrows to a point in the distance. Despite his use of perspective, Ye diverges from a realist depiction of this scene by omitting the scenery beyond the walkway and details of the walls sheltering the path down from the shelter. As a result, the people in the background exiting the shelter appear to hover above the artist’s head like a dream or memory. Thus, one way of interpreting the drawing is as Ye’s rendering of his emotional state as he leaves the air-raid shelter. In particular, Ye depicts interiority through his portrayal of the artist’s eyes, recalling his depiction of the resolute stare of the soldier and the fierce expression of the mother and her child in “Living for Revenge.” Through his focus on eyes, Ye thereby succeeds in “conveying the spirit” (chuan shen 传神) of his subjects. As artist Gu Kaizhi 顾恺之 (345–406) argued, “the anima [shen 神] or the innermost personality of the subject in por- trait painting is revealed, first and foremost, through the eye.”38 However, in “After Exhaustive Bombing,” rather than expressing anger, the artist’s eyes reveal his fatigue as he gazes upward over layers of bags under his eyes and reflects on the trauma of taking refuge in a bomb shelter. In this regard, the weary artist in Ye’s sketch-cartoon has an affinity with Mu Dan’s disoriented speaker in “Lyric Poem in a Bomb Shelter” who emerges from the shelter “frozen, [his] face wreathed in smiles, and tears, and sighs.” Through his use of blank space, Ye not only departs from a realist mode of representation, but also draws on an aesthetic in traditional art that values leaving room for the viewer’s imagination to complete the work. In his Cartooning Methods (Manhua de miaofa 漫画的描法; 1943), Feng Zikai refers to this aesthetic: “It is crucial that the part of the painting not depicted by the artist be [filled in] by the imagination of the viewer; thus a work must be rich in its subtlety, and allow for depth of meaning.”39 More

38 This is Zong-qi Cai’s translation in his “The Conceptual Origins and Aesthetic Sig- nificance of ‘Shen’ in Six Dynasties Texts on Literature and Painting,” in Zong-qi Cai, ed., Chinese Aesthetics: The Ordering of Literature, the Arts, and the Universe in the Six Dynasties (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2004), pp. 315–16. Likening the eyes to a “fish trap” for catching the spirit of the portrait subject, Gu also wrote: “What lies inside a man cannot be better revealed than through the eye.” See ibid. 39 Geremie Barmé’s translation, in his An Artistic Exile: A Life of Feng Zikai, 1898–1975 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), p. 117. For the original Chinese, see Feng Zikai, “Manhua zhonglei” 漫画种类 (Kinds of Cartoons), in his Manhua de miaofa, IV: 274. intersections between cartoon and national art 99 generally, Ye’s employment of the sketch-cartoon to portray the imagina- tion and interiority of the artist draws from a traditional Chinese concept of art as a reflection of the mind or spirit (xin 心) of the artist. In his 1926 article “The Special Characteristics of Chinese Art” (Zhongguohua de tese 中国画的特色), Feng Zikai argued that the paintings of Tang dynasty poet Wang Wei 王维 (699–759) use nature imagery “to express the poetic vision of his mind”: As I have seen so few examples of [Wang Wei’s] paintings, I cannot comment on them at length. Yet based on what one can gather from commentaries and records it is clear that he was not interested in creating a faithful copy of nature. His genius lay instead in using nature to express the poetic vision of his mind . . . he was depicting a landscape that lay within himself, and to achieve that it was necessary to use [an] impromptu method, the sketch. A hillock would appear in his mind, and he would paint it immediately; . . . this is what is meant by the statement “there is poetry in his painting.”40 Like Wang Wei, Ye’s sketch-cartoon reflects the “poetic vision” of the artist. Yet, according to Ye, in Wartime Chongqing he sought not only to convey a sense of interiority, but rather a combination of “something in the imagination” (yi zhong zhi wu 意中之物) and “something seen with the eyes” (yan zhong zhi wu 眼中之物). Describing the process of artistic creation in this series, Ye wrote: I used the sketch rule of “watching with my eyes, recording in my mind, and conjecturing” that I had discovered through constant practice over the last few years. I took the things that I had seen and heard during the day, and in the evening created a drawing from memory beneath my oil lamp. It was both something in my imagination and something I had actually seen with my eyes. The result was a realistic record [shilu 实录] of people’s lives in the great interior.41 In keeping with Ye’s recollections of producing artwork in the evenings in the glow of his oil lamp, in his sketch-cartoon “New Appreciation for Antiques” (Guwu xin chong 古物新宠; Fig. 2.12), he depicts himself reading at night using an oil lamp for illumination. As the artist sits alone working at night, the outside world seems to fade away, and the small lamp looms large in his imagination. Even more markedly than “After Exhaus- tive Bombing,” this sketch-cartoon departs from the canons of realist

40 Geremie Barmé’s translation, in An Artistic Exile, p. 118; for the original Chinese, see Feng Zikai, “Zhongguohua de tese,” in Feng Zikai wenji 丰子恺文集 (Collected Works of Feng Zikai), 7 vols. (Hangzhou: Zhejiang wenyi, 1992), I: 47. 41 Ye Qianyu, Wo de manhua shenghuo, p. 47. 100 chapter two

Fig. 2.12. Ye Qianyu, “New Appreciation for Antiques,” from Wartime Chongqing. representation to depict the imagination of the artist. This piece also makes use of blank space, allowing the viewer’s imagination to roam freely within the painting and envision the mental landscape of the artist as he works late into the night. Yet at the same time, Ye retains a satirical ele- ment of cartoon in the title to the piece “New Appreciation for Antiques,” which refers to the prevalent use of oil lamps or “antiques” in the place of electric lights during frequent wartime power outages. More generally, this title could be understood as a reference to Ye’s new fondness for pre- modern artwork in the context of the war period. Despite Ye’s innovative deployment of Chinese art aesthetics to depict everyday wartime life in Chongqing, this series received mixed reviews from other cartoonists and artists. Fellow propaganda corps cartoonist Hu Kao, for example, wrote that although he considered Wartime Chongqing to be stylistically superior to Ye’s earlier wartime work, the series repre- sented a step backward from his propaganda posters of war heroes and rather pointed in the direction of his previous career as a cartoonist in intersections between cartoon and national art 101

Shanghai.42 Hu’s comments voiced dissatisfaction with the deployment of art for purposes other than to directly serve the nation state in time of war. Indeed, despite Ye’s efforts to encourage viewers of his work to culti- vate an “optimistic attitude” towards the war, the propaganda function of these works is less prominent than in his early wartime pieces. Rather than devoting his art exclusively to the cause of resistance, in Wartime Chongqing Ye also sought to forge his own unique identity as a Chinese artist, as is evident from his detailed attention to brushwork and deployment of a traditional seal. Moreover, he increasingly drew from tra- ditional art aesthetics in his use of blank space, impressionistic portrayal of landscape, and depiction of the interiority of the artist. Nonetheless, Ye’s sinicized cartoons do not simply mimic traditional forms. Rather, they reinvent them in the context of modern realities, as in the case of his unique rendering of a landscape painting crisscrossed with cars caught in a traffic jam. These works thus reflect Ye’s complex relationship to tradi- tion as well as to the cause of national salvation. While he hoped to sub- merge the self within the collective and reconnect to traditional art forms preserved in the collective memory, at the same time Ye used the hybrid sketch-cartoon as a vehicle for both lyric and humorous self-expression.

Escape from Hong Kong

After staying in Chongqing for over a year, Ye traveled back to Hong Kong in 1941 with his wife Dai Ailian 戴爱莲 (1916–2006). Shortly thereafter, Japanese troops invaded Hong Kong, and Ye was once again uprooted by war as he sought to escape back to the mainland. On his return to China, Ye settled in the wartime cultural center of Guilin where he made another smaller series of over 20 sketch-cartoons titled Escape from Hong Kong. Taken as a whole, this autobiographical collection narrates the story of Ye and Dai’s escape from Kowloon back to unoccupied China. In addi- tion, the entire series can be interpreted as a kind of picture book or set of linked images intended to inform readers about conditions in Hong Kong following the occupation.

42 Hu Kao, “Ye Qianyu—Chongqing xing huazhan” 叶浅予重庆行画展 (Ye Qianyu— Traveling to Chongqing, An Exhibition of Drawing), Huashang bao, Oct. 1, 1941. 102 chapter two

Whereas only a few drawings in Wartime Chongqing, such as “After Exhaustive Bombing” and “New Appreciation for Antiques,” portray the artist himself, in Escape from Hong Kong Ye connects his own wartime experiences more closely with the larger fate of the nation. In this respect, the series represents an example of what Charles Laughlin describes in his Chinese Reportage as the “historicization and/or nationalization of subjec- tivity” in first-person reportage produced during the War of Resistance.43 As Laughlin notes, in first-person reportage about displacement to the interior, writers often connected their autobiographical experiences with the fate of the nation: “each person described, even the very objects of the landscape in these forced retreats into the interior, resonate with histori- cal and national implications.”44 Moreover, by portraying the experience of the nation from the perspective of the individual, Laughlin argues that this type of reportage “endow[s] China in the world of the literary text with a body that feels history both physically and emotionally.”45 In “Frontline at Shatian” (Shatian qianxian 沙田前线), Ye portrays his experience of spending the night with his wife near the front at Shatian (Fig. 2.13). As missiles fly overhead, he and Dai seek refuge within dense foliage. Once again, as in “After Exhaustive Bombing,” the eyes of the artist are a focal point and are the only pair in the painting that are depicted as being open. Here, rather than looking exhausted, the artist peers out at the viewer with a terrified expression as his wife desperately clings to him for support. Although Ye does not use a seal in this work, he marks its status as a sinicized cartoon through his use of traditional brush-and-ink painting. In the background, Ye paints with bold washed strokes; in the foreground, he uses a thinner brush to outline the gnarled roots of trees and delin- eate details of the two human figures. Through layering different shades of grey and black, he gives a sense of the rugged terrain. With his detailed brushwork, Ye also delineates the psychological state of the painter as he lies awake at night hoping not to be killed. The knobby tree branch next to the artist seems like a claw reaching down to grab him, and the dark, sinister sky appears as though it is about to collapse onto him. Reminis- cent of Feng Zikai’s remarks on Wang Wei, Ye uses nature imagery to portray a “landscape that lies within himself.” In this regard, Ye’s painting

43 Charles Laughlin, Chinese Reportage: The Aesthetics of Historical Experience (Durham: Duke University Press, 2002), p. 195. 44 Ibid. 45 Ibid. intersections between cartoon and national art 103

Fig. 2.13. Ye Qianyu, “Frontline at Shatian,” from his 1942 sketch-cartoon series Escape from Hong Kong. also resembles Mu Dan’s poems such as “Walking through the Wilderness” and “May,” and can be interpreted as a further example of the “fusion of scene and emotion.” More broadly, Ye links the experience of the artist with wartime history and the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, and his self-portrait can be interpreted as his representation of “a body that feels history both physically and emotionally.” In “Inspection” (Jiancha 检查), another work from Escape from Hong Kong, Ye depicts the artist with arms raised in the air as he is searched by Japanese soldiers (Fig. 2.14). One of the soldiers is armed with a large sword, and the other carries a bayonet. Although they are supposedly car- rying out an “inspection,” they take advantage of the search to remove valuables, including a watch and a pocket knife. In this drawing, Ye cre- ates a contrast between the short, well-fed soldiers and the tall thin artist, as well as between his small pocket knife and the large weapons carried by the Japanese soldiers. Recalling Ye’s other autobiographical sketch- cartoons, the exaggerated, cartoon eyes of the artist are a focal point of the drawing—this time as he peers up worriedly while the soldiers examine his stolen belongings. The artist’s sense of helplessness as he is searched is again more broadly emblematic of the humiliating experience of life under foreign occupation. 104 chapter two

Fig. 2.14. Ye Qianyu, “Inspection,” from Escape from Hong Kong.

In “Leaving Kowloon” (Chu Jiulong 出九龙), Ye portrays himself and Dai Ailian as they escape back to the mainland (Fig. 2.15). In contrast to “Frontline at Shatian,” the artist is no longer wearing Westernized clothing. Dressed instead as peasants in sandals, Ye and Dai wear dirty, torn clothes and carry their possessions hung from poles that straddle their shoulders. Behind them, Hong Kong recedes in the distance as two boats sail towards the mainland. As Ye recalls in his memoir, he and Dai escaped from Hong Kong by disguising themselves as peasants, traveling by night and hiding out in peasants’ homes during the day. Eventually, they hid in a freighter’s cargo hold in order to make good their escape to the mainland. Reminis- cent of “After Exhaustive Bombing,” in which the people leaving the shel- ter seem to float above the artist, Hong Kong hovers above Ye’s head like a dream vision. Ye also employs blank space in this drawing, and the artist’s emotions are expressed through the startled look in his eyes—which Ye draws attention to by the contrast between his dark clothes and white eyes. Once again, the experience of the artist and his wife mirrors that of millions of families who became refugees during the war and made the perilous journey inland to the unoccupied territories, carrying only a few hastily gathered belongings on their backs. intersections between cartoon and national art 105

Fig. 2.15. Ye Qianyu, “Leaving Kowloon,” from Escape from Hong Kong.

The last cartoon in the series, “The Road to Free China” (Ziyou Zhong- guo zhi lu 自由中国之路), depicts the path from occupied to unoccupied China, here guarded by a checkpoint with a Japanese flag (Fig. 2.16). Hav- ing successfully made the crossing back into the unoccupied territories, Ye, Dai and other refugees run joyfully across an open field, silhouetted by mountains in the background. While some carry luggage, Dai and Ye only have umbrellas, and the artist’s arms are spread upwards in joy. Rather than conveying fear, alarm, exhaustion, or worry, here the eyes of the art- ist express joy as he gazes fervently in the direction of “Free China.” Simi- larly, the wide open road depicted here is different from both the dark, foreboding scenery in “Frontline at Shatian” and the crowded walkway leading out of the shelter in “After Exhaustive Bombing.” In some respects, Ye’s representation of the “road to free China” is remi- niscent of Mu Dan’s poem “Walking in the Wilderness,” in which the poet escapes the “net” of the city to travel on “China’s road,” which is “so free and vast.” As Laughlin observes, the trope of the road is also common in wartime reportage, and “multiplies symbolic or allegorical resonances, from the ancient and ubiquitous arch-image of ‘the path’ or ‘way’ (dao 道) to the more immediate historical problem of a ‘way out’ (chulu 出路) for 106 chapter two

Fig. 2.16. Ye Qianyu, “The Road to Free China,” from Escape from Hong Kong.

China.”46 Indeed, the road in Ye’s drawing could also be associated with multiple allegorical resonances. While the road represents a way out from enemy occupation towards freedom, it also symbolizes hope for postwar China, and parallels Ye’s own artistic journey in search of his cultural heri- tage and roots. Thus, apart from combining elements of sketch, cartoon, and tradi- tional ink painting, Escape from Hong Kong interweaves the fate of the individual with that of the nation, in the process combining elements of reportage, autobiography, and popular art. Yet, although Ye’s cartoons link the artist with the larger national collective, at the same time they also portray him as historical figure and object of artistic representation. In this regard, Ye’s drawings bear a further resemblance to Mu Dan’s poems, which frequently change deictic perspective and treat the poetic speaker as Other. Rather than simply submerging the individual within the “we” of socialist realism, many wartime writers and artists sought to portray their own emotional responses to the war at the same time as they treated the self as synecdoche for the larger nation-state.

46 Ibid., p. 196. intersections between cartoon and national art 107

Towards a New National Art of the Folk

After escaping from Hong Kong and traveling to Guilin in 1942, Ye accom- panied Dai Ailian on a journey to Guizhou, where she went to study and perform regional dances. During this visit, Ye spent two months living with the Miao people. In an attempt to better acquaint himself with the authentic Chinese folk, he made a concerted effort to visit local schools and sketch regional traditional dances. In his memoir, Ye described the formal challenges he faced as he attempted to represent the lives of the Miao minority people in his art: I lived in the Miao region for two months. During the day I conducted inter- views and sketched, and at night at the place where I was staying I would worry about how to portray the life of the Miao people. The first problem was one of form. Should I continue to use the style of cartoon sketch that I used in Wartime Chongqing? Even though I began using techniques of Chi- nese painting in that series, my model was still an exaggerated cartoon style which seemed unsuited to the natural and simple beauty I experienced in the Miao region.47 Just as Ye’s flight to Chongqing had inspired him to experiment with the hybrid sketch-cartoon in order to better represent wartime realities, his journey to Guizhou and encounters with the Miao people also served as an impetus to consider the theoretical “problem of form.” In his essay, “Cartoon and Sketch” (Manhua yu suxie 漫画与速写; 1979), Ye describes being mesmerized by the beautiful costumes worn by the Miao.48 After watching their dances, he decided that an artist needed to do more than simply expose or satirize social ills, and should also be able to praise that which is beautiful. In an attempt to resolve the question of how to portray the grace and beauty of the Miao people, Ye gravitated towards the form known as “national painting.” In contrast to a Westernized style of paint- ing, national painting refers to the use of traditional techniques, such as calligraphy and ink-and-wash. Although Ye had already begun to appro- priate traditional techniques, at this juncture he thus more consciously sought to abandon cartoon and instead employ a native Chinese style. Ye discussed how this shift in his thinking came about:

47 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, p. 143. 48 Ye Qianyu, “Manhua he suxie,” p. 235. 108 chapter two

From that time [his visit to the Miao region], I decided to distance myself from the exaggerated style of the cartoon and find a new technique through which to portray the human figure. I searched and searched, and came to believe that I should make a real effort to study the work of previous genera- tions of traditional artists of national painting. Subsequently, I moved away from making cartoons in the direction of national painting. The sketch was a bridge between the two. Previously, my sketches had served my cartoon- ing. From then on they would start to serve my national paintings. The force of this change made me radically reconsider my aesthetic conceptions of beauty.49 Having already experimented with “national forms” of the cartoon since the outbreak of war, Ye now took yet another step towards establishing his identity as a Chinese artist by studying national painting. Furthermore, Ye imagined his journey to Guizhou as one towards the past and the roots of Chinese culture. As he later recalled in his memoir, such literary classics as The Book of Songs (Shijing 诗经) and Qu Yuan’s 屈原 (340–278 BC) The Songs of Chu (Chuci 楚辞; 3rd cent. BC), widely regarded as authentic representations of the folk, inspired him in his quest.50 Only by becom- ing acquainted with the folk could an artist produce true national art. Like Mu Dan, Ye thus constructed his wartime journeys to the interior as a kind of rural return that served to reconnect him with China’s history and people. Ye’s painting Cockfight (Fig. 2.17, Plate Section) represents his first attempts to produce a form of national painting based on his sketches of the Miao. In this work, Ye abandons the autobiographical focus and the satirical or comic elements found in his earlier wartime sketch-cartoons. Whereas Ye’s sketch-cartoons portray the impact of war on the Chinese nation, in this painting he does not attempt to depict larger wartime reali- ties. Instead, he draws attention to the attractive blue clothing of the Miao villagers and to their local practice of cockfighting. Unlike the strong focus on the eyes and on “conveying the spirit” in his earlier wartime cartoons, in this work the human figures look away from the viewer without con- veying any striking emotion or facial expression. Although Ye claimed that Cockfight was a national painting, he did not employ traditional brush and ink, but instead used watercolors outlined in black ink.51 He also emulated a local practice of the Miao people from

49 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, p. 144. 50 Ibid., p. 142. 51 Ibid. intersections between cartoon and national art 109

Taijiang and used leather paper. Although Ye had eschewed an exagger- ated cartoon style, his sketched rendering of the large hands and feet of his Miao subjects nonetheless closely resembles his earlier cartoons. Ye’s foray into national painting thus involved a diverse combination of car- toon, sketch, watercolor painting, and regional minority art. His biographer Xie Bo described Ye’s early national paintings of the Miao as a “mixture of cooked and uncooked rice” (jiasheng fan 夹生饭), resembling neither mature traditional painting nor Ye’s own earlier satirical cartoons.52 Ye’s designation of this heterogeneous mixture of forms as “national painting” draws attention to the constructedness of the term itself as well as to the ongoing cross-generic and cross-cultural experimentation inspired by his search for national forms and a national art. Despite Ye’s claim to have left cartooning behind, shortly after his visit to Guizhou he returned to Chongqing and made a sketch-cartoon about his experience of living with the Miao titled “In a Miao Village in Guizhou” (Fig. 2.18). In this work, Ye used traditional Chinese ink and placed a seal on the right hand side of the frame. The sketch is split into two zones; the upper part depicts Ye attempting to eat a glutinous rice cake (ciba 糍 粑), a specialty of the southern Miao region. The lower part shows him sketching a local girl. In this work, Ye returned to the autobiographical focus of his earlier sketch-cartoons such as “After Exhaustive Bombing” and his series Escape from Hong Kong. As in these earlier drawings, the artist’s eyes are given special emphasis. In this case, in the upper part he is shown staring at the rice cake in his hand, and in the lower part he peers out inquisitively from behind a tree, while the eyes of the Miao girl are covered by her hands. In this sketch-cartoon Ye also includes an element of metafiction when he depicts himself at work producing his art. The drawing thus reflects his self-consciousness of his shifting role as an artist in wartime society. Having already evolved from an urban cartoonist into a propagandist working for the Nationalist government, then into a reporter and sketch artist recording the countryside at war, Ye now found himself recording the lives and customs of China’s folk minorities. However, the artist in Ye’s drawing appears somewhat out of his element in the Miao country- side, with his moustache, goatee, and Westernized suit. Although he tries

52 Xie Bo 解波, Ye Qianyu zhuan 叶浅予传 (Biography of Ye Qianyu; Changchun: Jilin meishu, 1991), p. 155. In his memoir, Ye uses the same term to describe some of his Chinese paintings. See Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, p. 144. 110 chapter two

Fig. 2.18. Ye Qianyu, “In a Miao Village in Guizhou,” sketch-cartoon produced during his visit to Guizhou in 1942. eating the local food, it gets stuck in his teeth and on his fingers. Similarly, instead of forming a positive relationship with the local people, he ends up only embarrassing his intended subject, a young girl who attempts to hide from him behind a tree. As with the villagers standing with their backs to the sketching artist in Cockfight, the Miao people apparently fail to embrace the visiting artist who has made it his mission to create art about and for them. Ye’s sketch-cartoon thus portrays the gulf that exists between the modern, Westernized intellectual and the folk of the rural countryside, a divide that also mirrors the formal gap between the cartoon and traditional Chinese painting. Apart from combining various genres and incorporating metafictional elements, “In a Miao Village in Guizhou” brings together two temporal frames, each showing a separate activity in which the artist is engaged. In addition, the split drawing depicts a divided subject. The artist portrayed in the upper part of the drawing seems to be peering down on his alter ego in the lower part. Although Ye’s autobiographical cartoons illustrating intersections between cartoon and national art 111 his Escape from Hong Kong treat the self as object of representation, here he explicitly employs multiple temporal and subject positions to depict the self as Other. In his memoir, Ye includes an excerpt of an article that he wrote in 1979 for The Great Earth Supplement (Dadi fukan 大地副刊) of The People’s Daily (Renmin ribao 人民日报). In this essay, Ye states that he created “In a Miao Village in Guizhou” to mark his “official” transition from car- toons to national painting.53 Yet, the existence of this sketch underlines the reality that he failed to make as clean a break from cartooning as he had intended. Ye also produced a series of sketch-cartoons the following year during his trip to India, titled Cartoons of India (Yindu manbi 印度漫 笔; 1943). According to the artist, cartooning had a “fermenting” ( fa jiao 发酵) effect on all his later work. After creating paintings for lengthy peri- ods, he states that he would often feel the urge to return to cartoons.54 As Ye encountered new subjects and attempted to fulfill a variety of different roles as a wartime artist, he became very self-conscious about his formal experimentation and about his role as an artist and cartoonist in Chinese society. In particular, his search for adequate forms to repre- sent the people and events he encountered during his travels made him attuned to the question of the relationship between artistic form and subject. As a result, Ye not only intermixed a variety of forms, but also shuttled back and forth between national art and cartooning. In addition, he employed his hybrid sketch-cartoons for a variety of different aesthetic purposes. While he used the sketch-cartoon to represent wartime realities and to express his own emotional response to the war, he also utilized this newly invented form to reflect metafictionally on the process of artistic creation.

Searching for Roots at Dunhuang

Following his stay in a Miao village in Guizhou in 1942, later that year Ye returned to Chongqing. During this visit, he went to see Zhang Daqian’s exhibition of copies of Tang murals from the Dunhuang caves in Gansu

53 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, p. 144. 54 Ibid., p. 40. See Ye Qianyu, Shinian huangtang meng 十年荒唐梦 (Ten Years of an Absurd Dream; Beijing: Renmin ribao, 1989). Even later in life, after Ye had become well- known for his traditional-style paintings of minority peoples, he continued to practice cartooning, as in his 1993 collection of cartoons about his childhood, “An Old Brush Recalls Childhood” (Laobi yi tongnian 老笔忆童年). 112 chapter two

Province, a series of wall paintings which Zhang had spent a total of two years and seven months producing (Figs. 2.19–2.20, Plate Section). So impressed was he by these works that when Ye traveled to India in 1943 as a wartime correspondent, he stated that he often brought Zhang’s rub- bings to mind when he witnessed Indian dancers performing traditional dances.55 It is not surprising that Ye was reminded of Zhang’s rubbings when he watched Indian women performing native dances, given the Indo- European influences on the Dunhuang murals.56 Located at the historic juncture of the northern and southern Silk Road trade routes, Dunhuang was a major point of cultural interchange between China and the outside world. In particular, Buddhist monks from Persia, India, and other parts of Asia traveled through Dunhuang or spent time there before continuing their journeys to the Chinese capital. After returning from India, Ye continued his travels in Guizhou and Guangxi and produced many sketches of minority people, in particular of women performing regional dances. In addition, Ye made sketches of his wife Dai Ailian. In his sketch “Drum of the Yao People” (Yaoren zhi gu 瑶 人之鼓; 1944; Fig. 2.21, Plate Section), he portrays Dai Ailian performing one of the dances of the Yao minority people in Guangxi. In this work, he draws attention to the fluidity and motion of Dai’s poses and to her headdress and native costume. Following the end of the war, Ye contin- ued to produce many sketches of his wife performing a variety of regional dances; these include “Xinjiang Dance Music” (Xinjiang wuqu 新疆舞曲; 1946) and “Dai Ailian—Tibetan Dance Music” (Dai Ailian Xizang wuqu 戴 爱莲西藏舞曲; 1946).

55 For Ye’s impressions of Zhang Daqian’s exhibition, see Ye Qianyu, “Zhang Daqian linmo bihua huace xu” 张大千临摹壁画画册序 (Preface to Album of Zhang Daqian’s Copies of Wall Art), in Ningxia Huizu zizhiqu zhengxie wenshiliao yanjiu weiyuanhui 宁 夏回族自治区政协文史料研究委员会 (Ningxia Self-governing CCP Consultative Con- ference Research Committee), ed. Zhang Daqian shengping he yishu 张大千生平和艺术 (Zhang Daqian’s Life and Art; Beijing: Zhongguo wenshi, 1988), pp. 43–47. 56 On Indo-European influences on the Dunhuang murals, see Chapter Two, “The Transmission of Picture Recitation through Central Asia,” in Victor H. Mair, Painting and Performance: Chinese Picture Recitation and its Indian Genesis (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1988), pp. 39–54. As René Grousset said: “The culminating point of all these Central-Asiatic influences, with what they contained of Indian traditions or, through Indian Buddhism, of Graeco-Buddhist and Irano-Buddhist traditions, is to be found in Dunhuang.” See René Grousset, Chinese Art and Culture, Haakon Chevalier tr. (New York: Orion, 1959), p. 221. This remark is also cited in Victor H. Mair, T’ang Transformation Texts (Harvard: Council on East Asian Studies, 1989), p. 3. intersections between cartoon and national art 113

In his memoir, Ye recalls that his attraction to traditional painting grew stronger during the latter years of the war following his travels through southwest China. In the fall of 1944, he wrote to Zhang Daqian asking if he could visit and study with him at his home in Chengdu. Zhang agreed, and Ye stayed with him from the Mid-Autumn Festival of 1944 until the Japanese surrender in 1945. According to Ye, during his stay in Chengdu he was joined by others who came to watch Zhang at work: When Daqian worked on his paintings, he liked to have people on the side- lines making chitchat; guests would often come and go. When he painted, he was not afraid of being disturbed. When there were no guests, there would always be students at his side watching him paint and asking questions.57 Ye writes that he learned many techniques from Zhang, including “his method of using brush and ink, his method of layering color, his method of repeating outlines, and his method of applying a wash with underly- ing layers” (用笔用墨之法, 层层着色之法, 重复勾线之法, 衬底渲染 之法).58 Attempting to apply these newly learned techniques, Ye used his completed sketches of dancers in India as the basis for national paintings. His first painting of an Indian dancer, titled Indian Dance (Fig. 2.22, Plate Section), was based on a sketch of women performing a Buddhist “Dance of the Offering of Flowers” (xianhua wu 献花舞) at the Indian Interna- tional University in Delhi to commemorate Bengali poet, philosopher, and Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941). In contrast to his use of watercolor in his earlier national paintings, here Ye employs oils to create a smooth coat of aqua blue, which he layers with a slightly darker shade to depict the shadows falling on the dancer’s robe as she moves. While Ye’s painting was based on his sketch of an Indian Dancer, it also employs Zhang’s copies as a model. In particular, Ye’s use of black ink to outline the dancer’s garment and delineate its folds and layers resembles the flowing lines of the robes worn by Zhang’s dancers. Several years later, in 1948, Ye completed another painting based on the same sketch, titled Indian Dance Pose (Fig. 2.23, Plate Section).59 This time,

57 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, p. 162. For a more in-depth discussion of Zhang Daqian and his influence on Ye, see Ye Qianyu, “Zhang Daqian de yishu daolu” 张大千的 艺术道路 (Zhang Daqian’s Artistic Path), in Ye Qianyu, Hua yu lunyi, pp. 33–41. On Ye’s visit to Zhang Daqian, see Yang Jiren 杨继仁, Zhang Daqian zhuan 张大千传 (Biography of Zhang Daqian), 2 vols. (Beijing: Wenhua yishu, 1985), I: 420–24. 58 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, p. 162. 59 For more of Ye’s drawings of dancing women, see Ye Qianyu, Renwu huaji 人物画集 (A Collection of Figure Portraits; Beijing: Renmin meishu, 1981) and Ye Qianyu, Ye Qianyu huaxuan 叶浅予画选 (A Selection of Ye Qianyu’s Drawings; Beijing: Renmin meishu, 114 chapter two

Ye used chartreuse for the dancer’s costume, with the border rendered in olive green. He chose a darker color for her skin and added details such as additional bracelets worn on her arm. In 1949, Ye finished a further painting based on his sketches of Indian women performing the flower- offering dance, titled Dance of the Offering of Flowers (Fig. 2.24, Plate Section).60 In this work, Ye painted the dancer’s robe in blue and white and colored her blouse beige. His skillful brushwork and delicate layering of color brilliantly conveys the flowing motion of the dancer and the light, translucent texture of her blouse. Yet, despite the lifelike appearance of the dancer, Ye’s repeated use of the same sketch to produce different paintings reflected his new focus on copying models. While Ye was quick to affirm that he learned many techniques from watching Zhang at work, he also emphasized that both artists studied from each other during his stay. In his memoir, Ye recorded Zhang’s inter- est in his sketches and paintings of India: Sometimes I would close the door to paint my Indian dancing figures and ask Daqian for advice. However, Daqian also borrowed drafts of my paint- ings and used his own Dunhuang model of painting to portray Daqian- style Indian Dancers. He would explain the inspiration for these drawings through the inscriptions he placed on them. Without a doubt, this was a real encouragement to me.61 Zhang’s painting titled (like Ye’s own) Dance of the Offering of Flowers (Fig. 2.25, Plate Section) is an example of his “Daqian-style Indian danc- ers” based on Ye’s sketch and paintings of Indian women performing this particular dance. In his rendition of the Indian dancer, Zhang uses beige as the predominant color and adds a floral border to the dancer’s dress. Following the practice in traditional Chinese painting of combining art

1986). For Ye’s drawings of minority women accompanied by analysis, see Ye Gang 叶冈, Qianyu huazhuan 浅予画传 (An Illustrated Biography of Ye Qianyu; Shanghai: Shanghai shuhua, 1999). 60 Ye Qianyu’s inscription on this painting was not added until many years later fol- lowing the end of the Cultural Revolution. It reads: “Liu Xiaoying, the former preserver of this old work made 33 years ago, saved it during the [years of] calamity [of the Cultural Revolution] by removing my signature and thus was able to preserve it. Today I reinscribe it. Fall, 1981. Recorded by Qianyu” (此三十三年前旧作原藏者梁小莺在浩劫中挖去名 款得以保存今补题之一九八一秋浅予记). For the painting and inscription, see Zhang Tianman 张天漫, Ye Qianyu 叶浅予 (Beijing: Hebei jiaoyu, 2000), p. 104. Following the border dispute between India and China in 1962, the painting was misrepresented as an attempt by Ye to curry favor with the enemy. As a result, it was hidden by Liu Xiaoying throughout the 1960s and 1970s. 61 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, p. 162. intersections between cartoon and national art 115 with calligraphy or poetry, Zhang added an inscription explaining the origin of the painting: The Indian International University commemorated Tagore by, for example, performing a dance of the presenting of flowers. The dancers’ postures were graceful and subdued, beautiful but not seductive, perhaps resembling what was called the “Dance of the [Sixteen Female] Demons.”62 The reason that their hands and feet were dyed red was that the 80 manifestations of Bud- dha all had copper-colored hands and feet. If we look at the Buddhist paint- ings by artists of the Northern Wei in the Mogao Cave [at Dunhuang], we can sometimes still see images like this. I happened to see my friend Ye Qianyu’s painting of this dance, so I created this record. 印度国际大学纪念泰戈尔, 诸如生为献花之舞, 姿态婉约, 艳而不佻, 迨所谓天魔舞也耶。其手足皆敷殷红, 则缘如来八十种随好手足亦 铜色也。观莫高窟北魏人画佛, 犹时有亦现此相者。偶见吾友叶浅 予作此, 漫效之并记。63 Whereas Ye was reminded of Zhang’s versions of Dunhuang wall art when he was living in India and working as a reporter, conversely Zhang recalled the dancers on the Dunhuang murals when he looked at Ye’s drawings. Zhang’s inscription once again highlights the cultural linkages between Dunhuang art and Indian Buddhist rituals and draws attention to the col- laboration between the two artists. In these paintings from the latter years of the war and the early postwar period, Ye and Zhang created new hybrid forms of the sketch amalga­ mated with techniques drawn from traditional painting and containing resonances of Buddhist Dunhuang artwork. Their paintings thus crossed the boundaries between Indian, Chinese, and Western culture. Whereas Ye initially studied national painting in an attempt to move closer to the folk and to the roots of Chinese culture, he somewhat paradoxically ended up using elite literati painting and Indian Buddhist artwork as models for his work. Compared to his earlier cartoons and sketch-cartoons in which he attempted to promote patriotism and record the nation at war, these later paintings are indicative of a shift inward in search of new directions as an artist. This transition is in turn reflected in the meditative appearance and closed eyes of his dancers, in contrast to the large, expressive car- toonized eyes of the figures in his earlier sketch-cartoons.

62 A Buddhist ritual dance. For more information on the “Dance of the Sixteen Female Demons,” see “Shiliu tianmo wu” 十六天魔舞 (Sixteen Demon Dance), accessed June 12, 2011, http://www.hudong.com/wiki/%E3%80%8A%E5%8D%81%E5%85%AD%E5%A4 %A9%E9%AD%94%E8%88%9E%E3%80%8B. 63 For a transcription of the inscription, see Zhang Tianman, Ye Qianyu, p. 105. 116 chapter two

Painting a Beard with a Beard

In addition to using his sketches of Indian dancers as the basis for several paintings, Ye made a series of six sketch-cartoons depicting Zhang Daqian at work painting, titled Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian, which he finished during the summer of 1945. Like Escape from Hong Kong, this sequence resembles a series of linked pictures. However, rather than functioning as a kind of reportage on wartime occupation, Six Portraits of Zhang Daq- ian portrays the artist at various stages of producing his artwork. After Ye completed the series, Zhang Daqian invited his friend and calligrapher Feng Ruofei 冯若飞 to add poetry inscriptions to Ye’s works in Septem- ber of 1945. Shortly thereafter Zhang also asked traditional landscape painter and calligrapher Xie Zhiliu 谢稚柳 (1910–97) to place an addi- tional inscription on Ye’s sketch-cartoon “Comprehensive Scene within Four Meters” (Zhang’er tongjing 丈二通景).64 The first drawing in Ye’s series, “Large Painting Table” (Da hua’an 大画案; Fig. 2.26), portrays Zhang at work as he prepares to begin a new paint- ing. Compared to Ye’s previous sketch-cartoons, “Large Painting Table” is apparently even more sinicized. While it incorporates two seals and a calligraphy inscription, it also depicts the implements used in creating traditional painting. Ye draws attention to the various tools Zhang uses in creating his artwork, including ink, water, and scrolls. In contrast to the small sketchpad depicted in “In a Miao Village in Guizhou,” in this draw- ing the figure of Zhang Daqian is dwarfed by his painting table. Likewise, Feng’s inscription emphasizes the contrast between the painting table and the small ink-stone and brushes that Daqian uses. It reads: “Large painting table, huge beard, so big that there is nothing outside it; small as a mustard seed, movement without any obstacle, great freedom achieved” (大画案, 大胡子, 大无外; 小若芥, 运用无碍, 大自在). Another sketch-cartoon from Ye’s series, titled “Painting a Beard with a Beard” (Huzi hua huzi 胡 子画胡子; Fig. 2.27), depicts Zhang in front of a scroll and ink-stone. However, instead of using a brush, he utilizes his beard to create a painting of a traditional scholar with long hair tied back. As with the dancing Indian women in Ye and Zhang’s paintings, here the artist’s eyes are closed in a kind of meditative state as he paints. Feng’s inscription reads: “The man with the beautiful sideburns and beard is painting a 6-foot figure within a 3-foot frame. Using his beard as

64 Li Yongqiao 李永翘, Zhang Daqian quanzhuan 张大千全传 (The Complete Biogra- phy of Zhang Daqian), 2 vols. (Guangzhou: Huacheng, 1998), I: 264-65. intersections between cartoon and national art 117

Fig. 2.26. Ye Qianyu, “Large Painting Table,” from his 1945 sketch-cartoon series Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian. a reference point for painting, he well knows how to proceed” (美髯公, 络腮胡, 三尺画, 六尺躯, 以胡较画知何如). Reminiscent of Maurits Cornelis Escher’s (1898–1972) famous post- World War II lithograph, “Drawing Hands” (1948; Fig. 2.28), “Painting a Beard with a Beard” refers to the recursive nature of artistic production. However, whereas the hands in Escher’s drawing succeed in creating equally lifelike hands that in turn continue the process of artistic produc- tion, Zhang uses his beard as a model or “reference point” for his 3-foot painting. While Escher’s hands implicitly raise the question of whether art imitates life or life imitates art, Ye’s sketch-cartoon focuses on the way in which art is produced through an iterative process involving copying models. In a similar fashion, Ye’s own works from the latter part of the war reflect his decision to “learn from previous generations of traditional artists.” While Ye’s paintings of Indian women were inspired in part by Zhang’s copies of Buddhist wall art, this sketch-cartoon also reflects the influence of Zhang’s work in its portrayal of the flowing lines of Zhang Daqian’s robe. In “Comprehensive Scene within Four Meters” (Fig. 2.29), Ye again por- trays Zhang Daqian at work, this time on a 4-meter landscape painting of a lotus flower, titled Lotus Flower (He hua 荷花), which he completed in Chengdu’s Zhaojue Temple 昭觉寺 several days prior to the end of the war. In this work, Ye includes an autobiographical element, depict- ing himself standing at left next to a Buddhist monk while two students help Zhang carry his water and ink-stone. Here, he portrays the process 118 chapter two Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian. B eard,” from B eard with a Fig. 2.27. Ye Qianyu, “Painting a intersections between cartoon and national art 119

Fig. 2.28. Maurits Cornelis Escher, 1948 lithograph, “Drawing Hands.” of painting as a social activity in which students (like Ye) from different walks of life come to watch the master at work and to learn from him as he paints. Likewise, Ye’s sketch-cartoon is the product of his collaboration not only with Zhang Daqian, but also with Feng Ruolan and Xie Zhiliu, who added inscriptions to the work. The outer inscription by Xie Zhiliu reads: Zhang Daqian bends down to the ground and paints a 4-meter landscape screen. On the left, holding his water-container, is his female student, Shide, and on his right, bending and holding out his ink-stone is his male student, Luoluo. With his hands in his sleeves, watching from the side, is the abbot of the Zhaojue Temple, Konghui. With his eyes wide open and his hands in his pockets is the creator of this drawing, Ye Qianyu. 大千伏地写莲花丈二通景屏, 其左持水盂者为其女弟子拾得, 右鞠躬 捧研者其男弟子罗罗, 袖手旁观昭觉寺方丈空慧, 张目决眦两手插裤 袋则制图者叶浅予也. Feng Ruolan added a second inscription inside of Xie’s, a quatrain which reads: “A comprehensive scene captured in four meters, thousands of acres of lotus flowers; Like catching a large fish in the Shinobazu Pond, or gazing into Jade Well on the summit of Mt. Taihua. Looking at the Jade Well” (丈二通景, 荷花万顷, 不忍池中捉大鱼, 太华峰头看玉井). 120 chapter two

Fig. 2.29. Ye Qianyu, “Comprehensive Scene within Four Meters,” from Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian.

Feng’s inscription contains an allusion to Han Yu’s 韩愈 (768–824) poem “Ancient Meaning” (Gu yi 古意; 802). In this poem, Han Yu describes a 20-meter lotus root in a jade well at the top of Mount Taihua, a plant that he longs to find: On the peak of Mt. Taihua sits a lotus in a jade well; When the flower opens it is 20 meters long, with roots as big as a boat. It is colder than snow or frost, and sweeter than honey; If a single piece enters the mouth, it can cure any illness. I yearn to find it and don’t fear the great distance to travel, But there are no roads through the blue-green walls of the mountain and it is hard to make one’s way. Where can I find a tall ladder and order to ascend and pluck the seeds, And plant them in the waters of the south so their roots will intertwine. intersections between cartoon and national art 121

太华峰头玉井莲, 开花十丈藕如船。冷比雪霜甘比蜜, 一片入口沉痾痊。我欲求之不惮远, 青壁无路难夤缘。 安得长梯上摘实, 下种七泽根株连。65 In traditional culture, the lotus flower is viewed as a symbol of purity because while it rises from the mud, it remains pristine and unsoiled. By focusing on the lotus, Han Yu expresses his yearning for freedom from worldly affairs and corruption, and the jade well at the top of Mt. Taihua also connotes purity and truth. Through his reference to Han Yu’s poem, Feng Ruolan’s inscription draws attention to the size of Zhang’s painting by implicitly comparing it to the 20-meter-long lotus described in “Ancient Meaning.” Feng Ruolan also alludes to themes of aesthetic transcendence found in Han Yu’s poem. More generally, the theme of peace is readily associated with the reference to the lotus flower, since the word lotus (he 荷) sounds like the character for harmony (he 和). In addition, Feng’s reference to the Shinobazu Pond in Ueno Park in Tokyo, Japan, refers to a calligraphy inscription Zhang added to his painting Lotus Flower shortly after the Chinese victory of the war. In this inscription, Zhang wrote “Shinobazu Pond is in Tokyo. The lotus flow- ers there are most abundant. In the past, I lived in that country and enjoyed boating and viewing flowers many times” (不忍池在东京, 荷花最盛,昔 居是邦, 数数赏花泛舟).66 Having studied in Tokyo during his univer- sity days, Zhang frequently visited Shinobazu Pond, a beautiful pool filled with lotuses, which he brought to mind when he completed his painting of a lotus. Like Feng’s inscription, Zhang’s painting of a lotus and added callig- raphy express themes of peace associated with the ending of the War of Resistance. In fact, Zhang was very fond of lotuses and over the course of his career produced hundreds of paintings of these flowers. In part, his affinity for them was an outgrowth of his interest in Buddhism. While the lotus flower is a symbol of purity and peace in China, it is also associated with the Buddha, and statues of the Buddha are often placed on a bed of lotus known as a lotus throne. Compared to Ye’s early wartime cartoons portraying soldiers and the effects of bombing, “Comprehensive Scene within Four Meters” is

65 Han Yu, “Gu yi,” in Qu Shouyuan 屈守元 and Chang Sichun 常思春, eds., Han Yu quanji jiaozhu 韩愈全集校注 (The Complete Works of Han Yu with Comparative Annota- tion), 5 vols. (Chengdu: Sichuan daxue, 1996), I: 115. 66 See Wang Jiacheng 王家诚, Zhang Daqian zhuan 张大千传 (The Biography of Zhang Daqian; Tianjin: Baihua wenyi, 2008), p. 224. 122 chapter two emblematic of a shift in his work from wartime heroics towards more self-reflexive and philosophical themes. In this regard, Ye resembles Mu Dan and many other wartime writers and artists who experienced disil- lusionment during the latter years of the protracted war against Japan. If Ye’s cartoon “Abandon the Civilian Life, Join the Army” can be interpreted as a reflection of the artist who leaves his civilian life behind in order to promote the cause of resistance, then the artist depicted in “Compre- hensive Scene within Four Meters” as a keen student of Zhang Daqian’s Buddhist-inspired art at the Zhaojue Temple, suggests a very different role for the artist in wartime. In addition, Ye’s representation of himself in this drawing differs from his self-portrait in the sketch-cartoons from Escape from Hong Kong or Wartime Chongqing. Rather than portraying himself as a player in larger historical events, such as the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, here the artist appears to be engaged in a search for spiritual refuge and the transcendence of wartime strife through reconnection to pre-modern artistic traditions. In addition to conveying Buddhist themes of peace, “Comprehensive Scene within Four Meters” self-referentially focuses on the process of artistic production. In some respects, the self-consciousness of this draw- ing echoes “In a Miao Village in Guizhou,” which provides a metafictional representation of the cartoonist at work. However, rather than making art about and for the people like the cartoonist in this work, here the cartoonist is depicted as part of a community of other artists. Instead of sketching scenes from everyday life, he is focused on learning and copying Zhang Daqian’s techniques. The change in Ye’s self-representation mirrors his own shift towards studying traditional painting and thereby situating his artwork within a recursive tradition of Chinese art. This new focus is also reflected in the intertextuality of Ye’s drawing, which contains two calligraphic inscriptions and refers both to Han Yu’s poem and Zhang’s painting of a lotus, as well as to Buddhist themes of peace and harmony associated with the lotus flower. However, even though Ye took on a new direction in his own career as an artist through studying traditional art, he did not entirely turn his back on his earlier efforts to support the cause of national salvation. Rather he continued to seek rapprochement with the national collective—although he envisioned the nation as a composite of cultural traditions preserved in the collective memory. To Ye’s way of thinking, traditional art and poetry, including classics like The Book of Songs, dealt with the lives of the com- mon people. Thus, by borrowing from traditional forms embedded in intersections between cartoon and national art 123 the collective memory, he sought to bring his own work into closer align- ment with the history of the Chinese nation and its people. Moreover, Ye’s decision to create national art was framed as a rejection of the Western cartoon, which he found inappropriate to portray the “natural and simple beauty” of the Miao. Through abandoning the cartoon and the detached critical perspective of the satirist, Ye sought yet another means of bridging the distance between himself and the common people. Ye’s wartime experiments with national art and the sinicized cartoon reflect his complex and ambivalent relationship to the national collective. Even though Ye envisioned himself producing national artwork about and for the folk, his intertextual works from the latter war period were not readily accessible to the masses and brought together an eclectic mix of native and foreign influences. As in the case of Mu Dan’s poems, Ye’s art- work thus breaks down the either/or binarism of nationalist discourse. Rather than simply conceiving of himself as a wartime propagandist, he attempted to fulfill other roles as satirist and wartime reporter, and frequently used his work as a vehicle for lyric self-expression. Moreover, his understanding of the national was expressed in a variety of ways. Although, particularly at the beginning of the war, he saw the nation as coterminous with the Chinese masses, he also conceived of the national in terms of cultural forms. In addition, in his sketch-cartoons in Escape from Hong Kong, Ye treated the self as a synecdoche for the nation, as “a body that feels history both physically and emotionally.” Ye’s experiments in search of the authentic sinicized cartoon thus draw attention to the con- structedness of “national art,” and to the plurality of the different forms that he designated as national. Apart from breaking down the either/or binary of Nationalist discourse, Ye crossed a variety of other cultural divides in his wartime works. While he envisioned his sketches as serving as a “bridge” between cartoons and national art, he also created linkages between tradition and modernity, high and low art, and the self and the nation. In addition, Ye’s artwork traversed geographic borders through his combination of regional folk art, the sketch, Dunhuang Buddhist art, traditional ink and brushwork, and cartooning. Like Mu Dan, Ye’s wartime artistic journey led him in direc- tions he had not initially foreseen when he set out with high hopes of a swift victory at the beginning of the war. Nevertheless, both these artists helped expand not only the aesthetic scope of Chinese modernism, but also its geographic boundaries far beyond the Westernized semi-colonial cities of Shanghai, Tianjin, and Beijing.

CHAPTER THREE

WANG ZENGQI’S COLLECTION OF CHANCE ENCOUNTERS: THE SHIFTING ESSENCE OF THE WARTIME SHORT STORY

The short story is a mode of deep thought, a form of emotion; it is a mani- festation of human wisdom.1 We envision a new kind of art in the future that can contain everything, but does not reproduce the form of anything. It is also completely different from film; its name is the short story.2 Just as the “bombing of lyricism” and the exigencies of wartime dis- placement served as the impetus for formal innovations in poetry and the cartoon, so too the chaotic realities of war inspired fiction writers to experiment with form. In particular, during the latter years of the war, many writers theorized about the inadequacy of neatly linear plots and heroic master narratives. In her 1944 essay, “Writing of One’s Own” (Ziji de wenzhang 自己的文章), Eileen Chang criticized what she referred to as “the classicist manner” of fiction in which “good and evil, spirit and flesh, are always posed against each other in stark conflict.”3 She added: “I think the theory that a literary work needs a main theme could do with some revision.” Instead, she proposed that, “In writing fiction, one ought to have a story. It is better to let that story speak for itself than fabricating a plot in order to fit a certain theme.”4 Eileen Chang’s distaste for overly developed plots was shared by many other wartime writers. In “Recollecting Meiji Literature” (Mingzhi wenxue zhi zhui yi 明治文学之追忆; 1945), Zhou Zuoren expressed similar sentiments: To tell the truth, I don’t really like fiction, or maybe it’s just because I don’t understand that I don’t like it. I am not certain. When I read fiction, I read it as an essay. Therefore, there is some fiction that is not really like fiction, which I like a lot, short stories in the style of casual jottings [suibi 随笔].

1 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 31. 2 Ibid., p. 29. 3 Eileen Chang, “Writing of One’s Own,” p. 19; Zhang Ailing, “Ziji de wenzhang,” p. 286. 4 Ibid. 126 chapter three

Stories that have structure and a climax and seem like something created according to an American model, to the contrary, just make me impatient.5 To take the place of a contrived plot structure produced according to an “American model,” Zhou suggested a looser essay structure and opted for a style—more familiar to Chinese readers based on “casual jottings.” Like the wartime poets, writers were also keen to promote the “essayiza- tion” (sanwenhua 散文化) of fiction.6 As well as adopting elements of the essay, they argued that fiction should also borrow from other genres. For example, as discussed in the introduction, Shen Congwen urged that fiction should adopt elements drawn from poetry, painting, music, and the essay. Like Shen Congwen, his teacher at Lianda, Wang Zengqi argued that the short story should draw on other genres. In “The Essence of the Short Story,” Wang wrote, “At least we hope that the short story can assimilate the particular strengths of poetry, drama, essay, and still be what it should be, a short story.”7 Wang claimed that the short story was particularly amenable to such cross-generic experimentation because as Chinese writ- ers had not previously placed a high value on the short story, it lacked rig- idly defined aesthetic boundaries.8 Moreover, Wang apparently found the loose form of the short story better suited to portraying chaotic wartime realities as compared to the sustained narrative required by the novel. In his first collection of short stories, Collection of Chance Encounters (1949), Wang sought to experiment with and expand the generic bound- aries of the short story.9 In this collection, he included eight of his stories from the wartime and postwar periods: “Revenge” (Fuchou 复仇; 1944), “Old Lu” (Lao Lu 老鲁; 1945), “Artists” (Yishujia 艺术家; 1948), “Carpenter Dai” (Dai chejiang 戴车匠; 1947), “Down and Out” (Luopo 落魄; 1947) “Convicts” (Qiufan 囚犯; 1947), “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” (Jiya mingjia 鸡鸭名家; 1947), and “Chance Encounter” (Xie hou 邂逅; 1948). In each of these stories, Wang’s I-narrator has a “chance encounter” with a variety of Others, including a Buddhist monk, a former soldier, a dumb

5 Zhou Zuoren, “Mingzhi wenxue zhi zhui yi,” in Qian Liqun, ed., Ershi shiji Zhongguo xiaoshuo lilun ziliao, pp. 362–63. 6 Wartime writer’s advocation of the need for sanwenhua also parallels the “prosifica- tion” or “essayization” of wartime poetry, though in this case the only logical translation of sanwenhua is “essayization.” 7 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 29. 8 Ibid., p. 28. 9 Wang Zengqi, Xie hou ji 邂逅集 (Collection of Chance Encounters; Shanghai: Wen- hua shenghuo, 1949). the shifting essence of the wartime short story 127 artist, a carpenter, a group of convicts, two men from his native region of Gaoyou, and a blind performer and his daughter. According to Wang, the name of the collection was intended to reflect both the I-narrator’s varied experiences and also, more generally, the accidental, chance nature of lit- erary inspiration. He wrote: “The subjects of my stories have been mostly happened upon quite unexpectedly. Thus I titled my first collection of stories Collection of Chance Encounters.”10 More broadly, the title reflects Wang’s view of life as “scattered” and “filled with coincidence,” rather than “organized in a clear progression.”11 Indeed, Wang’s own life during the War of Resistance and the subsequent Chinese Civil War was characterized by displacement and was “filled with coincidence.” Unlike Mu Dan, he did not travel to Kunming on foot with the Lianda students and faculty. At the outbreak of war, Wang was a high school student, and when Japanese troops occupied his native region of Gaoyou in Jiangsu, he fled to a nearby Buddhist monastery where he hid out for six months. Then in 1939, he made the journey to Kunming via Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Vietnam and subsequently enrolled at Lianda, where he studied with Shen Congwen and majored in Chinese literature. After leaving the university in 1944, Wang taught for two years at a middle school in the Kunming suburbs, before returning home for a brief visit in 1946. Next, he traveled to Shanghai, where he taught for two years prior to moving to Beijing in the spring of 1948. While for Wang the war years were full of unexpected travel and chance encounters, his literary background also represented an eclectic melding of Chinese and Western influences. Describing his college years, he wrote: “I studied in the Chinese Literature Department, but I spent most of my time reading translated foreign novels.”12 The foreign writers whom Wang cites as influences include André Gide (1869–1951), Virginia Woolf, Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–80), Anton Chekhov (1860–1904), Premio Azorin (pseudonym for José Augusto Trinidad Martínez Ruíz; 1873–1967), Marcel Proust (1871–1922), Ivan Turgenev (1818–83), and Rainer Maria Rilke.13 Although Wang draws attention to the impact of foreign writers on his work, his literary training was steeped as well in traditional aesthetics.

10 Wang Zengqi, “Wang Zengqi duanpian xiaoshuo xuan, zixu” 汪曾祺短篇小说选自序 (Preface to Selected Short Stories of Wang Zengqi), in Wang Zengqi quanji, III: 166. 11 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 22. 12 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen” 自报家门 (Self-Introduction), in Wang Zengqi quanji, IV: 286. 13 Ibid., p. 288. 128 chapter three

In addition to majoring in Chinese literature at Lianda, Wang recalls copy- ing Song dynasty song lyrics and reading traditional Chinese essays as a youth. Moreover, his stories are inspired by a variety of native Chinese sources, including the ancient philosophical treatise Zhuangzi 庄子 (4th cent. B.C.), the poetry and essays of Su Shi, the poetry of Du Fu 杜甫 (712– 70), the fiction of Shen Congwen, Lu Xun, and Fei Ming, and the essays of Ming dynasty scholar Gui Youguang 归有光 (1506–71). Wang’s exposure to a heterogeneous mix of influences—Eastern and Western, traditional and modern—parallels the path taken by his teacher Shen Congwen. Shen’s fiction was shaped by both Western writers and thinkers—such as James Joyce (1882–1941), Sigmund Freud (1856–1953), Chekhov, Alphonse Daudet (1840–97), Maxim Gorky (1868–1936), Guy de Maupassant (1850–93), Turgenev, William Shakespeare (1564–1616), and Gide—as well as by native influences, including vernacular novels of the Ming and Qing dynasties, Zhuangzi, Sima Qian’s (司马迁; 145–86) Records of the Historian (Shiji 史记), and the traditional poetry of Tao Yuanming.14 More generally, Wang’s fiction resembles the prewar work of other neo-traditionalist Beijing School writers discussed in the introduc- tion, such as Zhou Zuoren and Fei Ming, who sought to find “modernity in tradition” and “tradition in modernity.”15 Exposed to these manifold cur- rents, Wang’s stories embrace an unusually wide variety of genres, includ- ing poetry, the essay, drama, music, painting, “native-soil” fiction, and the popular martial arts story. Moreover, his literary language is very fluid and borrows from traditional aesthetics, Western modernism, and regional dialects. The aesthetic looseness and essay-like qualities of Wang’s war- time short stories has parallels to other modernist stories written during the war by such writers as Lu Ling 路翎 (1923–94), Bian Zhilin, Duanmu Hongliang 端木蕻良 (1912–96), Xiao Hong, Shen Congwen, Eileen Chang, and Shi Tuo.16

14 See Jeffrey Kinkley’s discussion of Shen’s literary influences in his Imperfect Paradise (Honolulu: Hawaii University Press, 1995), p. 3. 15 These terms are borrowed from Shu-mei Shih’s analysis of Fei Ming’s writings in her Lure of the Modern, p. 192. 16 For an analysis of the formal experiments undertaken by Lu Ling, Bian Zhilin, Duanmu Hongliang, Xiao Hong, Shen Congwen, and Eileen Chang on the wartime short story during the 1940s, see Qian Liqun, ed., Duihua yu manyou: sishi niandai xiaoshuo yan- jiu 对话与漫游四十年代小说研究 (Dialogue and Roaming: Research on Fiction from the Forties; Shanghai: Shanghaiwenyi, 1999). For a discussion of Shi Tuo’s stories, see Ste- ven Day, “Heroes without a Battlefield,” pp. 77–121; and Steven Day, “Shi Tuo,” in Thomas Moran, ed., Chinese Fiction Writers 1900–1949 (Farmington Hills: Thomson Gale, 2006), the shifting essence of the wartime short story 129

In this chapter, I provide a close reading of four of Wang’s stories from his Collection of Chance Encounters: “Revenge,” “Old Lu,” “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck,” and “Chance Encounter.” The discussion follows a chronological order, beginning with “Revenge,” which Wang wrote in 1944, and ending with “Chance Encounter,” which he wrote after the war in 1948. Analyzing Wang’s stories in dialogue with his postwar essay “The Essence of the Short Story” and several of his essays from the post-Mao period, I chart the development of his modernist style over the course of the war period. Moving away from an overtly Western modernist style focused on interiority in his early stories, in the postwar period Wang began to write about common people and draw from regional language and colloquialisms. He also became increasingly critical in his appropria- tion of Western modernism, as is evident in his discussion of Virginia Woolf ’s 1924 modernist manifesto “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown” in “The Essence of the Short Story.” Nonetheless, despite this shift in focus, all Wang’s short stories embody a diverse array of native and Western influences. In “Revenge,” he reworks the conventional martial arts story into a philosophical meditation on the meaning of wartime violence, drawing on both Daoist and Freudian thought. “Old Lu” is written in the tradition of Lu Xun’s realist short sto- ries about the oppressed Other—although compared to Lu Xun’s highly crafted plot structures, Wang employs a looser, essay-like style. “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” represents Wang’s take on the native- soil genre; he employs stream-of-consciousness narration to reveal how the land is reinvented in the psyche of his displaced narrator. Lastly, I argue that “Chance Encounter” can be interpreted as Wang’s rewriting of Woolf ’s essay “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown,” in which he adapts the train metaphor, applied by Woolf to fiction, to a ferry journey taken by a writer returning to his native region.

Encounter with the Intimate Enemy

It is abundantly clear that the short story cannot be detached from poetry. A short story writer is truly someone who has fallen down from the heav- ens. Once he has fallen into the red dust, fallen from grace to the world of man, he is thrust into the constant struggle between clear skies and the

p. 209. For analysis of Lu Ling’s short stories, see Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front, pp. 107–28. 130 chapter three

muddy soil beneath. He is profoundly aware that man lives in the midst of mediocrity, pettiness, and sin. However, because he knows that there is still a heaven above, he doesn’t give up and die, and he believes it is not a lie to say that there are many good things still to be had. What man truly wants is poetry. A true writer of short stories is a poet.17 In 1942, the poet Bian Zhilin published his translation of Rainer Marie Rilke’s Die Weise von Liebe und Tod des Cornets Christoph Rilke (The Lay of the Love and Death of Cornet Christopher Rilke; 1899) into Chinese as Flag- bearer Christopher Rilke’s Song of Love and Death (Qishou Kelisituofu Li’erke de ai yu si zhi ge 旗手克里斯托弗里尔克的爱与死之歌) for a special edition of the Lianda student journal, Literary Gatherings. In the same issue, Bian also contributed an essay discussing his translation of Rilke’s prose-poem about the young squire Rilke, who dies an heroic death fight- ing as a standard-bearer in the Austrian army battling the Turkish inva- sion of Hungary. In his essay, Bian claimed that Rilke’s work exemplified the ideal of modern fiction in its incorporation of elements of poetry, the short story, epic, and film. Describing the filmic quality of Rilke’s prose- poem, Bian wrote: Although The Love and Death of the Flag-bearer [Qishou de ai yu si 旗手 的爱与死] is not the same as a film, yet it unfolds scene by scene, eliding transitions. This is a general trend that ought to be reflected in the writing of the modern short story and the composition of lyric poetry—because, espe- cially now after everyone has been primed up by watching films, if a writer provides too many unnecessary connections, it’s perceived as an impedi- ment and makes people impatient.18 For the Lianda academics, Rilke’s prose-poem—which developed “scene by scene” and eschewed “unnecessary connections”—embodied a new, imagistic way of writing fiction that favored the expression of lyricism. In addition, Bian praised Rilke’s piece for its un-heroic and anti-fascist portrayal of violence: Here Rilke merely encourages us to live a full life; it has nothing to do with any “isms,” nor does he blindly praise violence as fascists tend to do. Yet the beauty he portrays is filled with blood and flesh, with action, with power- fully realized images of love and death. Given this fact, I would recommend

17 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” pp. 28–29. 18 Bian Zhilin, “Fu’er de Hengli di san he Li’erke de Qishou” 福尔的亨利第三和里尔 克的棋手 (Paul Forte’s Henry the Third and Rilke’s Flag-bearer), Wenju 文聚 (Literary Gatherings; Kunming: Wenjushe, November 14, 1942); reprinted in Bian Zhilin wenji 卞之 琳文集 (Collected Works of Bian Zhilin; Hefei: Anhui jiaoyu, 2002), pp. 472–73. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 131

it to Nazi troops if they have the opportunity to read it; maybe then Flag- bearer would become popular again.19 Like others at Lianda, Wang Zengqi was impressed by Bian’s translation of Rilke.20 In “The Essence of the Short Story,” Wang recalls that after reading it, he stood up in the middle of his teacher Shen Congwen’s class and shouted: “An ideal short story ought to be written like The Love and Death of the Flag-bearer!”21 Shortly afterwards, he wrote an essay for Shen Congwen titled “The Ideal Short Story,” in which he argued that Rilke’s prose-poem embodied the epitome of fiction-writing.22 In “The Essence of the Short Story,” Wang reiterated this view, and praised Rilke for his formal experiment in crossing literary divisions between the short story and poetry. Yet at the same time, he also claimed that Rilke’s poem lacked the “spontaneity,” “depth,” and “beauty” of the essay form.23 Two years later, in 1944, Wang wrote his own unconventional story about a wandering knight, “Revenge.”24 In this work, he sought to outdo Rilke’s formal experimentation by infusing elements of not only poetry and fiction, but also of the essay form into the story. As Wang comments in his 1982 preface to Selected Short Stories of Wang Zengqi (Wang Zengqi duanpian xiaoshuo xuan 汪曾祺短篇小说选): “When I was young, I wanted to break down the boundaries between the short story, essay, and poetry. ‘Revenge’ was an experiment that attempted to attain this goal.”25 In 1946, “Revenge” was published in Literary Renaissance (Wenyi fuxing 文艺复兴), and it later appeared as the first story in Collection of Chance Encounters. Wang had written an earlier version of “Revenge” in

19 Ibid., p. 483. 20 For an analysis of the impact of Bian’s translation on Wang’s short stories, see Yao Dan, Xinan Lianda lishi qingjing zhong de wenxue huodong, pp. 292–93. In his 1944 post- script to Wu Zixu 伍子胥, Feng Zhi singles out Rilke’s prose-poem as the chief inspiration for this work. See Feng Zhi quanji, III: 426–27. Also, Feng Zhi’s daughter Feng Yaoping recalls that her father was deeply moved after reading Bian’s translation, and subsequently wrote Wu Zixu. See Feng Yaoping 冯姚平, “Xindi de reliu” 心底的热流 (A Stream of Warmth from the Bottom of my Heart), accessed June 7, 2011, http://culture.163.com/ edit/001205/001205_43816.html. 21 See Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 19. 22 Ibid., p. 29. 23 Ibid. 24 For the 1944 version of “Fuchou,” see Wang Zengqi, Wang Zengqi quanji, I: 29–38. Unless otherwise stated, all references to “Fuchou” are to the 1944 version. The story has been translated by Andrew Schorr and Shu-mei Shih as “Revenge,” Renditions 37 (1992): 35–42. 25 Wang Zengqi, “Wang Zengqi duanpian xiaoshuo xuan, zixu,” pp. 165–66. 132 chapter three

1941, which was published the same year in Hong Kong’s Impartial Daily (Dagong bao 大公报).26 Both versions of “Revenge” contain the same basic plot and tell the story of a knight on a quest to avenge the death of his father. They begin in the middle of the knight’s journey when he stops the night to rest at a monastery in the mountains. Here he meets with the monk who killed his father. However, rather than killing the monk, he decides to abandon his sword for a chisel, and to work alongside the monk to create a “pathway to the light.” Wang’s story thus sets aside the traditional themes of ven- geance and fighting against injustice conventionally found in martial arts fiction about wandering knights. Wang’s story, particularly the second version, can be read instead as a disillusioned response to the protracted war against Japan. 27 As historian John Israel has described in his study of Lianda, the latter years of the war, or Lianda’s “years of trial,”28 were characterized by intensified bombing raids, inflation, food shortages, and lack of adequate school supplies and funding. Moreover, the residents of Kunming had to endure the presence of American troops, whom Wang recalls drove around loudly with pros- titutes in their jeeps and left condoms strewn around the local graveyard where he had once enjoyed peaceful evening strolls.29 Yet, while both versions of “Revenge” were written in reaction against the mainstream glorification of violence in wartime literature, they are framed very differently. The first version is written as a children’s bedtime story about a chivalrous knight on a quest. It begins with the caption, “A story told to a child,” and ends with the admonition: “You are not allowed to ask any more questions. See, the Big Dipper is already hanging above your window.”30 In contrast, the second version opens with an epigram opposing violence from Chapter 19 of the Zhuangzi: “The avenger does not destroy the sword of his enemy. Though hot-tempered, he does not rail at the falling roof tiles” (复仇者不折镆干。虽有忮心, 不怨飘瓦).31

26 For the 1941 version, see Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, I: 1–6. 27 Jeffrey Kinkley also comments on the opposition to hero worship found in wartime works by Wang’s teacher Shen Congwen. Kinkley points out that some of Shen’s works can be interpreted as “subtly reproving left-wing students for running off to fight ‘romantically’ for the Communists.” See Jeffrey Kinkley, Odyssey of Shen Congwen (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1987), pp. 249–50. 28 See Chapter 16 “Years of Trial: 1943–1945, ” in John Israel, Lianda, pp. 333–66. 29 Wang Zengqi, “Guanyin si” 观音寺 (Guanyin Temple), in Wang Zengqi quanji, IV: 184. 30 Wang Zengqi, 1941 version of “Fuchou,” p. 6. 31 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 42; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 29. For the original, see Chen Guying 陈鼓应, ed. Zhuangzi jinzhu jinyi 庄子今注今译 (Zhuangzi: with the shifting essence of the wartime short story 133

The lines that follow this excerpt from Zhuangzi continue with the same theme: “This reveals to us a way in which all the world can become peace- ful and balanced. It is through this Course that freedom from the chaos of war and the cruelties of killing can be reached.”32 Describing the impact of Daoist philosophy on his writings, Wang comments in his essay “Self- Introduction” (Zibao jiamen 自报家门; 1988): “Some critics say my work has been influenced by the thought of Laozi and Zhuangzi from 2,000 years ago. Maybe it has a little. When I taught middle school in Kunming, the Collected Commentaries on Zhuangzi (Zhuangzi jijie 庄子集解) was often sitting on my desk.”33 Daoist and Buddhist themes are evident throughout the second version of Wang’s story. This telling includes an allusion to “Zhuangzi’s Dream of the Butterfly” (Zhuang Zhou mengdie 庄周梦蝶);34 when in a dream, Wang’s protagonist recalls how the monk walks “like the wind” with his sleeves “floating like a big butterfly.” Also, whereas in the earlier version the protagonist and the monk work together to dig a tunnel through a mountain, the later version ends with a more evocative and abstract image: “One day, two chisels chiseled emptiness together. The first ray of light entered from the other side.”35 One way of interpreting these lines is to see them as a reference to the Buddhist concept of samsara or emptiness.

­Contemporary Annotation and Translation; Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1983), p. 467. Brook Ziporyn translates this passage as “A seeker of revenge does not go so far as to smash his enemy’s weapon, and even the most ill-tempered person bears no grudge against a loose tile that happens to plunk down on his head.” See Zhuang Zhou, Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings with Selections from Traditional Commentaries, Brook Ziporyn, tr. (Indianapolis: Hacket Publishing, 2009), p. 78. 32 Brook Ziporyn, Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings, p. 78. These lines are given by Guanyin 关尹 in response to Liezi’s 列子 question, “The Consummate Person can walk under water without suffocating, tread on fire without getting scorched, move over the face of all things without trembling. How does he reach such a state? ” In response, Guanyin says, “By preserving his pure vital energy—not through understanding, skill, resoluteness, or courage.” Next, Guanyin explains what he means by “preserving his pure vital energy.” See ibid., p. 78. 33 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, IV: 288. 34 “Zhuangzi’s Dream of the Butterfly” evokes the concept of the “transformation of things.” Ziporyn translates the passage as follows: “Once Zhuang Zhou dreamt he was a butterfly, fluttering about joyfully just as a butterfly would. He followed his whims exactly as he liked and knew nothing about Zhuang Zhou. Suddenly he awoke, and there he was, the startled Zhuang Zhou in the flesh. He did not know if Zhou had been dreaming he was a butterfly, or if a butterfly was now dreaming it was Zhou. Surely, Zhou and a butterfly count as two distinct identities! Such is what we call the transformation of one thing into another.” See Ziporyn, tr., Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings, p. 21. For an analysis of this passage, see Yu-Shih Chen, Images and Ideas in Chinese Classical Prose (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), pp. 148–49. 35 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 42; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 38. 134 chapter three

In addition, the ray of light in the final sentence could be viewed as sym- bolizing a quest for enlightenment and spiritual transcendence in the place of violence. Like Mu Dan and Ye Qianyu, who gravitated towards more philosophical and self-reflexive themes from the latter years of the war, Wang evinced a similar shift in his rewriting of “Revenge.” Apart from gaining a new layer of philosophical and spiritual meaning, the later version also follows Bian’s advice to avoid “unnecessary connec- tions” in the narrative and instead create stories that develop “scene by scene,” as in a film. A comparison of the opening lines of the two stories helps to elucidate the differences between them. The first version begins with the traveler arriving at the monastery, hoping to find something to eat: A tin of honey, half a white candle, the deep emotion of the protagonist. “Tonight I am all alone,” the young man thought to himself and smiled. His whole appearance showed that he had been on a long journey. A person of this kind who had arrived in this remote place, even if he were carrying grain, would still be looking for something to comfort him after a long day of trudging. In the mountains, there are only wild rabbits.36 The second version also starts out with the images of a candle and a tin of honey. However, details explaining why the traveler is hungry after his long journey are removed. Instead, the narration is broken up by vivid sensory imagery and seemingly disconnected reflections: One white candle, half a tin of wild honey. At that moment, his eyes did not see the honey. The honey was in the tin. He was sitting on the couch. But he was filled with the feeling of honey, thick, dense. No acidity rose in his throat. He had a good appetite. He had rarely vomited in his lifetime. Lifetime, how long is a lifetime? Is this my lifetime? It doesn’t matter, this is a very common expression. Everybody says: ‘In my lifetime . . .’37 Although Shu-mei Shih translates this passage into the past tense, given that Chinese is an uninflected language, the tense in the original is ambig- uous. However, the text conveys a sense of immediacy through Wang’s use of the word “now” (xianzai 现在), translated by Shih as “at that moment.” Translated into the present tense, Wang’s text gains in narrative power: One white candle, half a tin of wild honey. Now, his eyes do not see the honey. The honey is in the tin. He is sitting on the couch. But he is filled with the feeling of honey, thick, dense. No acidity rises in his throat. He has a good appetite. He has rarely vomited in his lifetime. Lifetime, how long

36 Wang Zengqi, 1941 version of “Fuchou,” p. 1. 37 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 35; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 29. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 135

is a lifetime? Is this my lifetime? It doesn’t matter, this is a very common expression. Everybody says: ‘In my lifetime . . .’ Throughout the story, Wang continues to emphasize the immediacy of the protagonist’s thoughts by his frequent use of the word “now.”38 Accord- ing to Wang, through depicting the flow of thoughts and images in the mind of his protagonist, he sought to imitate the “stream of conscious- ness” (yishi liu 意识流) technique that he had learned from reading works by modernist Western writers such as James Joyce and Virginia Woolf. 39 Indeed, as Li Tuo observes in his analysis of “Revenge,” Wang’s style in this story is overtly modernist and Westernized (ouhua 欧化) as evident in his employment of a stream-of-consciousness technique and heavy use of pronouns.40 Yet, in his essay “Self-Introduction,” Wang comments that his loose and imagistic prose was also partly inspired by Song dynasty poet and essayist Su Shi: I very much admire Su Shi’s saying: “Like floating clouds and flowing water, rigid in its inception, yet it follows its rightful course and stops when it is meant to stop. Its pattern is spontaneous and unexpected figures arise.” In China my fiction has been called “essay-like” fiction. I feel that “essayization” is a trend (but not the only one) in short stories around the world.41 Reminiscent of Su Shi, Wang’s writing in this story is characterized by a very smooth and essay-like style, as it flows alternately between the thoughts and sensory impressions of the protagonist and the words of the narrator. In this sense, Wang’s prose reflects his view that the essay form embodies “the naturalness of speaking freely” (suiyi shuo hua de ziran

38 Tang Shi also comments on the prevalence of what he refers to as “jinxingshi” 进行式 (progressive tense) in Wang’s stories. See Tang Shi 唐湜, “Qiancheng de Narui si-Tan Wang Zengqi de xiaoshuo” 虔诚的纳蕤思—谈汪曾祺的小说 (Sincere Narui Thought— A Discussion of Wang Zengqi’s Novels), in Qian Liqun, ed. Ershi shiji Zhongguo xiaoshuo lilun ziliao, p. 500. 39 See Lu Jianhua 陆建华, Wang Zengqi de chun, xia, qiu, dong 汪曾祺的春夏秋冬 (Wang Zengqi’s Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter; Zhengzhou: Henan renmin, 2005.), pp. 73–75. 40 Li Tuo 李陀, “Wang Zengqi yu xiandai Hanyu xiezuo-Jiantan Maowenti” 汪曾祺 与现代汉语写作-兼谈毛文体 (Wang Zengqi and Modern Chinese Writing—With a Discussion of Maoist Discourse), Jintian 4.39 (1997): 1–30. Also, in his essay “Tan Fenge,” Wang Zengqi comments that “Revenge” reflects his “imitation of Western modernist liter- ary technique.” See “Tan Fenge,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, III: 341. Wang also comments that he has “worked hard to free himself of all kinds of influences” and make his own works unique. See ibid. 41 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” p. 292. 136 chapter three

随意说话的自然).42 Particularly given the absence of a strong plot and Wang’s frequent interspersion of philosophical reflections, it is possible to interpret “Revenge” as a philosophical essay or meditation on the mean- ing of wartime violence and the passage of time. While Wang’s use of a stream-of-consciousness technique produces an essay-like flow, it also creates a lyric immediacy as images, thoughts, emo- tions, and memories pass through the mind of the protagonist. Moreover, Wang adds a lyric element to his second version of “Revenge” by including a section of free-verse poetry midway through the story. In this section, he depicts the sun glimmering over a large expanse of water and portrays water in various permutations of rain, mist, seawater, and white foam. Also, Wang introduces rhymes between the words jiao 角 (angle) and niao 鸟 (bird), as well as between duan 段 (edge), yan 烟 (mist), chuan 船 (boat), and zhuan 转 (turn). In addition, he uses alliteration. The sounds deng 灯 (light) and dang 荡 (sway) heard in the poem43 resonate with the ding 丁 sound of the monk’s bell that rings incessantly throughout the story. As well as incorporating elements of poetry and the essay form, “Revenge” contains many passages that resemble a colorful painting. In one scene, Wang’s narrator addresses the traveler: “You, tiny man, body bent forward, walking down a thick ribbon of white road amidst yellows, greens and reds.”44 When, in another scene, the protagonist tries to recall his mother’s shape, “the outlines of his mother’s image [are] suddenly filled in with the colors of his younger sister.”45 And, in the free-verse section, Wang introduces a vivid image with both concrete and abstract elements: “There comes a boatful of melons, a boatful of colors and desires. . . .”46 Wang’s inclusion of such visually evocative imagery, along with his use of rhyme and resonant aural imagery, is in keeping with his belief that the short story should contain elements of painting and music. In “The Essence of the Short Story,” Wang praises Rabindranath Tagore and Marcel Proust for seeking to incorporate these other art forms in their fiction: Tagore told Roman Roland that he studied painting because he felt that there were some things that could not be expressed in words—only colors and lines were up to the task. Proust in his book suddenly drew a music

42 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 21. 43 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 39; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 34. 44 Ibid. 45 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 36; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 30. 46 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 39; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 34. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 137

staff; any author must sympathize with them—if not sympathize with them, then praise them.47 Thus one way of interpreting “Revenge” is as an experiment in generic boundary-crossing between not only poetry, the essay, and fiction, but also music, and painting—expanding the borders of the short story through a variety of synesthesia. Yet Wang’s story is amenable to a variety of inter- pretations, and, as we have seen, could also be read as a Daoist medita- tion on violence. In addition, it can be read as a metafictional portrait of the author engaged in the process of writing a martial arts story. This performative reading accords with Wang’s claim in “The Essence of the Short Story” that the short story should draw from drama, from which it can gain “liveliness, profundity, and a sense of mischief.”48 Evidence for this reading can be found near the beginning of the story where the trav- eler is seen sitting alone in front of a flickering candle before he begins to write about his journey: “He [the protagonist] described [miaoxie 描写] everything as still, but it all seemed to be moving now. He even imag- ined himself as an itinerant merchant who would add some sound to this mountain village.”49 Here the narrator uses the term miaoxie, contain- ing the character xie 写 (to write), suggesting that the knight is already engaged in writing a description of his journey. Yet, although Wang’s pro- tagonist attempts to put together a coherent narrative about his travels, the story seems to change in the act of telling, and he ends up “play[ing] different roles in similar scenes.”50 The shifting narrative perspective adds to this sense of dislocation. Con- tradictory voices in the consciousness of Wang’s protagonist/narrator poke fun at him. At times, he envisions himself as the hero of his own story, and boldly proclaims his plan to gain revenge: “But I must have revenge”51 and “I will walk every road!”52 Yet, at other times the narrator makes fun of and belittles the knight. The narrator asks, “Do you feel moved by yourself?”53 In another scene, the narrator switches to third-person when he mocks the swordsman’s pathos over his own plight: “At his own words he shed a

47 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 29. Also, in his essay “Liangqi zashu” 两栖杂述 (The Rambling narration of an amphibian), Wang compares the process of writing fiction to painting. See “Liangqi zashu,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, III: 197. 48 Ibid., p. 28. 49 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 36; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 30. 50 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 37; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 31. 51 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 41; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 37. 52 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 40; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 35. 53 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 39; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 34. 138 chapter three tear. At his own sadness he was sad.”54 While in this passage the narrator refers to his protagonist alternately in the second and third-person, in the opening passage cited above he shifts between the first and third-person when addressing the knight. Indeed, throughout the story, Wang’s narra- tor alternates between the first, second, and third-person without adding grammatical markers to indicate a change of narrative perspective. The effect of these syntactic shifts is to blur the boundary between the narra- tor and the protagonist—it becomes unclear which of them is responsible for writing the martial arts story that unfolds before the reader. Moreover, through such rapid shifts in point of view, Wang lays his story open to a Freudian interpretation as the representation of a divided consciousness. Indeed, Wang read Freud under Shen Congwen’s tutelage during the war, and Shen’s own wartime stories like “Gazing at Rainbows” (Kan honglu 看虹路) reflect the impact of Freud in their portrayal of characters with divided psyches.55 Viewed in this light, the confrontation between Wang’s protagonist and the “enemy” could be interpreted as a psychoanalytic parable about the encounter between the self and what Ashis Nandy refers to as the “inti- mate enemy,” or the self under colonialism. As Nandy observes, the colo- nial subject is affected both on a material level through the colonizer’s introduction of law, and on a psychological level when he internalizes the colonizer’s ideologies. According to Nandy, this “second colonization” occurs when “colonialism colonizes minds in addition to bodies,” result- ing in a situation where “the West is now everywhere, within the West and outside; in structures and in minds.”56 Read in the context of Nandy’s theories, the encounter between Wang’s narrator and the monk could be understood as an allegorization of the clash between divergent Eastern

54 Schorr and Shih, “Revenge,” p. 41; Wang Zengqi, “Fuchou,” p. 37. 55 For more on Shen Congwen’s interest in Freud and psychoanalysis, see Jeffrey ­Kinkley, The Odyssey of Shen Congwen, p. 254. Kinkley writes that Shen was criticized for his psychoanalytic wartime stories, which according to critics did not make any sense. See also Shen Congwen, “Wo de xuexi” 我的学习 (My Studies), Dagong bao, Nov. 20, 1951. For a translation into English of Shen’s “Kan honglu,” see Jeffrey Kinkley, Imperfect Para- dise, pp. 463–84 (based on a manuscript version obtained from Shen Congwen and not included in Shen’s published collected works). Also, for a study of the impact of Freudian thought on Chinese culture during the Republican era, see Jingyuan Zhang, Psychoanaly- sis in China: Literary Transformations, 1919–1949 (Ithaca: Cornell East Asia Series, 1992). Zhang observes that over 40 articles and books were published on the subject of psycho- analysis in China between 1919 and 1927. 56 Ashis Nandy, The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self Under Colonialism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), p. xi. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 139 and Western ideologies, such as Freudianism and Daoism, in the mind of the protagonist. Indeed, while the narrator/protagonist yearns, in Dao- ist terms, for peace and transcendence, in keeping with Freudian views of the psyche he discovers that his consciousness is perpetually divided. Moreover, he finds himself trapped within the language of the colonizer when he uses a Westernized literary style, characterized by heavy use of pronouns and focused on psychological interiority. In an effort to retaliate, the narrator envisions himself as a heroic knight, thereby exhibiting what Nandy refers to as the “hyper-masculinity” of the colonized male who seeks to overcome the emasculating condi- tion of colonial violence by constructing a defensive masculine identity.57 Indeed, through writing about a knight on a quest who stays at a Bud- dhist monastery, Wang reinvents his own wartime displacement to a Buddhist monastery as an heroic journey, rather than the flight of a refu- gee along with millions of others.58 However, unlike Nandy’s colonized subjects, Wang’s narrator eventually decides not to wage war against the enemy within, but rather attempts to make peace. In Shu-mei Shih’s reading of “Revenge,” she also interprets the recon- ciliation between Wang’s knight and the “enemy” on an allegorical level, this time as a reflection of the dissolution between “self and Other” or “China and the West”: Ultimately, this dissolution of the distinction between self and Other can be read as a metaphor for that between China and the West, for in Wang’s work one can no longer delineate the elements that belong to each. The poetic density of his prose in capturing the interior thoughts of the protagonist is simultaneously the consequence of Su Shi-esque “looseness” and a Western modernist penchant for psychological depiction. The result of such a “loose” style approaches what is now termed the postmodern.59

57 Nandy, for example, describes Indian males’ attempt “to beat the colonizers at their own game and to regain self-esteem as Indians and as Hindus” by seeking “a hyper- masculinity or hyper-Kastriyahood that would make sense to their fellow countrymen . . . and to the colonizers.” See ibid., p. 52. 58 For Wang’s description of his wartime displacement to a monastery, see Wang Zengqi, “Wang Zengqi duanpian xiaoshuo xuan, zixu,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, III: 92–93. See also Wang Zengqi, “Guanyu ‘Shoujie’” 关于受戒 (On “Buddhist Initiation”), in Wang Zengqi quanji, VI: 101–103. For other fictionalized reworkings of Wang Zengqi’s wartime displacement to a monastery, see his stories “Miao yu seng” 庙与僧 (Monasteries and Monks; 1946), in Wang Zengqi quanji, I: 65–71; and “Shou jie” 受戒 (Buddhist Initiation; 1981), in Wang Zengqi quanji, I: 322–43. 59 Shu-mei Shih, The Lure of the Modern, p. 383. 140 chapter three

As Shih notes, the looseness of Wang’s prose approaches the postmodern through his experimentation with a variety of genres, narrative and tem- poral perspectives, and Western and Chinese literary influences. Shih’s observations about the merging of China and the West in Wang’s fiction coincide with Wang’s own comments about his efforts to cross the divide between Eastern and Western culture. In his essay “The Rambling Nar- ration of an Amphibian” (Liangqi zashu 两栖杂述; 1982), Wang writes that he sees himself as a kind of “amphibian” or “hybrid species,” a writer who incorporates diverse cultural traditions in his works.60 “I have always hoped to fuse together [rong wei yi hu 熔为一炉] traditional and modern, and Chinese and Western.”61 Yet although it seems that, in “Revenge,” Wang sought to smooth over the gaps between tradition and modernity, and the self and the Other, the incessant conversations in the mind of his divided knight witness to the difficulty of erasing such gaps. In some respects, Wang succeeds in draw- ing attention to some of the differences between Chinese and Western aesthetics. For example, his heavy use of pronouns and rapid shifting between deictic positions is emblematic of a Western, modernist style foreign to traditional Chinese essays or poetry.62 Moreover, his portrayal of a divided psyche and his modernist focus on the self is not in keep- ing with the Buddhist and Daoist themes of peace and reconciliation that Wang deals with in this story. Interpreted as a psychoanalytic parable, Wang’s story thus represents not so much the dissolution of the boundar- ies between self and Other, but rather the narrator’s psychological battles as he struggles to find personal meaning and philosophical consolation in the midst of protracted war and foreign occupation.

In Search of a Native Language

I place a great deal of importance on language—perhaps I overemphasize it. I believe that language is content. Language is the main part of fiction. It

60 Wang Zengqi, “Liangqi zashu,” pp. 196–203. 61 Ibid., p. 202. See also Wang Zengqi, “Wo shi yige Zhongguo ren” 我是一个中国人 (I am a Chinese), in Wang Zengqi quanji, III: 299–304. In this essay, Wang argues that “Foreign influence and native style are not contradictions in opposition. The determining element of native style is language.” See also his thoughts on making connections between Eastern and Western aesthetics in “Jian shizi’er, dai xu” 捡石子儿代序 (Collecting Stones, In Lieu of a Preface), in Wang Zengqi quanji, V: 250. 62 Li Tuo counts 15 pronouns in the first paragraph of “Revenge.” See Li Tuo, “Wang Zengqi yu xiandai Hanyu xiezuo-Jiantan Maowenti,” p. 7. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 141

is not an external thing, and it is not only a question of form, or skill . . . Lan- guage is a culture-bearing medium. The language of a work reflects the author’s entire history of aesthetic cultivation. The beauty of language is not in each individual sentence, but in the relationship between sentences.63 One year after completing the second version of “Revenge,” in 1945, Wang Zengqi wrote “Old Lu.”64 At this time, he had been teaching for a year at a middle school organized by Lianda graduates in the suburbs of Kunming. Whereas in “Revenge” Wang depicts the I-narrator’s encounter with an allegorized representation of “the enemy,” here the I-narrator, a school- teacher, meets a former soldier who comes to work at the school and helps with a variety of jobs such as cooking, running errands, and carry- ing water. When he arrives at the school, Lu is already over 50 years old and it is many years since he was a soldier. However, as a child, he was forced to serve in the army of Shandong warlord Zhang Zongchang 张宗昌 (1881–1932)—otherwise known as the “Dogmeat General” (Gourou jiangjun 狗肉将军), and dubbed by Time magazine as China’s “basest war lord.”65 Having endured terrible conditions of starvation and privation dur- ing his youth, Lu has the ingenious knack of using local plants and even insects as ingredients to produce delicious dishes, a skill that comes in handy in his new setting since the school often lacks money to buy food. This talent, along with his ability to tell riveting stories about his experi- ences during his years of soldiering, wins him the admiration of Wang’s I-narrator and the other teachers. However, the following year the narra- tor loses contact with Lu after the school is relocated and he moves into his own apartment. Later, when the narrator meets up with Lu again, he is disappointed to discover that Lu seems to be a different person and has developed a bad temper and a drinking habit. Eventually, the narrator learns that Lu’s lot in life has improved after he started a small business selling steamed buns. The narrator ends his story with a sigh of regret over the passage of time: “The spring is passing again; when can we return to the past? Old Lu, ah, when can we go back?”66 Like “Revenge,” in which a swordsman gives up his quest for vio- lence, “Old Lu” portrays a man who once was a soldier. However, unlike Wang’s swordsman, Lu is an aging and illiterate peasant who gave up his

63 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” p. 292. 64 Wang Zengqi, “Lao Lu,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, I: 39–57. 65 See “China’s Basest War Lord,” Time Magazine, March 7, 1927, accessed June 7, 2011, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,722931,00.html. 66 Wang Zengqi, “Lao Lu,” p. 57. 142 chapter three career as a soldier many years ago. In addition, whereas “Revenge” is set in an unidentified period and can be read as a Daoist parable, “Old Lu” is framed by Wang’s first-person narrator as a realist account of a man he met during the latter years of the War of Resistance. As the narrator comments near the end of the story, “This is a record of reality, and it is also something of a lament” (这是纪实, 又似乎有点感慨).67 Somewhat paradoxically, the sadness expressed in Wang’s story refers not only to the loss of contact with his former friend, but also to the ending of the War of Resistance in 1945 when he wrote this story. Although protracted war, in particular the latter years of the war, brought many hardships for writ- ers and artists resettled in the interior, the ending of hostilities created new anxieties. As Wang disclosed in a 1994 interview, the end of the war and the subsequent civil war between the Nationalists and the CCP was a particularly difficult and unsettling period for him, since he was the son of a wealthy landlord.68 As with Ye Qianyu’s “realistic” portrayal of wartime Chongqing and Mu Dan’s efforts to depict such daily experiences as taking refuge from air- raids, Wang’s wartime works reflected a growing interest in portraying the daily lives and realities of the people he encountered during this time. This shift in focus is apparent in many of Wang’s stories from the civil war period, including “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck,” “Convicts,” “Carpenter Dai,” “Chance Encounter,” and “Artists,” from Collection of Chance Encounters, as well as other stories outside this series, such as “Special Gift” (Yibing 异秉; 1948). In all these works, Wang portrays the lives of ordinary people, focusing on experienced artisans who are adept at traditional manual skills. According to Wang, his interest in writing about the common people can be traced back to his teacher Shen Congwen. Wang recalls that Shen told him: “The heart of a writer should be close to his characters. The writer must have a good deal of sympathy for them and share their sor- rows and joys. When a writer fails to keep close to his characters, his work will be artificial.”69 Indeed, Wang’s choice of subject in “Old Lu” has many parallels to Shen’s own fiction. Shen Congwen served as a soldier

67 Ibid., p. 56. 68 See Yang Dingchuan 杨鼎川, “Guanyu Wang Zengqi 40 niandai chuangzuo de duihua: Wang Zengqi fangtan lu” 关于汪曾祺 40 年代创作的对话汪曾祺访谈录 (On Wang Zengqi’s Creative Works from the ’40s: Record of an Interview with Wang Zengqi), accessed June 7, 2012, http://www.literature.org.cn/article.aspx?id=26037. 69 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” p. 287. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 143 in a warlord army during his youth, and wrote stories about soldiering, including “My Education” (Wo de jiaoyu 我的教育; 1929), “The Company Commander” (Lianzhang 连长; 1927), and “Staff Advisor” (Guwenguan 顾 问官; 1935). Yet, although Wang cites Shen as an important mentor who influenced his fiction, Wang only began writing about ordinary people after he left Lianda and started teaching—an experience that brought him in contact with a variety of local people, and forced him to leave the confines of academia. Also, after leaving Lianda, Wang Zengqi began to adopt a different style of writing. Whereas “Revenge” employs a high modernist style character- ized by stream-of-consciousness narration, in “Old Lu” the narrator con- verses with his imagined readers in an informal manner. The opening lines of the story provide a telling contrast with the beginning of “Revenge”: That time we spent last summer was truly fun. I cannot think of any other appropriate words [to describe it] than to say that it was fun. For four months the school would not pay our salaries, and meals were sporadic; sometimes there was a meal, and sometimes not. 去年夏天我们过的那一段日子实在很好玩。我想不起别的恰当的词 儿, 只有说它好玩。学校四个月发不出薪水, 饭也是有一顿没一顿的 吃。70 Unlike the stream of visual and sensory imagery and philosophical mus- ings in “Revenge,” here the narrator does not focus on portraying the inte- riority of his narrator or of Old Lu. Eschewing the use of dense, poetic language, the narrator draws on colloquial Chinese when using words like “fun” (hao wan 好玩). Also, he mimics the Beijing dialect through the use of erhua 儿化, the phonological process of adding an “er” sound to words in Chinese. Although Wang’s narrator adopts a more casual, conversational style in “Old Lu,” at the same time he draws on elements of classical Chinese lan- guage (wenyan wen 文言文). For example, the closing lines of the story, “The spring is passing again; when can we return to the past?” (今春看 有过, 何日是归年?),71 are taken from a quatrain in traditional regulated verse by Tang dynasty poet Du Fu:

70 Wang Zengqi, “Lao Lu,” p. 39. 71 Ibid., p. 57. 144 chapter three

Birds are still whiter against river’s sapphire, Blooms in hills’ green seem about to catch flame. And as I watch, this spring too is passing, And when will be the time that I turn home?72 江碧鸟逾白 山青花欲燃 今春看又过 何日是归年73 In this poem, written during his later years in Guizhou, Du Fu expresses his yearning for his hometown and his sadness over the passage of time. Through his use of striking visual imagery, contrasting the white hue of the birds with the sapphire water, and setting the bright red flowers, which appear to be “burning,” against the green of the hills, the poet brings a beautiful spring scene to life. He then implicitly juxtaposes this verdant scene with his own loneliness and separation from home. In a similar fashion, through his allusion to Du Fu’s poem, Wang Zengqi’s nar- rator expresses his own sadness over the passage of time, and the passing of spring and the ending of the war prompt happy memories of Old Lu and of his time teaching during the previous summer in the Kunming countryside. Wang Zengqi’s melding of classical and colloquial Chinese in this story is emblematic of his self-conscious use of language and has links to Shen Congwen’s fiction, which Edward Gunn has characterized as “a mélange of Euro-Japanese wenyan wen, and Hunan regional features.”74 However, compared to Shen Congwen, Wang Zengqi has a stronger focus on lan- guage as a central theme in his story. Wang’s preoccupation with language is evident, for example, when his narrator pauses to reflect on his word choice, as in his remark that he “cannot think of any more appropriate word” than “fun” to describe the previous summer. Likewise, in many other passages, the narrator digresses to analyze Old Lu’s use of language. In one scene, the narrator asks Old Lu if he is tired, to which Lu responds, “What do you mean, tired? My vigor is at the height of its youthfulness”

72 Stephen Owen, tr. and ed., An Anthology of Chinese Literature, p. 439. Owen trans- lates the last two lines of this poem differently from me. In his allusion to this poem, Wang Zengqi does not necessarily mean to ask when he and Old Lu can return home, but rather when they can return to the past. 73 Du Fu 杜甫, Du Fu shixuan 杜甫诗选 (Selected Poems of Du Fu; Beijing: Waiwen, 2001), p. 51. 74 Edward Gunn, Rewriting Chinese: Style and Innovation in Twentieth-Century­ Chinese (Stanford: Stanford University Press. 1991), p. 116. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 145

(累什么, 我的精神是顶年幼儿的来). The narrator then steps back and makes an extradiegitic comment on Lu’s use of vocabulary: “This expres- sion, ‘at the height of its youthfulness’—what a fresh new phrase!” (这个“ 顶年幼儿的”, 好新鲜的词儿！)75 Similarly, in other parts of the story, the narrator adds parenthetical remarks about Lu’s language. In one case, after Lu describes how, during his years of soldiering, he had once been forced to eat pig fodder to avoid starvation, the narrator comments par- enthetically: “Old Lu’s description was really marvelous!”76 According to Wang, his focus on regional language parallels his efforts to get closer to native realities and to the lives of his characters. In his “Self-Introduction,” Wang explains his views about the links between a writer’s language and that appropriate to his characters: The writer’s descriptive language also has to be in harmony with the charac- ters portrayed. One cannot use the language of intellectuals to write about farmers. . . . it is an important principle. At least for realist fiction it is an important principle.77 However, although Wang’s narrator attempts to arrive at a better under- standing of Old Lu, his fascination with the old soldier’s use of language in some ways separates him intellectually from his character. Rather than commiserating with Lu’s plight as a child forced into soldiering, the nar- rator at times appears more interested in him as an object of linguistic study. Also, the narrator remains acutely aware of his independent exis- tence outside the world of the story. Three pages into the story, after dis- cussing life at the local school, the narrator abruptly stops and comments that he has rambled on for too long without focusing on the real subject of the story, Old Lu: Aiya, the subject is “Old Lu.” Once I start out, how come I carry on with so much scattered, empty talk? I still haven’t talked to my heart’s content, but I really have to stop here. If I say any more, not only will details obscure the main point, but the essay will also lack structure (now it is necessarily already this way)—but it will also unknowingly be interesting.78 Like the narrator/protagonist in “Revenge,” the narrator of “Old Lu” thus functions as both a character in the story and as a metafictional narrator

75 Wang Zengqi, “Lao Lu,” p. 50. 76 Ibid., p. 53. 77 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” p. 287. 78 Wang Zengqi, “Lao Lu,” p. 41. 146 chapter three outside the story. Yet whereas the narrator of “Revenge” envisions himself as writing a story, the narrator in “Old Lu” repeatedly makes reference to the fact that he is telling a story through his use of the verb “to talk” (shuo 说)—although at the same time he claims he is writing an essay (as in the passage above). In addition, compared to the narrator in “Revenge,” the narrator of “Old Lu” frequently addresses a seemingly large audience using plural pronouns, but nonetheless continues to shift between a variety of deic- tic perspectives. While in the passage cited above, the narrator speaks in the first-person singular, in other parts of the story, such as the opening passage, he switches between first-person singular and plural, apparently including other teachers and staff at the school in a more general “we.” At other times, the narrator uses the pronoun zanmen 咱们 (we, includ- ing the listener),79 and switches alternately between second-person sin- gular, second-person plural, and “ladies and gentlemen” (zhuwei 诸位).80 Though “you” refers generally to an unspecified listener or listeners, at the end of the story the narrator uses the second-person singular to refer directly to Old Lu. And, in one scene, the narrator addresses an imagi- nary audience in Shandong as “you [polite plural]” (nimen guichu 你们 贵处).81 The narrator of “Old Lu” thus addresses a larger audience than in “Revenge,” and tells a story about a bigger cast of characters, including himself and Old Lu, as well as other employees at the school, along with generals, soldiers, and a variety of characters from Lu’s past. In some respects, Wang’s shift in narrative perspective from “Revenge” to “Old Lu” resembles Mu Dan’s movement from a poetry inspired by Baudelaire, employing predominantly first-person verbs and pronouns, to an oratorical style in poems such as “Walking in the Wilderness” and “1939 Torchlit Procession in Kunming.” During the war, both writers took on new roles that imbued them with a heightened awareness of larger social realities, which in turn was reflected in a shifting deictic relationship between their narrators and imagined audiences. At the same time, both writers also shuttle back and forth between a modernist style focused on the self and interiority and a more socially conscious mode of writing. In

79 Ibid., p. 57. 80 Ibid., p. 51. 81 In this scene, the narrator admits that he does not know the characters he should use to transcribe the colloquial Shandong speech used by Old Lu. Therefore he directly addresses the audience and asks: “Countrymen, do you [plural polite; nimen guichu] have this saying?” See ibid., p. 52. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 147

Wang’s case, the narrator is particularly fluid when he serves alternately as a character in the story who shifts between the first-person singular and plural; a narrator outside the plot observing his story from a perspective of distance and analyzing Lu’s and his own use of language; and a storyteller addressing his audience sometimes as “ladies and gentlemen,” and other times as “you” or “Old Lu.” As Wang’s narrator steps in and out of the story addressing various imag- ined audiences, he also shuttles repeatedly back and forth between diver- gent temporal frames, in particular between story time and narrative time. While the story he tells about Old Lu occurred “one year ago,” the narrator signifies the immediacy of his own narration by the frequent use of the word “now.” This sense of immediacy is in turn set against the narrator’s lament over the passage of time. While the presentness of the story time has an affinity to Wang’s stream-of-consciousness narration in “Revenge,” the narrator’s yearning for the golden memories of the past draws on a common theme in traditional poetics. As Stephen Owen argues in Remem- brances, Chinese literature is “a literature of memory,” characterized by a yearning to recreate the lost past in art, or by what he refers to as the “aesthetics of the shard”: Here [in Chinese literature] we also find a gap, but of a different sort [from that produced by mimesis in Western fiction], a gap of time, effacement, and memory. The master figure here is synecdoche, the part that leads to the whole, some enduring fragment from which we try to reconstruct the lost totality.82 Despite the existence of this thread in “Old Lu,” as already noted, Wang’s narrator comments that his story represents not just a lament for the past, but “a record of reality.” By providing place names and names of characters, and including historical figures like Shandong warlord Zhang Zongchang, Wang attempts to cast his story in a more realist mode. And through paying detailed attention to regional language, he roots his story in native realities. In this respect, Wang’s story reflects the influence of Shen Congwen, who wrote about the lives of common people in Hunan and borrowed heavily from regional language. In addition, “Old Lu” con- tains echoes of Lu Xun’s realist stories. Reminiscent of Lu Xun’s “New Year’s Sacrifice,” “The True Story of Ah Q,” and “Medicine” (Yao 药; 1919), Wang’s story represents the plight of the oppressed Other, in this case an

82 Stephen Owen, Remembrances: The Experience of the Past in Classical Chinese Litera- ture (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1986), p. 2. 148 chapter three illiterate soldier who was forced as a child to serve in a local warlord’s army. Also, Wang’s talkative I-narrator, who maintains a certain critical distance both from his story and from Old Lu, in some ways resembles the I-narrators in Lu Xun’s fiction who stand aloof from the masses. In his essay “About Style,” Wang mentions Lu Xun as one of the three modern writers, along with Shen Congwen and Fei Ming, who most influenced his work,83 adding that, “prior to the 1950s, there were almost no short story writers who were not influenced by Lu Xun.”84 However, in contrast to the tightly organized plots found in Lu Xun’s stories, Wang narrates in a more fluid, essay-like style, and even his nar- rator admits that the story in “Old Lu” “lacks structure.” Such a plotless, essay-like style was common in wartime and postwar short stories. For example, discussing Shi Tuo’s “A Kiss” (Yi wen 一吻; 1946), Huters com- ments: “The sketchiness of the plot, the distance the narrator keeps from his characters, and, in particular, the predominance of static description over narrative movement lend ‘A Kiss’ many of the characteristics of a prose essay.”85 Similarly, in his analysis of Lu Ling’s short stories, Yun- zhong Shu observes that Lu Ling “plays much closer attention to charac- terization than to plot,” and that “the plot lines in his stories often consist of loosely strung small incidents in a stagnant world.”86 According to Wang, his approach to writing about the common man was inspired in part by Ming dynasty essayist Gui Youguang. In “Self- Introduction,” Wang writes: In my classical literature textbook, I was most deeply influenced by repre- sentative pieces by the Ming essayist Gui Youguang. Gui Youguang wrote about ordinary people with a light touch. His writing was familiar yet sad;

83 Wang Zengqi, “Tan fengge” 谈风格 (About Style), in Wang Zengqi quanji, III: 337. 84 Ibid., p. 338. 85 Theodore Huters, “The Telling of Shi Tuo’s ‘The Kiss’: Few Words and Many Voices,” in Huters, ed., Reading the Modern Chinese Short Story (Armonk: M.E. Sharpe, 1990), p. 75. Huters also comments on the aesthetic looseness of the collection of stories Guoyuan chengji 果园城记 (Records of Orchard City), of which “A Kiss” is a part. He writes: “Aside from a shadowy dramatized narrator who drops out towards the end of the collection, almost no characters appear in more than one story; the conventional unities of plot and time-sequence are dispensed with as well. The individual stories partake of this amor- phousness, each having little in the way of character or plot development or even tempo- ral unity.” See ibid., p. 74. 86 Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front, p. 112. For a more in-depth discussion of the aesthetic looseness of fiction from the 1940s, see Qian Liqun, “Manhua sishiniandai xiaoshuo sichao” 漫话四十年代小说思潮 (An Unreserved Discussion of the Zeitgeist of Fiction from the Forties), in his Duihui yu manyou, pp. 10–25. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 149

this was close to my own temperament. My current fiction often has traces of Gui Youguang in it.87 By modeling his fiction on the traditional essay, specifically on the Ming dynasty essay, Wang diverges from his teacher Shen Congwen who dis- dained the traditional essay because of its links to Confucian literati.88 Instead, in this respect, Wang reveals closer ties to Fei Ming and to Lu Xun’s brother Zhou Zuoren. Like Shen Congwen, Fei Ming studied with Zhou Zuoren at Peking University, and was influenced by Zhou’s advice to write in a more “natural” (ziran 自然) and “ordinary” (pingdan 平淡) style, as distinct from Lu Xun’s finely crafted and tightly plotted fiction.89 In particular, Wang’s efforts to combine fiction, the essay, and the short story recall Fei Ming’s writings about his native region of Huangmei in which he employs a style that is loose and essay-like, and also very lyri- cal. Indeed, in his essay “About Style,” Wang devotes a page to describing Fei Ming’s unique style,90 and comments that “he [Fei Ming] used the method usually applied to writing poetry to write fiction. In truth, his fic- tion is poetry.”91 Nonetheless, although Wang’s fiction clearly reflects the influence of other short story writers, in particular Shen Congwen, Fei Ming, and Lu Xun, he exhibits a high level of self-consciousness about language and form—so much so that, in many ways, language itself became the central theme and focus of his wartime and postwar stories. In this respect, Wang has parallels with other wartime writers and artists who (as discussed in

87 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, IV: 290. In “Liangqi zashu,” Wang Zengqi also describes Gui Youguang’s influence on his writings, and compares Gui Youguang to Chekhov. See “Liangqi zashu,” p. 198. In “Tan fengge,” Wang writes about how Gui shaped his writing. See “Tan fengge,” pp. 337–38. 88 Jeffrey Kinkley observes that “Wang Zengqi considers himself Confucian in out- look. . . . He extols the high or written culture much more than does Shen Congwen, who cherishes mainly arts, crafts, and oral traditions. ‘Rehabilitation’ of China’s old civilization [in Wang’s works] describes not so much the modern fiction of Shen Congwen or Wang Zengqi as it does Wang Zengqi’s interest in traditional painting, learning, and above all, Peking opera, as well as the Confucian side of Wang Zengqi that enters his writing mostly in the essay form. But here too, he parts company with Shen Congwen. Shen disdained the short essay, partly because it was linked to the Confucian literati.” See Kinkley, “Shen Congwen’s Legacy in Chinese Literature of the 1980s,” in Ellen Widmer and David Wang, eds., From May Fourth to June Fourth: Fiction and Film in Twentieth-Century China, p. 85. 89 For a more in-depth discussion of Fei Ming’s prewar works, see Chapter Five of this study. 90 See Wang Zengqi, “Tan Fengge,” pp. 339–40. 91 Ibid., p. 339. 150 chapter three the introduction) increasingly focused on issues of form, in particular appropriation from native genres, in the context of war. Reminiscent of Mu Dan’s efforts to produce a new lyricism and Ye Qianyu’s search for the sinicized cartoon, Wang consciously set out to produce a new kind of short story that appropriated elements from Western modernism and incorporated many different genres—at the same time as it drew heavily from both popular and elite, as well as traditional and modern Chinese culture. Moreover, Wang situated his new form for the short story in a liter- ary middle ground between modernist formal experimentation on the one hand and realist representation on the other. In “The Essence of the Short Story,” Wang elaborates his views on realism through a story about a painter who produces three different paintings of a human figure and a dog: “In the first painting, the person looks like a person, and the dog looks like a dog; in the second painting, they [the person and the dog] don’t closely resemble one another, but are still recognizable; in the third painting, they simply don’t look like anything.”92 After discussing these three approaches to art, Wang concludes that the third kind of painting brings the most “happiness.” Nevertheless, he argues that the short story ought to strive to fit somewhere between the first and third variety: “While the short story should not perhaps be like the first painting, it should at least move towards the second kind of painting.”93 In keeping with Wang’s theories, the narrator of “Old Lu” asserts his artistic license when he interrupts his narrative in order to comment on Lu’s use of language and express his sadness over the passage of time. In so doing, the author/narrator infuses his “record of reality” with elements of traditional poetics as well as echoes of Du Fu. He also experiments with divergent narrative and temporal frames as he passes in and out of the story, fluctuating between story time and narrative time, and between telling and writing his story. As well as crossing a variety of aesthetic boundaries, Wang attempts once again to break down divisions between the self and Other—here the Other being the former soldier Old Lu. Although the narrator befriends Old Lu, he maintains a critical distance from him as he repeatedly steps back from the story to analyze his own and Old Lu’s language. He eventu- ally loses contact with Lu and finds that his friend has changed when he

92 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 30. 93 Ibid. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 151 finally sees him again. It is against this background that Wang’s narrator emphasizes the briefness of his chance encounter with the former soldier. Despite his efforts to dissolve the boundary between self and Other, the narrator discovers a linguistic, social, and temporal divide separating him from the common man. In this respect, Wang again bears a resemblance to Lu Xun, who repeatedly expressed his sense of loneliness and alien- ation created by the insuperable barrier he found between himself and his fellow countrymen.

Return to the Native Land

To get from my house to school, I went down a large street and into a wind- ing alley. After school let out, on my way home I liked to have a good look around. I poked my nose into the stores, the artisan’s workshops, the cloth shop, the soy pickler’s, the general store, the fireworks store, the baked ses- ame seed cake shop, the shop that sold lime and hemp, the dyers. . . . I never tired of seeing them. Once when someone asked me how I had become a writer, I said it had to do with enjoying looking around at everything when I was young. These shops, these artisans touched me deeply; they let me smell the breath of a life that was laborious, humble, slightly sweet, and yet slightly bitter. Impressions of this street entered deep into my memory. Many of my stories are written about people and events in this isolated and faded little town.94 In June of 1947, one year after moving to Shanghai, and following a brief trip home to his native region of Gaoyou the previous year, Wang Zengqi wrote “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck.”95 In this story, his I-narrator describes a journey home to visit his father, whom he has not seen for over 10 years. The story begins with a description of the narrator watching his father wash and flay duck feet. Having just returned from a trip to the store to purchase ducks, the narrator asks his father about two familiar- looking men whom they passed on the way home. Surprised that his son does not remember them, he reminds him that the two men are Yu the Fifth (Yu Laowu 余老五), well-known for his skill at incubating chickens, and Lu Changgeng 陆长庚, or “Duckman Lu” (Lu Ya 陆鸭), famous for his talent at herding ducks. The father’s comments help to spark the son’s memories, and the rest of the story addresses the narrator’s recollections

94 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” p. 285. 95 Wang Zengqi, “Jiya mingyan,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, I: 76–94. 152 chapter three of these two old peasants, intertwined with reminiscences of his child- hood in his native region. In contrast to “Revenge” and “Old Lu,” “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” does not make any references, whether allegorical or direct, to the subject of war. Nonetheless, the story has many parallels to “Old Lu.” Here, Wang once again eschews the overtly modernist style and psychological focus on interiority he used in “Revenge,” and instead writes in colloquial language about the lives of people in the countryside. There is a strong focus on the special talents of his two main characters. Like Old Lu who learned during his years of soldiering how to use local plants and insects to make delicious dishes, Yu the Fifth and Lu Changgeng have mastered their respective trades through years of hardship and dedication. More- over, like “Old Lu,” the story ends with the narrator’s unanswered ques- tions in which he ponders the fate of former acquaintances who have drifted out of his life: “Why did these two old people come to this area? How are they getting along?”96 The narrator’s journey home in this way inspires him to reflect on peo- ple in his native region, and to recall memories of the past. In the opening scene, the narrator watches his father preparing the duck, and seeing his father’s hands thus engaged triggers memories of his childhood: “When I was little, I loved to watch him use his hands to do these kinds of things, just as I loved to watch him paint pictures and carve seals. I had been away from my father for 10 years, but his hands were still very familiar to me.”97 Whereas in “Revenge,” Wang’s narrator encounters “the enemy,” an allegorized portrait of his divided psyche, and in “Old Lu” he meets a former soldier, in “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck,” he comes into contact with people from his home district and recalls memories attached to this setting. In some respects, the story reads like a map of the narra- tor’s homeland, and is organized around a geographic layout of the farms, waterways, and town of Gaoyou, including “Da’nao” 大淖 (literally, “large marsh”), White Lotus Lake (Bailian hu 白莲湖), the Bridgehead Teahouse (Qiaotou chaguan 桥头茶馆), the Tai Mountain Temple (Taishan miao 泰山庙), and “Yaozhuang” 窑庄, a farming area in Gaoyou. Although the narrator attempts to reconnect with the Other of his past, he discovers that Gaoyou seems very different from what he remembered. Returning from the local store, the narrator reminisces about a poultry

96 Ibid., p. 95. 97 Ibid., p. 76. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 153 shop he used to visit as a child, and wonders about what happened to the man who worked at the store and the street on which it was located “with its old willows and slanting light.”98 However, he discovers that the store no longer exists, and that many new poultry shops have sprung up the area. Similarly the narrator has problems with his memory when at first he cannot remember who Lu and Yu are. Even after his father tells him their names, he realizes that the name Duckman Lu is familiar but not the person himself. Moreover, by beginning his story with a question—“Who were those two men just now?”—Wang highlights the narrator’s faulty memory.99 The narrator continues with five pages of description about his trip back from the store, during which he repeats this question six times. The last time it appears in quotation marks, apparently indicating that it repre- sents the narrator’s spoken rather than unspoken thoughts. Following this, the father finally responds, but with another question: “What—you don’t remember?”100 The opening section of “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” is thus written in a stream-of-consciousness style that is in some ways reminiscent of “Revenge.” And as in “Revenge,” the narrator uses expressions such as “now” and “just a moment ago” (gangcai 刚才) to indicate the immediacy of his thoughts. Only, in this case, the narrator records the thoughts, questions, and memories that flow through his mind as he attempts, with growing frustration, to recall people from his past who have suddenly become strangers to him. About five pages into the story, after the father has responded to his son’s question, the text divides into two sections: the first is devoted to Yu the Fifth and his work as an incubator, and the next to Lu Changgeng and his experiences herding ducks. In these two sections, the narrator uses a first-person perspective, but the story is told in a more realist style, with no sign of the doubt and hesitation expressed in the internal monologue with which the story began. Whereas in the opening section, the narrator hardly recognizes Lu, in the subsequent section he depicts the contours of his face in expressive detail: His eyes were a little less fearful than most peasants’, but they held a deeper despair. He was not like Yu the Fifth, who had wine and food, someone to look after him, and security. He was an unlucky man. His face was small,

98 Ibid., p. 77. 99 Ibid., p. 76. 100 Ibid., p. 80. 154 chapter three

but the pattern of wrinkles on his face was more chaotic [than Lu’s] and expressed more of human life.101 According to the narrator, some of the memories that he writes about date back to when he was six years old. Yet, rather than reflecting the unfiltered consciousness of a young child, the narrator adds many embel- lishments that are clearly not drawn from his own childhood memories. In one scene, for example, he describes Yu the Fifth’s reactions follow- ing the hatching of a group of chickens: “These chicks seemed anxious to use their voices to announce and verify that they were alive. Chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp—the sounds mixed together to make a lively, bustling noise. When the boss heard it, he felt elated.”102 Considered on their own, the last two sections of Wang’s story read as a nostalgic pastoral about the narrator’s home region and the people living there. Yet, when they are viewed in the context of the whole story, it is apparent that the narrator’s smooth and seamless prose represents his careful reinvention and interweaving of a past confected from elusive memories that he cannot quite grasp. Wang’s story thus draws attention to the way memory pieces together and recreates the past from the per- spective of the present. In the latter two segments of the story, Wang’s narrator employs not only a more realist style, but also a divergent temporal framework. Rather than emphasizing the fact that he is narrating in the present moment, he uses the habitual tense, including temporal phrases like “often,” “every day,” “in the evening,” “in the summer,” and “frequently,” along with the tense marker zhe 着, signifying duration, and expressions such as “all along” (yizhi 一直). In addition, he describes the annual tasks and sea- sonal rituals associated with raising ducks and incubating chickens, which begin with the Pure Brightness Festival (Qingming jie 清明节) in April and end with the hatching of ducklings during the summer months. In contrast to the ever-shifting present moment of his stream-of-conscious- ness narration in the opening section, in these latter sections Wang por- trays the passage of time as a cyclical process. In so doing, Wang signals a departure from both his earlier literary style and from many May Fourth writers, whose enlightenment project was founded on the notion of linear temporality, or what Shu-mei Shih describes as the “Darwinian time of

101 Ibid., p. 86. 102 Ibid., p. 84. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 155 linear development” and the “Hegelian time of World History.”103 Instead, Wang offers us a timeless vision of his native region still steeped in the traditional ways of the past. However, the narrator’s nostalgic return to these memories is brought to an abrupt end at the conclusion of the story when the narrator once again expresses his regret over the inexorable pas- sage of time and wonders about the fate of Lu and Yu. In writing about his journey back to his native region of Gaoyou, Wang draws on a long and rich tradition of literature on the theme of the writ- er’s return to his hometown or native land (guxiang 故乡).104 For exam- ple, Sima Qian, in his Records of the Historian, portrays the journey home of Emperor Han Gaozu 汉高祖, founding emperor of the Western Han, to his native region near the end of his life. During a feast prepared in his honor, Emperor Han Gaozu breaks down and weeps as he expresses his deep yearning for his homeland: “The traveler always pines for his native land.”105 Wang also writes within a modern tradition of native-soil litera- ture, including such works as Lu Xun’s “My Native Land” (Guxiang 故乡; 1921) and “New Year’s Sacrifice” (Zhufu 祝福; 1924); his teacher Shen Congwen’s Border Town (Biancheng 边城; 1934) and Random Sketches on a Trip to Hunan (Xiangxing sanji 湘行散记; 1936); and Fei Ming’s Tales of the Bamboo Grove (Zhulin de gushi 竹林的故事; 1925) and Peach Garden (Taoyuan 桃园; 1928). Describing the genre of native-soil fiction, focusing in particular on Lu Xun’s “My Native Land,” “New Year’s Sacrifice,” and “In a Tavern” (Zai jiulou shang 在酒楼上), David Wang writes: For all their thematic and stylistic differences, these stories spotlight a clus- ter of motifs and images which will be elaborated by writers in the next seventy years: the passage of time; the clash between old and new values;

103 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 49. See also Shih, “Time, Modernism, and Cul- tural Power: Local Construction,” in ibid., pp. 1–48. Wang’s portrait of his native region also reflects a traditional concept of time and space as described by Anthony Giddens in his Consequences of Modernity. According to Giddens, one of the hallmarks of modernity is time-space “distanciation.” As Giddens observes with respect to traditional societies: “Time was still connected with space (and place) until the uniformity of time measurement by the mechanical clock was matched by uniformity in the social organization of time. This shift coincided with the expansion of modernity, and was not completed until the current century.” See Giddens, Consequences of Modernity (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), pp. 17–18. 104 For a discussion of a genealogy of writings about the guxiang, and of different pos- sible translations for the term guxiang, see Xiaobing Tang, “Beyond Homesickness: An Intimate Reading of Lu Xun’s ‘My Native Land,’ ” in his Chinese Modern, pp. 74–76. 105 Xiaobing Tang’s translation in ibid., p. 74. For the original text, see Ma Chiying 马吃 盈, ed., Shiji jinzhu 史记今注 (Records of the Historian with Contemporary Annotation), 6 vols. (Taipei: Commercial Press, 1979), I: 343. 156 chapter three

yearning for the lost days of innocence or childhood; (re)encounters with quaint, backward country figures; observations of customs, anxieties about impending change; and mixed feelings of homesickness and fear of going home—all part of the bittersweet experience called nostalgia.106 While Wang Zengqi’s story represents an example of native-soil fiction, his modernist reworking of the native-soil genre more specifically reflects the influence of Shen Congwen who, as discussed above, combined regional language with classical Chinese and a Euro-Japanese literary style in his writings about West Hunan. Moreover, Shen Congwen’s writings on the native land theme are highly intertexual and are self-consciously written within a tradition of exile literature associated with the region of Hunan, which includes Tao Yuanming’s “Record of Peach Blossom Spring” (Taohua yuanji 桃花源记) and Qu Yuan’s The Songs of Chu. Since Shen’s nostalgia is for something that is “imaginary” or textually based, David Wang has coined the term “imaginary nostalgia” to describe Shen’s vision of the native land: The “homeland” he [Shen Congwen] reconstructs must not be regarded merely as a geographical wonderland but as a topographical locus, a tex- tual coordinate that demands multiple readings to lay out its contours. His nostalgia refers not so much to a representational effort to enliven the irre- trievable past as to a creation of an imaginary past on behalf of the present. The “imaginary nostalgia” constitutes one of the most sophisticated parts of Shen Congwen’s native-soil writings, and its lasting influence can be dis- cerned in the native-soil fiction of the eighties.107 Reminiscent of Shen, Wang Zengqi creates “an imaginary past on behalf of the present” in “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” when he weaves together a detailed portrait of Lu and Yu, two peasants whom his nar- rator at first can barely remember. Also, Wang’s story is written within a textual tradition of writings about the native land. Although he does not directly refer to such works as “Record of Peach Blossom Spring” or The Songs of Chu, his story implicitly alludes to other native-soil fiction.108 Yet, whereas many of Shen’s writings about Hunan depict the social ills afflicting his home region, Wang creates a fundamentally idyllic portrait

106 David Wang, Fictional Realism in Twentieth-Century China: Mao Dun, Lao She, Shen Congwen (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992), p. 249. 107 David Wang, “Imaginary Nostalgia: Shen Congwen, Song Zelai, Mo Yan, and Li Yong- ping,” p. 107. 108 In addition to completing a study of Border Town, Wang Zengqi wrote many essays during the 1980s about Shen’s influence on his writing. For a discussion of these essays, see Jeffrey Kinkley, “Shen Congwen’s Legacy in Chinese Literature of the 1980s,” pp. 71–106. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 157 of his hometown of Gaoyou drawn from memories of his childhood, even though he also shows the hardships and sadness experienced by ordinary people living there. In this regard, Wang bears a closer resemblance to Fei Ming who por- trays his native region of Huangmei in Hubei province as a dreamlike pastoral landscape in Tales of the Bamboo Grove.109 As mentioned above, Wang cites Fei Ming as one of the three modern writers whose work most deeply influenced his own, and his essay-like portrait of ordinary rural life has obvious parallels to Fei Ming’s fiction. However, in contrast to Fei Ming, whose stories are told from the perspective of a naïve and inno- cent child, Wang reveals in the stream-of-consciousness introduction to his story that it is written by a knowing adult. Compared to Fei Ming and Shen Congwen, Wang thus draws greater attention to the process through which this kind of literature is produced in the psyche of his exiled nar- rator, who reinvents the salient characteristics of his native land. In doing so, he thereby foregrounds the psychological interiority of the narrator, in particular his problematic memory and postwar sense of dislocation. Nonetheless, despite Wang’s modernist approach to the native-soil genre, at the same time he draws from traditional poetics. In particular, Wang deploys the conventional trope of the “fusion of scene and emotion,” and uses natural imagery as a means of portraying the inner emotions of the narrator. For example, on his way back from the store, the narrator of “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” is filled with a “quiet sadness” as he stands and watches the rushing river: On the sandbank, it was extremely peaceful. However, the sound of 10,000 musical pipes was issuing forth. From the torrential river, there floated up a kind of mysterious yearning, energetic and at the same time somber, a kind of vast and deep call, long and drawn-out, touching the heart with a quiet sadness.110 Here Wang uses water imagery to symbolize the relentless passage of time, as well as to reflect the narrator’s sense of sadness on his return home. In addition, throughout the story the narrator creates poetic links between locations in Gaoyou and his memories of childhood. Wang’s treatment of natural imagery reflects his view that character and environment, like

109 For a more in-depth discussion of Fei Ming’s early native-soil fiction, see Chapter Five of this study. 110 Wang Zengqi, “Jiya mingyan,” pp. 77–78. 158 chapter three character and language, should be in harmony. In “Self-Introduction,” he comments: Writing about landscape provides the characters with their environment. Writing about landscape is also part of portraying a character. Landscape and characterization cannot be separated. One often sees stories with beau- tiful descriptions of the physical environment, but the landscape is only in the author’s mind and has nothing to do with the characters. Sometimes this has the effect of distancing the characters.111 Similarly, in “The Essence of the Short Story,” Wang discusses the impor- tance of linking descriptions of scenery with character. Criticizing writers who portray natural scenery that fails to resonate in a meaningful way with the content of a story or with the characters’ inner lives, he refers to such descriptions as “manmade, externally added, constructed, and unharmonious.”112 Apart from including elements of traditional poetics, Wang’s story also contains references to traditional popular culture, in particular to regional opera. For example, in the opening scene, the narrator watches a married couple working together to haul a cart full of chickens. While the wife pulls the cart, her husband follows behind and pushes it out of the potholes each time it gets stuck. After watching the cart disappear in the distance, the narrator comments that he is reminded of a line from the traditional opera The Flower Drum (Da huagu 打花鼓): “A loving husband and his wife, the clapper never leaves the gong” (恩爱的夫妻, 槌不离锣).113 The Flower Drum is a regional opera performed throughout China, including Jiangsu, Wang Zengqi’s home province. The play tells the story of a married couple from the countryside who have been displaced by famine and struggle to make a living by performing operas.114 Wang’s allusion to this work once again points to the theme of displacement and the struggles of the common people. After watching the couple struggling with their cart, the narrator reflects on the wide variety of chicken breeds, and cites another traditional opera, Old Lady Wang Curses the Chickens (Wangpo ma ji 王婆骂鸡). As he observes, “In Old Lady Wang Curses the Chickens, there

111 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” p. 287. 112 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 20. 113 Wang Zengqi, “Jiya mingyan,” p. 79. 114 See Ding Hanjia 丁汗稼, Da huagu (Nanjing: Jiangsu renmin, 1956). A Wuhan ver- sion of the opera is available online for viewing, accessed January 2, 2013, http://www .tudou.com/programs/view/GN-3dIXs0gk/. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 159 is a long list of chicken breeds. It is a ‘dictionary of chickens.’ ”115 Like The Flower Drum, Old Lady Wang Curses the Chickens, which portrays an elderly woman whose chicken is stolen, is performed regionally in Jiangsu and other provinces.116 As in the case of “Old Lu,” “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” thus reflects Wang’s continued shift in focus away from a high modernist style towards an increased interest in traditional poetics and regional culture and language. Nonetheless, at the same time, Wang combines a diverse mix of regional popular culture, traditional poetics, and experimentation with stream-of-consciousness narration and divergent temporal frames into his native-soil fiction. In doing so, Wang seeks once again to dissolve various divisions—this time between character and setting, past and pres- ent, and the self and the native land. However, despite his efforts to cre- atively interweave a tapestry of memories of the past, the narrator openly exposes the fact that he is not entirely successful in his attempts to recon- nect to the Other of his native land. Rather, his repeated questions and unreliable memory draw attention to his sense of alienation from a past that he can regain only through reinvention.

Chance Encounter on a Homebound Ferry

In “Chance Encounter,” the last story in Wang’s collection and the title piece, his I-narrator is once again on a journey to his native region, from which he has been separated for over 10 years.117 However, in this story, the narrator is on a ferry crossing a river en route to his home. At the beginning of the story, the ferry sets out from the harbor, and the narrator sits looking out the window at the river while he smokes, reads the news- paper, takes a nap, drinks tea, and thinks about the journey ahead. It is a beautiful day without any wind, and the boat makes a smooth departure. During his journey, the narrator has another chance encounter, this time with two performers, a blind man and his daughter, who sing and perform a clapper talk adaptation of a scene from the celebrated Chinese novel Dream of the Red Chamber (Honglou meng 红楼梦; 18th century). Moved

115 Wang Zengqi, “Jiya mingyan,” p. 79. 116 In the opera, the thief is eventually punished in the underworld by being sent back as a maggot, which later gets eaten by a chicken. See the Jiangsu version of the opera online, accessed July 20, 2011, http://v.ku6.com/special/show_2561471/-HnzYLDOibm- VC63o.html. 117 Wang Zengqi, “Xie hou,” in Wang Zengqi quanji, I: 185–96. 160 chapter three by their performance, the narrator is reminded of previous journeys he made across the river to his hometown during his youth, and of perform- ers he saw during these trips. The story ends when the ferry arrives at its destination, and the passengers all spill out of the boat as though “a hemp bag was torn, and all kinds of fruit roll out.”118 Wang foregrounds the theme of journey in this story, echoing a sim- ilar emphasis found in many of his other stories in Chance Encounters and more generally in wartime art and literature discussed in previous chapters. However, in contrast to works such as Mu Dan’s “Walking in the Wilderness” and Ye Qianyu’s “The Road to Free China,” which emphasize patriotic themes associated with journeys made to escape enemy-occupied territory, Wang draws attention to the indeterminate and purposeless nature of his narrator’s journey home after the war. Also, in contrast to the groundedness of Mu Dan’s peripatetic speakers, Wang depicts a kind of disembodied, “floating” movement, not only in the case of his homebound ferry, but also in relation to the monk who appears “floating like a butter­ fly” in “Revenge.” As the boat leaves the harbor, the narrator stares out the window “without purpose, capturing and releasing fleeting images” that pass him by.119 Despite this sense of purposelessness, the narrator’s journey inspires him to reflect on the symbolic meaning attached to travel and to the ferry he is traveling on. Watching the other passengers, he muses that “Every kind of lifestyle is on display on the cabin seats—as if real, also as if an illusion . . . Maybe that is what ‘life’ itself is about. Right now, even though we are ‘crossing the river,’ everyone is together on one ‘boat.’ ”120 Accord- ing to the narrator, life is like a journey down a river, and the boat repre- sents the set of circumstances that briefly brings people together as they travel down their separate paths. Wang’s ferry can thus be read as a meta- phor for the chance encounters depicted in other stories in his collection and provides a mise-en-scène for the meeting in this story between the I-narrator and the blind performer and his daughter. The ferry can also be interpreted as a metaphor for the short story. This reading draws on Wang’s comparison of the short story to a train ride in “The Essence of the Short Story,” an analogy he claims to have drawn from Woolf ’s 1924 modernist manifesto “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown.”

118 Ibid., p. 196. 119 Ibid., p. 185. 120 Ibid. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 161

Her essay describes an elderly woman, Mrs. Brown, who is sitting in the corner of a train carriage on a trip from Richmond to London’s Water- loo Station. Woolf explores various literary techniques for portraying the woman’s character and in doing so analyzes the changing relationship between character and fiction in modern English literature. In particular, Woolf critiques Edwardian writers like Arnold Bennett (1867–1931), whom she argues have ignored the Mrs. Browns of the world in their work, and instead looked “sympathetically out of the window; at factories, at Uto- pias, even and the decoration and upholstery of the carriage.”121 In lieu of the Edwardian emphasis on the superficial “fabric of things,” Woolf calls for a new approach to representing character that attempts to “rescue” the interior life of a Mrs. Brown: “At whatever cost of life, limb, and damage to valuable property, Mrs. Brown must be rescued, expressed, and set in her high relations to the world before the train stopped and she disappeared forever.”122 For Woolf, the train on which Mrs. Brown travels represents not only a trip “from Richmond to Waterloo, but from one age of English literature to the next.”123 In contrast to Woolf, in his adaptation of “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown” in “The Essence of the Short Story,” Wang does not focus on the represen- tation of Woolf ’s elderly traveler, but rather dwells on the motif of travel. He writes: “Let us now just take this matter of the train to explicate the relationship between character and fiction.”124 Next, Wang proposes that his readers envision the train as a work of fiction and the train tracks as Mrs. Browning’s life.125 Boarding the train together with Mrs. Browning and a lot of ink and paper, Mr. XX’s (the name he gives to his notional writer) task is to ask Mrs. Browning all about her life and write down everything that she says. As the train moves down the tracks, Mrs. Brown- ing answers his questions and rehearses her life to date. Mr. XX works furiously to capture everything that she says and does on paper. Finally, the train arrives at the station, and the story ends. However, at the end of his story about Mr. XX and Mrs. Browning, Wang asks the reader “Do you think this is possible?”126 Wang thus casts doubt

121 Virginia Woolf, “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown,” in Mitchell A. Leaska, The Virginia Woolf Reader (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984), p. 205. 122 Ibid., p. 209. 123 Ibid., p. 205. 124 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 21. 125 In his essay, Wang refers to his character as “Bailangning taitai” 白朗宁太太 (Mrs. Browning), rather than as Mrs. Brown as in Woolf ’s original essay. 126 Wang Zengqi, “Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi,” p. 21. 162 chapter three on the feasibility of Woolf ’s project to “truthfully represent” and “rescue” her “ordinary” character, Mrs. Brown, before the train arrives at the sta- tion. Rather, Wang argues that representation is fraught with problems, including the unreliability of memory. Nonetheless, although Wang raises questions about the problematic of representation, he is still content to use the train as a metaphor for fiction. If the train represents the physical space within which the writer has an encounter with his characters, then fiction, in particular the short story, is the literary space within which the author depicts this encounter. In a similar fashion, Wang’s short story “Chance Encounter” can also be read as a further re-adaptation of Woolf ’s essay, albeit relocated on a boat. In contrast to Woolf ’s train, which runs along the clearly laid- out tracks of Mrs. Brown’s life, Wang’s ferry ride more aptly captures the sense of floating and indeterminacy that he associates with the theme of travel and chance encounter between the writer and his characters, or rather between the narrator and his Other. Like Wang’s earlier adaptation of Woolf ’s essay in which the length of the short story is bracketed by a train ride, here too the story begins with the boat leaving the harbor and ends on arrival. In addition, Wang’s story portrays the meeting between a writer and his character, which occurs over the course of a journey. Specif- ically, Wang’s I-narrator is depicted as an author who attempts to describe everything he sees on the ferry. At one point, the narrator searches for the right metaphors to describe the music produced by the blind performer and his daughter: Can you imagine this arrangement? A continuous decorative flower border composed of two colors braided together, two blue ones with a green one in between (purple, yellow, silver red, various colors). What if it were changed to two green borders and one blue one? . . . What—blue, green, it doesn’t seem like it! What is the point of using metaphors?127 Whereas Woolf focuses on the literary representation of Mrs. Brown, Wang’s narrator attempts to translate the rhythmic music produced by his characters into a painterly language of colors. Through so doing, he shifts between the genres of music, short story, and painting. Yet at the same time, the narrator is very critical of his own use of language. “What is the point of using metaphors?” he exclaims with frustration, and later com- pares metaphors to “a trap” that eventually leads nowhere.128 Nonetheless, the narrator repeatedly uses metaphors throughout the story. Apart from

127 Wang Zengqi, “Xie hou,” pp. 191–92. 128 Ibid., p. 192. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 163 comparing the journey across the river to “life” and likening passengers leaving the ferry to fruit falling from a hemp bag, the narrator also uses the metaphor of two roads that eventually merge into one to describe the interweaving of sound as father and daughter take turns singing and playing the clappers.129 In contrast to his frustration with his own writerly language, the narra- tor is deeply moved by the simple music of the performer and his daugh- ter. While in Wang’s earlier rendition of Woolf ’s essay, Mrs. Browning rehearses her life, here the busker duo sing an adaptation of a scene from Dream of the Red Chamber, which the narrator observes is “like a popular folk song,”130 expressing the sorrow of the people. And, whereas in Woolf ’s essay, Mrs. Brown’s performance is viewed only by the author, here the music of the entertainers is appreciated by the I-narrator and the crowd who gather around to listen. In this sense, music, like the ferry itself, serves as a catalyst for the encounter between the performers and the narrator, and between them and other passengers. Moreover, music brings father and daughter into a harmonious relationship as they take turns singing and playing the clappers during their rhythmic performance. Whereas for Woolf, Mrs. Brown, “an old lady of unlimited capacity and infinite variety,” represents “the spirit we live by, life itself,”131 Wang depicts a multifarious and crowded vision of “life” as a journey across a river on a ferry filled with people and music. Also, rather than “rescuing” the interior lives of his characters through his fiction, Wang’s narrator/ writer discovers that his own language is inadequate to depict the moving performance that he witnesses. Indeed, unlike Woolf, Wang’s narrator/ writer in this story is not particularly interested in the interior life of his characters. Rather, he is more concerned with portraying the interrela- tionship between father and daughter as they perform together, as well as between the performers and their audience. There is no doubt that, in many respects, Wang was influenced by Woolf ’s aesthetic theories and by her stream-of-consciousness tech- nique for portraying interiority. However, his later stories from the post- war period reflect a movement away from the prioritization of the inner

129 Ibid. Also, when the narrator first notices the blind performer, for example, he states that “it is as if he had suddenly fallen from a tree.” See ibid., p. 185. In addition, the narra- tor comments that the daughter sings “as if deep in thought.” See ibid., p. 190. Also, at the beginning of the story, the narrator notes that when he first notices the blind performer and looks towards him, it is “as if he had received an order.” See ibid., p. 185. 130 Ibid., p. 190. 131 Virginia Woolf, “Mr. Bennet and Mrs. Brown,” p. 212. 164 chapter three life of his characters towards interest in a larger social canvas. Although Wang continues to use stream-of-consciousness narration in these works, he does so in combination with other literary styles. Also, in contrast to Woolf, Wang’s views on fiction were heavily influenced by traditional Chinese aesthetic ideals of harmony and balance. Whereas Woolf focuses on the importance of representing psychological interiority over a superfi- cial Edwardian “stress upon the fabric of things,”132 Wang instead attempts to create harmony between character and exterior setting, as well as between character and language. Moreover, unlike Woolf, who argues that modern writers need to “begin by throwing away the method”133 of earlier Edwardian writers, Wang envisions the short story as a form that synthesizes both modern and traditional, as well as Eastern and Western aesthetic theories and practices. Thus, in addition to reading “Chance Encounter” as a short story, it can also be read as a piece of aesthetic theory that reworks Woolf ’s essay within a native context and provides a metafictional commentary on the other chance encounters portrayed in Wang’s collection. Viewed in this light, the Others that Wang’s I-narrator meets in this story, and in the other stories in the collection, more broadly represent the source of the narrator’s inspiration that he accidentally happens upon. Indeed, another theme in “Chance Encounter” is artistic inspiration, and in particular wait- ing for inspiration. According to the narrator, meeting the object of his inspiration is like waking in the middle of the day and experiencing the morning sun shining in. As the narrator comments directly prior to his meeting with the blind performer: Living in this world, it is as if you are always waiting with a sense of expecta- tion, waiting for something to look at. Sometimes you are exhausted, your mind rests, your life creeps along like a resting dog and, when something comes up, you wake up, in the middle of the day, and the morning shines through.134 The sense of anticipation that Wang’s narrator expresses here is echoed throughout the story in frequent scenes of people waiting. When the narrator first sees the blind entertainer, he is standing and waiting, look- ing “lonely and helpless.”135 Likewise, at the beginning of the story, the

132 Ibid., p. 207. 133 Ibid., p. 208. 134 Wang Zengqi, “Xie hou,” p. 186. 135 Ibid. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 165 narrator stares out the window at the river and “thinks about the events that might happen during the trip ahead.”136 Whereas “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” expresses the narrator’s confusion about the past, “Chance Encounter” portrays a deep sense of uncertainty and expecta- tion about what lies ahead. In this respect, “Chance Encounter” can be interpreted as a reflection of the period when the story was written, in 1948, shortly before the end of the Chinese Civil War and the beginning of the Mao Era (1949–76). Likewise, the narrator’s journey home after the war mirrors Wang’s own journey home in 1946, a trip that for him marked the end of the War of Resistance. This theme of transition from one era to another echoes Woolf ’s depiction in “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown” of a train carriage that travels from “one age of English literature to the next.” Indeed, for Woolf, her train represents a metaphorical journey not only from one age of literature to another, but from one period of history to another. Accord- ing to Woolf, English writers need to adopt a new aesthetic approach to representing character as a result of a new reality—that “human character [has] changed”137 and “human relations have shifted.”138 She dates this shift to 1910, just prior to the outbreak of World War I. Although Woolf ’s essay was written between the two world wars, over 20 years earlier than Wang’s story, like the latter the motif of travel in her essay reflects on a major social transformation resulting from the cataclysmic violence of world war. Yet, in contrast to Woolf ’s train which is headed for Waterloo Station, Wang’s ferry is homebound and elicits memories of the past and previ- ous journeys home. Nevertheless, as in “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck,” the native land remains elusive, and Wang’s story ends with the boat’s arrival in harbor without depicting the narrator’s return to Gaoyou. “Chance Encounter” thus creates a dialectic, also found in Wang’s other stories, between themes of travel and wandering versus a yearning for connection to the past and attachment to place. In particular, the image of river water in “Chance Encounter” embodies this binary. On the one hand, water is linked to the passage of time and to motifs of travel; on the other hand, water repeatedly reminds the narrator of his former journeys home and of the past. In “Self-Introduction,” Wang discusses the centrality of water to his vision of his native region:

136 Ibid., p. 185. 137 Virginia Woolf, “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown,” p. 194. 138 Ibid., p. 195. 166 chapter three

There are many waterways in our county. To go from the county seat to one of the townships, one usually takes a boat. Almost every peasant family has a boat. Not only did water unconsciously become a backdrop for several of my stories, but it also influenced my style of writing. Water sometimes surges forward and breaks with mighty waves, but there [in my hometown] our water is soft and peaceful, flowing gently.139 The quietly flowing water that Wang describes here resembles the narrator’s depiction in “Chance Encounter” of “soft and gentle river water” and the sense of “peacefulness” on the boat as the eddies and ripples create shadows that sway along the hull.140 According to Wang, a comparable peaceful “flow” also shaped his writing style. Just as he seeks harmony between his characters and their setting, as well as between character and language, Wang is concerned to match his style to the natural setting of his home- town. This flowing, liquid style recalls Su Shi’s writing, which resembles “floating clouds and flowing water.” However, it diverges once again from the iconoclastic aesthetic outlined by Woolf, who describes the “sound of breaking and falling, crashing and destruction,”141 which results from Brit- ish writers’ search for a new means of portraying character—“grammar is violated; syntax disintegrated.”142 Yet, although Wang repeatedly emphasizes the need to strive for har- mony and balance, his writings evince a gap between his own ideals and his highly self-conscious, modernist style. While Wang claims that he wants his writing to flow like water, the narrator in “Chance Encounter” repeatedly interrupts the flow of his discourse to express dissatisfaction with his own use of language. In a similar fashion, in Wang’s other stories, despite his narrators’ attempts to close the gap between self and Other and past and present, they often find themselves uprooted and alienated from the world around them. In “Revenge,” the narrator is beset with a divided consciousness; in “Old Lu,” the narrator is cut off from Lu by a temporal and social divide; and in “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck,” the narra- tor has difficulties remembering people and places from the past. In some respects, the themes of loss and yearning for the past in Wang’s stories echo similar themes found in traditional Chinese poetry. At the same time, the sense of alienation felt by his narrators is linked to their modernist tendency to dwell on psychological interiority even as they

139 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” p. 281. 140 Wang Zengqi, “Xie hou,” p. 195. 141 Woolf, “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown,” p. 209. 142 Ibid., p. 210. the shifting essence of the wartime short story 167 yearn to reconnect with various Others. Moreover, themes of exile are emblematic of the chaotic war years and the postwar period when many refugees returned home to find themselves dislocated from the past and uncertain about the future in the midst of growing civil war. In an effort to write about this chaotic period, Wang experimented with a wide array of traditional and modern genres and forms. The pro- tracted war left Wang dissatisfied with the heroic themes associated with the martial arts story. As a result, he sought to reinvent the martial arts story as a lyric meditation on violence, infused with Freudian and Daoist themes. Likewise, in an attempt to depict the lives of common people, Wang sought to adopt a more colloquial and conversational style. How- ever, he continued to draw heavily from Western modernism, in par- ticular though his employment of a stream-of-consciousness technique of writing. In these stories from Collection of Chance Encounters, Wang expressed his vision of the future for the postwar Chinese short story, at once informed by Western theory, yet closely tied to the daily realities and language of the common people, and to traditions and memories of the past. Like Virginia Woolf, who envisioned Mrs. Brown and Mr. Ben- nett’s train ride would serve as a passageway to “another age of English literature,” Wang hoped through his theories and formal experiments to chart a different course for the short story as China journeyed into a new age of history and modern literature.

CHAPTER FOUR

BETWEEN FORGETTING AND THE REPETITIONS OF MEMORY: FEI MU’S AESTHETICS OF DESOLATION IN SPRING IN A SMALL TOWN

Heroism has strength but no beauty and thus seems to lack humanity. Tragedy, however, resembles the matching of bright red with deep green: an intense and unequivocal contrast. And yet it is more exciting than truly revelatory. The reason desolation resonates far more profoundly is that it resembles the conjunction of scallion green with peach red, creating an equivocal contrast. I like writing by way of equivocal contrast because it is relatively true to life.1 Like wartime cartoonists, poets, dramatists, and other artists who traveled inland to promote the cause of resistance, the Chinese film industry was also displaced to the Nationalist interior during the War of Resistance. The Nationalist government-owned Central Film Studio (Zhongyang diangy- ing sheyingchang 中央电影摄影场) and China Motion Pictures Studio (Zhongguo dianying zhipianchang 中国电影制片厂) were relocated to Chongqing, where the government encouraged the production of docu- mentary and feature films to promote the war effort. However, political instability, inflation, supply problems, and inadequate means of distribu- tion made it difficult to create high-quality films, and both Central Film and China Motion Pictures were forced to suspend filmmaking activities between 1941 and 1943.2 Although film studios in “Orphan Island” (gudao 孤岛) Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Manchuria operated throughout most of the war, working under the watchful eye of Japanese censors, filmmakers in the occupied regions were unable to produce films that explored in depth the experiences of ordinary people in wartime.

1 Eileen Chang, “Writing of One’s Own,” p. 17; Zhang Ailing, “Ziji de wenzhang,” p. 285. 2 See Yingjin Zhang’s discussion of the Nationalist government’s wartime operations in the hinterland in his Chinese National Cinema (New York: Routledge, 2004), pp. 92–94. Also, see Jay Leyda, Dianying: An Account of Films and the Film Audience in China (Cam- bridge: MIT Press, 1972), pp. 114–158. For scripts of films produced in the Nationalist interior during the war, see Zhang Junxiang 张骏祥, ed., Dianying 电影 (Films), in Lin Mohan, ed., Zhongguo kangri zhanzheng shiqi dahoufang wenxue shuxi, vol. 18 (Chongqing: Chongqing, 1989). 170 chapter four

By the end of the war, Chinese audiences were eager for new films about the War of Resistance. In his study of postwar film in China, Paul Picko- wicz describes the tense mood in postwar Shanghai where a riot broke out at the Strand Theater in June 1946 when customers angrily protested the screening of yet another old Charlie Chaplin movie.3 Similarly, local newspapers expressed frustration and asked why there were no new Chi- nese films.4 In fact, the expanding civil war had brought about delays in the government’s nationalization of Japanese-controlled studios and the relocation of Central Motion Pictures to Shanghai and Beijing. In 1946, the Nationalist government completed its takeover of Japanese film facilities, and several private studios, including Wenhua 文华 and Kunlun 昆仑, were established or revived from the prewar period.5 By late 1946 and early 1947, film production had dramatically increased,6 and a string of celebrated postwar epics, including Cai Chusheng 蔡楚生 (1906–68) and Zheng Junli’s 郑君里 (1911–69) The Spring River Flows East (Yi jiang chun- shui xiang dong liu 一江春水向东流; 1947) and Shi Dongshan’s 史东山 (1902–55) Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon (Baqian lilu yun he yue 八千里路云和月; 1947), were released. The final few years before the CCP’s victory witnessed an explosion of filmmaking in what would be remembered as China’s second “golden age”7 of cinema. Not only were these films tremendously popular among postwar audiences, but they would also leave an indelible mark on the Chinese collective memory.8

3 Paul Pickowicz, “Victory as Defeat: Postwar Visualizations of China’s War of Resis- tance,” in Wen-hsin Yeh, ed., Becoming Chinese: Passages to Modernity and Beyond (Berke- ley: University of California Press, 2000), p. 366. 4 See ibid. 5 See Du Yunzhi’s 杜云之 discussion of Nationalist government-owned and private studios in postwar China in his Zhonghua minguo dianying shi 中华民国电影史 (History of Film in the Republic of China; Taipei: Xingzhengyuan wenhua jianshe weiyuanhui, 1988), Chapters 14, 15, and 16. 6 See Zhang Yingjin, “The postwar film market: Hollywood versus native film,” in Chi- nese National Cinema, pp. 95–97. 7 Teo regards prewar film of the early 1930s as a “golden age” of modern Chinese film, and Leo Ou-fan Lee argues that the postwar period was another golden age. See Stephen Teo, Hong Kong Cinema: The Extra Dimensions (London: British Film Institute, 1997), p. x. See also Leo Ou-fan Lee, “The Tradition of Modern Chinese Cinema: Some Preliminary Explorations and Hypotheses,” in Chris Berry, ed, Perspectives on Chinese Cinema (London: British Film Institute, 1991), p. 6. 8 Following its release in October 1947, The Spring River Flows East broke records at the box office. See Zheng Junli 郑君里, “Weishenme paishe Yijiang chunshui xiang dong liu” 为什么拍摄一江春水向东流 (Why I made The Spring River Flows East), Renmin Ribao, Sept. 23, 1956. The popularity of these films and their central role in shaping China’s col- lective memories of the War of Resistance is also evidenced by the many re-releases and remakes of postwar film classics. Following its release in 1947, The Spring River Flows East between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 171

In particular, postwar films gave voice to widespread popular senti- ments that cast “victory as defeat.”9 As Chinese citizens grappled with the immense scale of wartime destruction, rampant inflation, and a growing civil war, the initial excitement produced by victory over the Japanese rapidly faded. The assassination in 1946 of poet Wen Yiduo by Nationalist government secret agents sparked a series of protest rallies and scenes of mourning in cities throughout China, and deepened the realization that the violence of the long war had in no way ended. A memorable scene at the end of Ba Jin’s (1904–2005) famous 1947 novel Cold Nights (Han ye 寒夜) captured these postwar sentiments of despair particularly well, portraying the tubercular protagonist lying sick in bed as he listens to the victory celebrations happening outside. As in Ba Jin’s novel, postwar epics such as The Spring River Flows East, Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon, and Chen Liting’s 陈鲤庭 (1910–) Distant Love (Yaoyuan de ai 遥远的爱; 1947) all portrayed emasculated male characters unable to prevent the disintegration and demise of their families.10 Like post-WWII films in the United States and Europe that, according to Kaja Silverman, focused “obsessively and at times erotically on the physical and psychic mutilation”11 of male characters, Chinese films dwelt on male illness and powerlessness in their depiction of the wounds of war. Filmed in the bombed ruins of a former mansion in a small town outside Shanghai, Fei Mu’s 1948 classic Spring in a Small Town features a sick male protagonist, Dai Liyan 戴礼言, the eldest son of a declining elite family, who suffers from lung and heart disease. Living separately from his wife Zhou Yuwen 周玉纹 in their bombed-out estate along with his 16-year-old sister, Dai Xiu 戴秀, and their one remaining servant, Lao Huang 老黄,

was re-released in 1956 and again in 1979, both times accompanied by commemorative articles. See Zhu Jinming, “Chunshui dongliu yi guren” 春水东流忆古人 (The Spring River Flows East, Remembering People from the Past), Dazhong dianying 2 (1979): 10–11. The Spring River Flows East was remade as a Taiwanese television drama in 2004. Similarly, Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon was adapted as a television show in Taiwan in 1989 and as a Chinese miniseries in 2003. 9 Paul Pickowicz, “Victory as Defeat,” p. 342. According to Pickowicz, director Shi Dongshan described the experience of victory as a kind of defeat. Shi’s statement can be found in a handout given to ticket-holders as they entered the theater to see Eight Thou- sand Miles of Clouds and Moon in 1947. The handout is conserved by the Film Archive of China (Zhongguo dianying ziliao guan 中国电影资料馆). 10 For a discussion of the prevalence of weak male figures in postwar film, see Pickow- icz, “Victory as Defeat,” pp. 365–98. See also Bret Sutcliffe, “A spring river flows east: ‘pro- gressive’ ideology and gender representation,” accessed July 10, 2012, http://www.latrobe .edu.au/screeningthepast/firstrelease/fir1298/bsfr5c.html. 11 Kaja Silverman, Male Subjectivity at the Margins (New York: Routledge, 1992), p. 53. 172 chapter four

Fig. 4.1. Yuwen walks daily along the ruins of the city wall in Spring in a Small Town.

Liyan barely talks to his wife. Nor does Yuwen speak to anyone else, but spends most of her time walking aimlessly and alone along the bombed city wall (Fig. 4.1). One day their lives are disrupted when Liyan’s friend Zhang Zhichen 张志忱, a doctor of Western medicine, comes to visit. Unbeknownst to Liyan, Yuwen and Zhang were childhood sweethearts, and their feelings are rekindled upon seeing each other again. When Liyan discovers that his wife is in love with Zhichen, he tries to commit suicide and nearly dies of a heart attack, only to be saved by Zhichen. Remorseful and weighed down by a sense of responsibility, Yuwen stays to care for her husband. On its release in 1948, the film attracted some positive reviews, but was criticized by left-wing critics for its sympathetic portrayal of the landlord class and its lack of a clear “progressive” message.12 During the 1950s,

12 For positive reviews of Spring in a Small Town, see Ding Yaping 丁亚平, Ying­xiang Zhongguo: Zhongguo dianying yishu 影像中国中国电影艺术, 1945–1949 (Imagining China: Chinese Film Art, 1945–1949; Beijing: Wenhua yishu, 1998), pp. 469–78. For nega- tive reviews by left-wing critics, see Ru Huo 茹获, “Lüetan Xiaocheng zhi chun” 略谈小城 之春 (A Short Discussion on Spring in a Small Town), Dagong bao, October 20, 1948. See also Shi Man 石曼, “Dakai shiye de chuangzi—Kan Xiao cheng zhichun hougan” 打开视野 的窗子看小城之春后感 (Opening the Window onto One’s Field of Vision—Impressions after Watching Spring in a Small Town), Dagong bao, October 20, 1948. On the critical reception of Spring in a Small Town in postwar China, see Chen Mo 陈墨, Fei Mu dian­ ying lungao—Liuying chunmeng 费穆电影论稿—流莺春梦 (Essays on the Films of Fei Mu—Wandering Bird and Spring Dream; Beijing: Zhongguo dianying, 2000), pp. 461–78. According to Wei Wei, the lead actress in Spring in a Small Town, the film was not a great success with postwar audiences in Shangahi, although it was better received in Kunming and Chongqing. See “Fang Wei Wei” 访韦伟 (Interview with Wei Wei), in Huang Ailing between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 173

Fei Mu was denounced by the CCP, and his film was banned for several decades. In his History of the Development of Chinese Cinema (Zhongguo dianying fazhanshi 中国电影发展史; 1961), Marxist critic Cheng Jihua echoed the widespread criticism of the film by asserting that although it was characterized by superior artistry, it was also a “negative and back- ward work,” whose “intellectual content was completely divorced from the great struggle of the people’s liberation.”13 However, in the wake of Mao’s death in 1976, scholars and critics, now pursuing a softer line, conceded that the Party had misjudged the film and overturned their previous indictment of Fei Mu. As a result, Spring in a Small Town became available to a younger generation of film scholars and directors in mainland China, who embraced it as a “newly discov- ered” classic.14 In 2002, Tian Zhuangzhuang 田壮壮 (1952–) produced a remake of the film and in the credits paid homage to “China’s pioneering filmmakers.” The same year it was voted the best modern Chinese film of the past 100 years by the Hong Kong Film Association.15 Like many other contemporary directors, Zhang Yimou 张艺谋 (1951–) praised Fei Mu as a master of modern Chinese film,16 and Hong Kong film director Stan- ley Kwan 关锦鹏 (1957–) paid a further tribute to him in his 1992 film Ruan Lingyu 阮玲玉 (a.k.a Centre Stage). Similarly, scholars in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan published essays praising Fei Mu’s use of traditional aesthetics and hailed the film as a paradigmatic example of “Eastern cinema.”17

黄爱玲, ed., Shiren daoyan—Fei Mu 诗人导演—费穆 (The Poet Director—Fei Mu; Hong Kong: Hong Kong Film Critics Association, 1998), p. 206. Susan Daruvala points out that the short run of the film in Shanghai may have been due to distribution problems. See her “The Aesthetics and Moral Politics of Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town,” Journal of Chinese Cinemas 1.3 (Sept. 2007): 171. 13 Cheng Jihua, Zhongguo dianying fazhanshi, 2 vols. (Beijing: Zhongguo dianying, 1998), II: 272. Also, Cheng criticized the film for its “narcotic” effect on audiences. See ibid. 14 Chen Mo 陈墨, “Buxiu de Xiaocheng zhi chun” 不朽的小城之春 (The Timeless Spring in a Small Town), in his Bainian dianying shanhui 百年电影闪回 (A Retrospective on One Hundred Years of Chinese Film; Beijing: Zhongguo jingji, 2000), p. 175. 15 Hong Kong Film Awards, “The Best 100 Chinese Motion Pictures,” accessed July 10, 2012, http://www.hkfaa.com/news/100films.html. 16 See Zhang Yimou’s comments in Ni Zhen, Memoirs from the Beijing Film Academy: The Genesis of China’s Fifth Generation, Chris Berry, tr. (Durham: Duke University Press, 2002), p. 103; see also interview between Zhang Yimou and Zhu Jun 朱军, accessed July 10, 2012, http://book.qq.com/s/book/0/5/5498/70.shtml. 17 Ying Xiong 应雄, “Xiacheng zhichun yu ‘dongfang dianying’ ” 小城之春与东方电影 (Spring in a Small Town and ‘Eastern Cinema’), Dianying yishu (1993) 1:11–18 and (1993) 2:46–51; see also the essays collected in Wu Zhongli 吴中立, ed., Xiaocheng zhi chun de dianying meixue 小城之春的电影美学向费穆致敬 (The Film Aesthetics of Spring in a 174 chapter four

In contrast to these recent interpretations of Fei Mu’s film as a “time- less” masterpiece characterized by a quintessentially national style, in this chapter I instead seek to contextualize Spring in a Small Town within the period when it was produced, in the wake of the War of Resistance. Analyzing Fei Mu’s use of voiceover narration and cinematography, I argue that he experiments with modernist film noir techniques in order to bring to life the psychological experience of postwar life.18 Through voicing over the film’s unstable narrator Yuwen, who can neither forget nor remember the past, Fei Mu gives expression to the traumatized con- sciousness of people in the aftermath of war. Also, he utilizes long take shots, dissolves, low camera angles, and chiaroscuro effects to recreate the disorienting sense of life amidst ruins of the old society. As Fei Mu commented in a letter to Yang Ji written shortly after the film’s release, Spring in a Small Town was a “crazy and bold” (kuangwang er dadan 狂妄而大胆) experiment intended to portray the “bleak mood of ancient China” through the use of long takes and a slow-moving camera.19 Despite his use of film noir techniques, Fei Mu also borrows heavily from traditional aesthetics, including elements of lyric poetry, traditional theater, and landscape painting. In analyzing Fei Mu’s artistry in Spring in a Small Town, I draw on Eileen Chang’s theories of wartime “desola- tion.” Chang argues that, in contrast to the stark oppositions of tragedy, desolation is “a form of revelation” characterized by “equivocal contrasts” that are “relatively true to life,” resembling not the bold contrast of pri- mary colors but rather “the conjunction of scallion green with peach red.”20 Chang’s conception of desolation thus refers to an in-between grey area of subtle contrasts, or what Nicole Huang describes as her “aesthetics of liminality.”21 In a way reminiscent of Chang’s writings, Fei Mu focalizes

Small Town—A Tribute to Fei Mu; Taibei: Shenshi yishu, 1996); Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan. 18 Chen Mo also argues that Spring in a Small Town embodies a kind of realism. See Chen Mo, “Fei Mu dianying lun” 费穆电影论 (On the Films of Fei Mu), Dangdai dianying 8.9 (1997): 39. 19 Fei Mu, “Daoyan juzuozhe—Xie gei Yang Ji” 导言剧作者写给杨纪 (Director, Script- writer—Written for Yang Ji), in Huang Ailing, Shiren daoyan, p. 99. This piece is dated September 9, 1948. Fei Mu comments: “In order to convey the bleak mood of ancient China, I used long takes and a slow-moving camera to create my drama (without any techniques), and made an experiment that was both crazy and bold” (我为了传达古老 中国的灰色情绪，用“长镜头”和“慢动作”构造我的戏（无技巧的），做了一 个狂妄而大胆的尝试。). 20 Eileen Chang, “Writing of One’s Own,” p. 17; Zhang Ailing, “Ziji de wenzhang,” p. 285. 21 Nicole Huang, Women, War, and Domesticity, p. 135. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 175 his film on various liminal sites or “equivocal contrasts” between tradition and modernity, past and present, the spring setting and the ruins of war. In so doing, he effectively portrays an atmosphere of desolation and dra- matizes schizophrenic postwar realities. More generally, he draws from a practice in traditional poetry of juxtaposing images in parallel couplets to produce subtle and evocative contrasts. In the first section of this chapter, I discuss Fei Mu’s reworking of Li Tianji’s script about the return home of a young male intellectual into a portrayal of a family’s daily life amidst the ruins of war. Next, I analyze Fei Mu’s prewar and wartime films and theoretical writings so as to bet- ter contextualize changes in his style that occurred over the course of the war period. Then I discuss how Fei Mu’s film relates to other postwar films in its depiction of victory as defeat. In the following two sections, I examine Fei Mu’s use of voiceover narration and his experimentation with cinematography. Finally, I provide an analysis of his aesthetics of desolation. Interpreting the film in dialogue with Eileen Chang’s writings, I also discuss its links with Su Shi’s song lyric “A Spring Scene,” which Fei Mu recited to Li Tianji after reading his script.

From Bitter Love to Spring in a Small Town

In dealing with reality, writing a prescription is impossible because reality is a fossil formed over thousands of years and cannot easily be cured by any medicine. National cinema cannot hope for help from outside to provide it with a “way out” [chulu], but rather must save itself.22 In contrast to many other postwar Chinese films that employed large casts and told epic stories of families torn apart by the War of Resistance, Spring in a Small Town was shot with only five actors, using three interior sets.23 The five characters in the film are featured in a 1948 advertisement (Fig. 4.2, Plate Section). Zhichen appears in a sealed-off bubble that hov- ers above the main scene in the upper right-hand corner, while family ser- vant Lao Huang sits alone in the background, looking down at the ground and set against the ruins of the estate. Similarly, Yuwen stands by herself in the front left-hand corner of the poster. Disengaged from one another,

22 Fei Mu, “Guochan pian de ‘chulu’ wenti” 国产片的出路问题 (The Problem of a “Way Out” for National Film), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, p. 95. 23 Huang Ailing, “Fang Wei Wei,” p. 203. 176 chapter four the characters stare out towards the camera (or the viewer), conveying a sense of isolation and alienation. In an interview with Hong Kong film critic Huang Ailing, the film’s lead actress, Wei Wei 韦伟 (1922–), recalled that a minimalist approach was adopted with Spring in a Small Town in order to save money. As she recalls, Wenhua Productions opted to shoot amateur screenwriter Li Tian- ji’s film at low cost in order to make enough profit to cover the expenses of their more ambitious production, A Good Husband and Wife (Hao fuqi 好夫妻).24 However, the film’s minimalist aesthetic was also the result of Fei Mu’s editing. According to Li Tianji, Fei Mu requested that he cut out almost two thirds of the original script.25 For example, he reduced the original six characters to five by removing Liyan’s traditional physician from the story and transforming Zhichen into a doctor of modern West- ern medicine. Also, Fei Mu took out Li’s subplot of a budding romance between Zhichen and Dai Xiu, arguing that Dai Xiu was too young and innocent to understand the notion of romance. In some ways, Fei Mu’s reworking of Li’s script into a story about a modern doctor’s return to his hometown echoes Lu Xun’s account in his “Preface to Call to Arms” (Nahan xuyan 呐喊序言; 1922) of his dream of studying to become a doctor so that he could return home and help his countrymen: My dream was a beautiful one: after graduation, I’d go home and allevi- ate the suffering of all those unfortunates who had been victimized like my father. In the event of war, I’d become a surgeon in the military; and in any case, I would strengthen my countrymen’s faith in modernization.26 Lu Xun recalls that he later became disillusioned and gave up his dream of becoming a doctor—although he still hoped to employ literature as a form of medicine to treat the soul of the Chinese people. However, in contrast to Lu Xun, in Spring in a Small Town Fei Mu does not valorize the modern doctor or Western medicine. Although Zhichen manages to pre- vent Liyan dying following his suicide attempt, the image of Liyan walk- ing feebly with a cane at the end of the movie suggests that the modern

24 Ibid., p. 201. 25 See Li Tianji’s essay on his three meetings with Fei Mu to edit his script, “Sanci shou jiaoyu: Youran yongjue” 三次受教育悠然永诀 (Receiving Instruction Three Times: Dis- tant Parting Forever), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, pp. 189–93. 26 William Lyell, tr., “Preface to Call to Arms,” in his Lu Xun: Diary of a Madman and Other Stories (Honolulu: University of Hawaii, 1990), p. 23; Lu Xun, “Nahan xuyan,” in Lu Xun quanji, I: 416. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 177 doctor lacks long-term solutions to the problems of the old society and the disappearing landowning class. As Fei Mu remarked in his letter to Yang Ji about the bleak, hopeless ending of the film, he and Li Tianji were unwilling to force a facile “way out” for the characters.27 Li also remembered that Fei Mu encouraged him to reconsider the title and thematic focus of the film. Originally called Bitter Love (Kulian 苦恋), the title was first changed to Lost Love (Mishi de aiqing 迷失的 爱情) before the pair finally agreed on Spring in a Small Town. Li recalled how Fei Mu asked him whether the story in fact had much if anything to do with love. On reflection, he conceded that it actually had more to do with “dejection” (kumen 苦闷).28 Rather than telling a plot-driven story about “lost love,” Fei Mu let the ruins of war tell their own story through his cinematography. Asked by Li about his editing choices and decision to film in a bombed-out mansion, Fei Mu responded somewhat enigmati- cally, “Sometimes a cinematic frame can speak volumes.”29 In another important change, Fei Mu shifted the narrative perspective of the film from the modern intellectual Zhichen to Yuwen. Apart from add- ing the voiceover for Yuwen, he changed the beginning and ending of the film. Li’s original script opened with Zhichen walking into the small town and ended with him leaving town “facing the sunlight,” striding away from the romantic entanglements of the past.30 Reminiscent of Juehui 觉慧 in Ba Jin’s Family ( Jia 家; 1933), Zhichen’s departure from his hometown was constructed as a teleological journey away from the countryside towards a bright personal future. At the end of Family, Juehui happily leaves home on a boat, traveling down a relentlessly “on-rushing river”: The past seemed like a dream. All that met his eye now was an expanse of deep green water, reflecting trees and hills. . . .

27 Fei Mu, “Daoyan juzuozhe—Xie gei Yang Ji,” p. 99. 28 Li Tianji, “Wei le fanwan ganshang dianying” 为了饭碗赶上电影 (Hurrying to Make Films for Food), in Li Tianji dianying juzuo xuan 李天济电影剧作选 (Selected Filmscripts of Li Tianji; Beijing: Xuelin, 1996), p. 331. In an essay about her father, Fei Mingyi also recalls that when she mistook Spring in a Small Town for a romance, her father told her that she must have been exposed to too many Hollywood films; see Fei Mingyi 费明仪, “Fei Mu xiansheng—Wo de fuqin” 费穆先生— 我的父亲 (Mr. Fei Mu—My Father), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, p. 8. 29 Zhu Tianwei 朱天纬, “Dui Xiaocheng zhi chun juzuojia he zuoqujia de fangwen” 对小城之春剧作家和作曲家的访问 (Interview with the Screenwriter and Composer of Spring in a Small Town), presented at the “Conference on Research on Fei Mu’s Films,” held at the Beijing Archives on March 3, 1997; cited in Chen Mo, Fei Mu dianying lungao, p. 361. 30 Li Tianji, “Wei le fanwan ganshang dianying,” p. 337. 178 chapter four

This river, this blessed river, was taking him away from the home he had lived in for eighteen years to a city and people he had never seen. The pros- pect dazzled him; he had no time to regret the life he had cast behind. For the last time, he looked back. “Goodbye,” Juehui said softly. He turned to watch the on-rushing river, the green water that never for an instant halted its rapidly advancing flow.31 In Ba Jin’s novel, as in Li’s original script, the countryside is constructed as the site of the past, and the intellectual’s journey away from home par- allels the “rapidly advancing flow” of the river, symbolizing the progres- sive movement of the revolution. However, the final version of Spring in a Small Town dispensed with this theme. According to Li, “after the film was changed, it opened with Yuwen and ended with a focus on Yuwen and her husband.”32 Fei Mu thus portrayed a very different story when at the end of the film he positioned the camera behind Yuwen and her husband as they stood on the ruined wall watching the Western-trained doctor leave (Fig. 4.3). Instead of depicting revolutionary heroics, Fei Mu focused on the sense of homelessness and loss experienced by those left behind amidst the ruins of war. Fei Mu also made changes to the beginning of the film by adding a brief flash-forward to a scene that occurs at the end of the film, where Zhang Zhichen, Lao Huang, and Dai Xiu leave for the train station. In place of Li’s teleologically constructed plot, Fei Mu thus created a film with a circular structure that ends where it began. In addition, by both beginning and ending the film with images of Yuwen on the city wall, Fei Mu reworked Li’s script into a story about aimless wandering. In this sense, Yuwen is similar to the peripatetic figures in Wang Zengqi’s stories who travel with- out a clear sense of purpose. Yet, in contrast to the other works discussed in this study, and also unlike Li Tianji, Fei Mu replaced a male intellectual with a female character to represent the “consciousness” of the film. After making many adjustments to Li Tianji’s script—as Zhang Hong- mei 张鸿眉 (1927–), the actress who played Dai Xiu, recalls in her essay “Fei Mu Told Me to Forget it” (Fei Mu jiao wo wangdiao ta 费穆叫我忘 掉它)—Fei Mu instructed the cast to simply forget the script.33 Fearing that an overly crafted and heavily staged plot would make the film seem

31 Ba Jin, Family, Olga Lang, tr. (Prospect Heights: Doubleday, 1972), p. 329; for original Chinese, see Ba Jin, Jia (Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1981), p. 390. 32 Li Tianji, “Wei le fanwan ganshang dianying,” p. 337. 33 Zhang Hongmei, “Fei Mu jiao wo wangdiao ta,” in Huang Ailing, Shiren daoyan, p. 210. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 179

Fig. 4.3. Yuwen and Liyan watch Zhichen leave at the end of Spring in a Small Town. unrealistic, Fei Mu opted for naturalness and spontaneity. In one scene, where the four main characters go boating together and break into song, Fei Mu recorded the song live instead of dubbing it afterwards to create a more natural effect. Likewise, he instructed Zhang Hongmei to wear her own clothes and shoes and keep her hair in braids for filming; he also told Wei Wei to incorporate her own “daily habits” into her performance, like loosening her collar after drinking too much and crumpling her handker- chief between her palms.34 Through his adaptation of Li Tianji’s script, Fei Mu thus transformed the original story about a progressive young intel- lectual who leaves his past behind in the countryside into a “natural” and “lifelike” portrait of a family’s daily life amidst the ruins of war.

The Modern Sage

While Spring in a Small Town represents a major departure from Li Tianji’s screenplay, it also diverges from Fei Mu’s earlier works. In contrast to Spring in a Small Town, in which Fei Mu refused to depict a “way out” for China, many of his earlier films promoted traditional Confucian morality

34 Huang Ailing, “Fang Wei Wei,” p. 206. 180 chapter four as the solution to the problems facing modern China. Indeed, because of the prevalence of Confucian thought in both his films and theoretical writings, he was referred to by some contemporaries as a “modern sage” (modeng shengren 摩登圣人), an intellectual who embodied the ideals of traditional Confucian morality in the modern era.35 These concerns are found in Fei Mu’s 1935 film Filial Piety (Tianlun 天伦), which critiques the “spiritual pollution” of modern times and advo- cates a return to traditional morality.36 Produced by United China Film (Lianhua 联华), the film was used to promote the Nationalist govern- ment’s fascist New Life Movement (Xin shenghuo yundong 新生活运动) that Chiang Kai-shek (1887–1975) had founded in 1934. Filial Piety was also one of the first Chinese films to be distributed in the United States.37 Released under the title Song of China (1936), it was marketed as an authentic Chinese film embodying “immortal themes” drawn from tradi- tional Chinese culture. The opening credits read: For more three thousand years, filial piety has remained the dominant force in China’s history and culture. In their religion, philosophy, drama, litera- ture, and music, it is truly the “Song of China.” The immortal theme is again presented in this authentic picture of modern China, which was produced, written, directed, acted, photographed, and musically scored in China by Chinese and first presented at the Grand Theatre, on Bubbling Well Road, Shanghai[,] China.38 In Filial Piety, Fei Mu depicts the return of the prodigal son Sun Liting 孙礼庭 to see his father shortly before his father’s death. On his death- bed, the father berates his son for his wayward lifestyle and encourages Liting to mend his ways and nurture a love for mankind. In an effort to heed his father’s words and protect his children from the evils of the Westernized city of Shanghai, several decades later Liting moves to the countryside where he devotes his energies to building an orphanage. He is

35 See Shu Yan 舒湮, “Tianlun ping er” 天伦评二 (Second Review of Filial Piety), in Chen Bo 陈播, ed., Sanshi niandai Zhongguo dianying pinglun wenxuan 三十年代中国 电影评论文选 (Selection of Reviews of Chinese Films from the 1930s; Beijing Zhongguo dianying, 1993), p. 417. Shu Yan also comments that Filial Piety “uses a new intellectual framework to explicate Confucian benevolence.” See ibid. 36 For an analysis of Filial Piety, see Paul Pickowicz, “The Theme of Spiritual Pollution in Chinese Films of the 1930s,” Modern China 17.1 (January, 1991): 57–61. 37 See “1935: Fei Mu, Lianhua, and Song of China,” The Chinese Mirror, a Journal of Chinese Film History, accessed June 10, 2011, http://www.chinesemirror.com/index/2010/09/1935- fei-mu-lianhua-and-song-of-china.html. 38 Song of China is available for viewing online. See Fei Mu, Tianlun, accessed June 10, 2011, http://site.douban.com/widget/videos/2322804/video/55112/. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 181 eventually abandoned by all of his children, although his grandson Sun Yutang 孙玉堂 later returns to live with him. However, the film ends more happily with a family reunion shortly before Liting’s death, when his son and daughter both come to pay their final respects and he exhorts them to embrace Confucius’ teachings and show benevolence towards others. In the final scene, Liting’s orphans appear marching happily across the screen. A central theme of Filial Piety is the juxtaposition of an idealized rural life against the corrupt Westernized city, a theme also found in Fei Mu’s films Night in the City (Chengshi zhi ye 城市之夜; 1933), and Life (Ren­ sheng 人生; 1934).39 As Zhang Yingjin notes, Filial Piety conveys a “uto- pian vision of an idyllic countryside as a safe haven from urban evils.”40 In these early films, Fei Mu posits Westernized modernity, symbolized by the city, as the source of modern China’s problems. In contrast, he advocates a return to the countryside and to traditional values of benevolence and filial piety as a means of restoring the integrity of both the modern family and modern society. In particular, the patriarchal figure of Sun Liting is depicted as a kind of “modern sage” who renounces his former ways and makes a positive contribution to society through adhering to traditional virtues. In some respects, Fei Mu resembles other early Republican-era film- makers who critiqued the evils of modernity and called for a return to tra- ditional values in order to solve the problems facing modern China. Zhang Shichuan 张石川 (1890–1954) and Zheng Zhengqiu’s 郑正秋 (1889–1935) Orphan Rescues Grandfather (Gu’er jiu zu ji 孤儿救祖记; 1923), for exam- ple, is a multi-generational family drama that juxtaposes the vices and greed of the younger generation against traditional virtues. The symbol- ism of this situation could not be missed. As Zhang Yingjin comments, “the message of ‘rescuing grandfather’ (or tradition) in family dramas was undoubtedly a reference to ‘rescuing the nation.’ ”41 However, Fei Mu’s focus on traditional morality set him apart from a growing number of leftist filmmakers who were concerned with portraying the suffering and exploitation experienced by the poor in such films as Cai Chusheng’s Song of the Fisherman (Yuguang qu 渔光曲; 1934).

39 Both Night in the City and Life have been lost. 40 Yingjin Zhang, Chinese National Cinema, p. 81. 41 Ibid., p. 57. 182 chapter four

In the wake of growing Japanese aggression and the occupation of Manchuria in 1931, like many other filmmakers, Fei Mu used cinema as a tool to promote the cause of national salvation, and in 1936, he directed the anti-Japanese film Blood on Wolf Mountain. Following the outbreak of the War of Resistance, he remained in Shanghai where he produced both stage dramas and films. His most well-known work from this period is Confucius (Kong fuzi 孔夫子; 1940; Fig. 4.4, Plate Section). Like Filial Piety, Confucius advocates a return to traditional morality. Set during the Warring States period (475–221 BC), the film follows Confucius as he travels throughout China for 14 years, attempting unsuccessfully to spread his teachings before returning home to his native state of Lu to write the Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu 春秋). Reminiscent of Filial Piety, the film ends with a deathbed scene in which Confucius dispenses advice to his descendants. Confucius exhorts his grandchildren: “Rec- tify the mind, be sincere, cultivate moral character, establish harmony at home, institute order in the state, and bring tranquility to the world” (正心诚意修身齐家治国平天下).42 According to one account, the film was well-received by Shanghai audi- ences who interpreted Fei Mu’s portrayal of corrupt officials as an implicit critique of the puppet government of Wang Jingwei 汪精卫 (1883–1944).43 In particular, the audience responded with resounding applause to one scene in which Confucius’s disciple Zilu 子路 (542–480 BC) fights his enemies to the death before retying the tassels on his hat, expressing his adherence to Confucian propriety even in the face of death. As Zilu remarks, “When a gentleman dies, he must still wear his hat” ( junzi si, guan bu mian 君子死冠不免).44 However, despite the positive reception of the film by wartime audiences, Fei Mu was attacked by leftist critics who viewed Confucius as a symbol of the feudal ruling class. Reacting to this criticism, Fei Mu defended himself in his essay “A Response to Fang Dian and Ying Weimin’s ‘Hopes for Confucius’ ” (Da Fang Dian Ying Weimin de “Qiwang yu Kong Fuzi” 答方典应卫民的期望於孔夫子; 1940), citing Carl Crow’s (1884–1945) Master Kung, where Crow argues that Confucius

42 For an analysis of the film and the final scene, see Yuanyuan Wang, “The Travels of Fei Mu’s film Confucius from 1939 to the Present,” Journal of Cambridge Studies 4. 2 (June 2009): 126–38. 43 Qin Pengzhang 秦鹏章, “Fei Mu yingju zayi” 费穆影剧杂议 (Random Comments on the Film and Drama of Fei Mu), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, p. 163. 44 Ibid., p. 160. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 183 the man and Confucius the saint were two different people.45 Accepting this distinction, Fei Mu claimed that he was simply hoping to portray Confucius the man and convey his humanistic message.46 As his reference to Crow’s book shows, Fei Mu was attempting to rein- terpret Confucian thought not only in terms of modern Chinese realities, but also within a global context. In a similar fashion, in his essay “Con- fucius’s Life and Times” (Kongfuzi ji qi shidai 孔夫子及其时代; 1940), Fei Mu draws parallels between Chinese and Western philosophy and reli- gion when he compares Confucius to Sakyamuni Buddha and Jesus Christ. In this essay, he also alludes to Hu Shi’s An Outline of Chinese Philoso- phy (Zhongguo zhexue dagang 中国哲学史大纲; 1919), which includes a comparative historical analysis of European and Chinese philosophical traditions.47 In some respects, Fei Mu’s neo-traditionalism resembles Bei- jing school writers’ efforts to find “modernity in tradition” and “tradition in modernity,” although Fei Mu’s films and writings were more deeply influenced by Confucianism. In this regard, Fei Mu is closer to other neo- Confucianists, such as Harvard-educated intellectuals Mei Guangdi 梅光 迪 (1890–1945) and Wu Mi 吴宓 (1894–1978), who sought to bring Confu- cian philosophy into dialogue with Greek and Roman thought as well as classical Western literature by writers like Shakespeare and Dante. Apart from the influence of traditional philosophy, Fei Mu’s works were rooted in traditional theater and literature. During the war period, Fei Mu directed modern dramas that borrowed heavily from traditional theater,48 such as Dream of Plum Blossoms (Meihua meng 梅花梦; 1941), Yang Guifei 杨贵妃 (1942), Six Chapters from a Floating Life (Fusheng liuji 浮生六记; 1943), and The Fragrant Concubine (Xiang Fei 香妃; 1943).49 Assessing the influence of traditional theater on Fei Mu’s wartime dramas, Edward Gunn concludes:

45 Carl Crow was a businessman and author from Missouri who managed several news- papers in Shanghai. He wrote 13 books, including Master Kung: The Story of Confucius (1937) and The Chinese are Like That (1938). 46 Fei Mu, “Da Fang Dian Ying Weimin de ‘Qiwang yu Kong Fuzi,’ ” in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, pp. 73–77. 47 Fei Mu, “Kongfuzi ji qi shidai,” in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, pp. 65–72. 48 Fei Mu, “Zaxie” 杂写 (Random notes), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, p. 31. 49 During the war, Fei Mu worked mostly in modern drama. In 1942, he organized the Shanghai Arts Theater (Shanghai yishutuan 上海艺术团). Although the scripts of his war- time dramas are no longer extant, Fei Mu has been credited with writing at least four wartime plays. 184 chapter four

Although Fei Mu’s techniques were innovative on the huaju [话剧 spoken drama] stage, his stories were all steeped in tradition, and the innovations themselves bring the full theatrical potential of the classical drama to the less colorful and unmusical modern stage.50 Some of Fei Mu’s wartime and postwar films were also adaptations of traditional operas, such as Murder in the Oratory (Zhanjing tang 斩经堂; 1937), starring Zhou Xinfang (周信芳; 1895–1975), and Regret that Sur- passes Life and Death (Shengsi hen 生死恨; 1948; Fig. 4.5, Plate Section), starring Mei Lanfang. Moreover, Fei Mu was a prolific film theorist and published many essays stressing the need to incorporate traditional Chinese painting, poetry, and drama into the building of a modern national film tradition.51 In “The Challenge of Turning Traditional Opera into Film” (Zhongguo jiuju de dianyinghua wenti 中国旧剧的电影化问题; 1942), he discusses his experience producing film versions of traditional Chinese operas and argues that “in the heart of the director there often exists a desire to create national painting . . .”52 In both this essay and “Some Thoughts on ‘Atmo- sphere’ ” (Lüetan “kongqi” 略谈空气; 1934), Fei Mu draws heavily from traditional aesthetics in discussing the importance of creating balance and harmony between a film and its audience, and characters and their backdrop, as well as between a film’s content and its form.53 As he argues, film should do more than simply “represent reality” (xieshi 写实). Rather, it should emulate traditional Chinese art and strive to both “express meaning” (xieyi 写意) and create “atmosphere” (kongqi 空气) through cinematography and mise-en-scène.54 Although Fei Mu’s artistry was shaped by traditional aesthetics, he was also well versed in Western film theory and literature. Having attended a French-language school, he was able to read French, English, Italian, German, and Russian, skills which enabled him to read Western film

50 Gunn, Unwelcome Muse, p. 147. Gunn also cites wartime critic Mai Ye’s comments on the lyricism of Fei Mu’s plays, along with his observation that Fei Mu seemed to turn stage play into film. See Mai Ye 麦耶, “Shiyue yingju zongping” 十月影剧总评 (Summary of Films and Theater for October), Zazhi 12.2 (November 1943): 171–72. 51 See Fei Mu’s essays “Zhongguo jiuju de dianyinghua wenti”; “Lüetan ‘kongqi’ ” 略谈 空气 (Some Thoughts on ‘Atmosphere’); and “Shengsi hen tekan xuyan” 生死恨特刊序言 (Preface to Special Publication for Regret that Surpasses Life and Death), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, pp. 84–87, pp. 27–28, and pp. 101–105, respectively. 52 See Fei Mu, “Zhongguo jiuju de dianyinghua wenti” 中国旧剧的电影化问题 (The Challenge of Turning Traditional Chinese Drama into Film), in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, p. 83. 53 Fei Mu, “Lüetan ‘kongqi’,” p. 27. 54 Ibid. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 185 theory in the original languages. Inspired by much of this material, Fei Mu discussed Western film techniques in many of his essays. For example, in his 1934 essay “A Small Problem in Sea of Fragrant Snow—The Use of ‘Flashback’ and ‘Suspense’ ” (Xiangxuehai zhong de yige xiao wenti— “Daoxufa” yu “xuanxiang” de zuoyong) 香雪海中的一个小问题-倒叙 法与悬想的作用), he described his experimentation with flashback and suspense in his 1934 film Sea of Fragrant Snow.55 Fei Mu consistently sought to introduce new techniques in his works and was critical of directors for placing too much emphasis on the content of their films and not enough on stylistic experimentation.56 In Regret that Surpasses Life and Death (1948), Fei Mu was the first Chinese film director to film in color. Moreover, his use of theatrical tableaux, painted landscape backdrops, and treatment of light and shadow in Confucius has inspired comparisons to Sergei Eisenstein’s (1898–1948) Alexander Nevsky (1938) and Kenji Mizoguchi’s (1898–1956) Genroku Chushingura (1941).57 As a result of his innovations in staging, lighting, editing, and cinematog- raphy, including his use of the long take and montage, Fei Mu was praised by many of his contemporaries.58 In terms of their incorporation of a variety of Western film techniques in combination with traditional aesthetics, Fei Mu’s earlier films can be seen as precursors to Spring in a Small Town—although in this film Fei Mu achieved a new level of aesthetic fluidity. However, in contrast to his efforts in many of his earlier films to convey a clear didactic message, in Spring in a Small Town Fei Mu rather sought to create a realistic por- trayal of everyday life. In this regard, Spring in a Small Town diverges from the theatricality of Fei Mu’s opera films and also represents a departure from Confucius, which, as Yuanyuan Wang notes, “stresses historical and ancient aura rather than realist representation.”59

55 Fei Mu, “Xiangxuehai zhong de yige xiao wenti,” in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, pp. 25–26. 56 Fei Mu, “Guochanpian de ‘chulu’ wenti,” p. 94. 57 See Yuanyuan Wang, “The Travels of Fei Mu’s film Confucius from 1939 to the Pres- ent,” p. 130. 58 See, for example, Pian Feng 片风, “Tianlun ping yi” 天伦评一 (First Review of Fil- ial Piety), in Chen Bo, ed., Sanshi niandai Zhongguo dianying pinglun wenxuan, p. 415. In this review, Pian Feng praises Fei Mu for having attained the “height of pre-eminence in Chinese silent films.” Shu Yan writes that Fei Mu reached the heights of technical achieve- ment in Filial Piety despite using substandard equipment. See Shu Yan, “Tianlun ping er,” p. 417. 59 Yuanyuan Wang, “The Travels of Fei Mu’s film Confucius from 1939 to the Present,” p. 130. Also, according to Fei Mu, he was criticized for excessive use of melodrama in Sea of Fragrant Snow. See Fei Mu, “Xiangxuehai zhong de yige xiao wenti-‘Daoxufa’ yu ‘xuan­ xiang’ de zuoyong,” p. 25. 186 chapter four

In addition, whereas many of Fei Mu’s earlier films look to the past and to traditional morality for solutions to problems of the modern era, Spring in a Small Town instead depicts the violent rupture between past and pres- ent in the wake of the War of Resistance. While Filial Piety advocates a return to the countryside and to the virtues of filial piety and benevolence as an antidote to the evils of Westernized modernity, Spring in a Small Town portrays the reduction of the countryside and the old society to ruins. Like- wise, the sickly landlord Liyan differs in many ways from the courageous Confucian patriarchs depicted in Fei Mu’s earlier films who uphold their faith in traditional virtues even in the face of adversity. Sun Liting devotes himself to his orphanage and to taking care of his grandson; Zilu fights his enemies to the death before nonchalantly retying the tassels on his hat in accordance with traditional decorum; and Fei Mu’s Confucius remains a virtuous man despite his political failures. In contrast to these heroic fig- ures, Liyan gives up all hope of life and attempts to hide himself away in the family garden. As Yuwen comments with respect to her husband, “I don’t have the courage to die. He doesn’t seem to have the courage to live.” On an allegorical level, Liyan symbolizes the collapse of the old society and the landlord class. Yet, at the same time, he is in some ways similar to Fei Mu. Like his character, Fei Mu suffered from heart disease and was the eldest son of a landowning family who had accepted a marriage arranged by his parents. Rather than portraying a Confucian hero in Liyan, Fei Mu thus instead sought to depict an ordinary man more like himself.

Victory as Defeat

Fei Mu’s portrayal of Liyan has parallels with other postwar films which depict male characters in a negative light as ineffectual in resolving the problems facing postwar China. Describing the treatment of male charac- ters in films from this period, Pickowicz writes: The narratives seem to hold men responsible for China’s plight; men were not able to prevent the Japanese invasion and, after the war, were not able to reunite the nation. The failings of China, in this controversial reading, are the failings of its men. . . . According to patriarchal norms, men are ultimately responsible for the well-being of the family, and by extension, the nation. But in these family narratives most of the males who are central to the sto- ries are not seen in such time-honored roles. . . . In short, the viewer is led to believe that wartime conditions brought out the worst in China’s men.60

60 Paul Pickowicz, “Victory as Defeat,” pp. 388–89. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 187

Pickowicz focuses his analysis on the three films The Spring River Flows East, Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon, and Distant Love. He argues that the first of these provides the most disturbing portrait of a “good” man who went “bad” in the context of war. Although the male protagonist Zhang Zhongliang 张忠良 is a “Confucian-style family man” and an ardent patriot, he ends up abandoning his family after becoming “entangled in a web of wartime corruption, greed, and moral depravity.”61 As Pickowicz observes, the ending of the film is particularly unsettling: Most disturbing of all, it is by no means clear at the end of the narrative that the corrupted hero can be reformed and returned “home “ to his mother and son. The whole meaning of the term “family” has been distorted beyond recognition when Zhang, confused and panicky, is shown together on (of all days) National Day with his prewar wife, his wartime wife, and his postwar “secret” wife.62 Indeed, the ending of the film is very tragic. After Zhang’s (prewar) wife Sufen 素芬 discovers that her husband has another wife, she feels dis- graced and commits suicide by jumping into a river. Zhang’s mother and Sufen’s young son rush to save her, but are unable to do so. Zhang’s mother then looks into the camera, lamenting: “In times like these, decent people can’t survive while villains live for a thousand years!” In fact, the ending was so depressing that director Cai Chusheng was required to change it several times before the film could be marketed in the United States. Short of funds, the film’s distributor, the Kunlun Film Company, hoped to maxi- mize revenue by selling distribution rights in the US. However, Cai was first asked to cut the female lead’s suicide scene, and then add a happy family reunion at the end before American viewers were satisfied with the film.63 In contrast to American audiences, those in China greeted tragic post- war epics like The Spring River Flows East with enormous enthusiasm. It seemed that Chinese viewers related not only to the sense of “victory as defeat” portrayed in these films, but also to the Confucian moral frame- work they espoused. Pickowicz observes that “without exception the posi- tive characters in all the films were people who cherish ‘traditional’ family values: respect for parents and devotion to spouse and children.”64 Yet, at

61 Ibid., p. 386. 62 Ibid. 63 See Li Yizhong 李亦中, Cai Chusheng dianying daoyan qiaochu 蔡楚生电影导演 翘楚 (Cai Chusheng, Master Film Director; Shanghai: Shanghai jiaoyu, 1999), p. 180. 64 Pickowicz, “Victory as Defeat,” p. 392. See also Bret Sutcliffe’s analysis of the Con- fucian morality espoused in The Spring River Flows East in his “A spring river flows east: ‘progressive’ ideology and gender representation.” 188 chapter four the same time, as in the case of Zhang Zhongliang, these films depicted ambivalent figures who abandoned family values over the course of the war. Even the positive character Libin 礼彬 in Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon, who devotes himself to his family and to promoting the cause of resistance, discovers that he is unable to provide for his family when he does not have enough money to pay for the delivery of his child with his wife Lingyu 玲玉. In some respects, these postwar epics pointed the finger of blame at government corruption; characters who take advantage of the war for personal profit are portrayed in a very negative light. Also, several films produced in the latter years of civil war, such as Shen Fu’s 沈浮 (1905– 94) Myriad of Lights (Wanjia denghuo 万家灯火; 1948) and Zheng Junli’s Crows and Sparrows (Wuya yu maque 乌鸦与麻雀; 1949), more directly critiqued the exploitation of the lower classes and advocated social change through collective action. As a result, these films were hailed in retrospect by the CCP as “progressive” (jinbu 进步) left-wing classics that exposed the vices of the Nationalist government. However, both Communist and Nationalist historians have been embar- rassed, albeit for different reasons, by the fact that Distant Love, Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon, and The Spring River Flows East were among 10 films in 1947 to receive the Zhongzheng 中正 Culture Prize named in honor of Chiang Kai-shek.65 Similarly, Bai Yang 白杨 (1920– 76), the lead actress in Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon, and The Spring River Flows East, won the first Chiang Kai-shek best actress award in 1947 for her roles in these films. Indeed, all three films were produced under the watchful eye of Nationalist censors,66 and the morality struc- ture they endorse is generally Confucian rather than left-wing. Moreover, these postwar epics were produced partly in response to the government’s call for educational, morally engaged films as an antidote to “degener- ate” popular films, and many were filmed using government funding. For example, Chen Liting’s Distant Love, which indicts wartime corruption, was produced by the Nationalist government-owned China Film No. 2 Studio.67

65 Paul Pickowicz, “Victory as Defeat,” p. 390. 66 In the wake of the War of Resistance, the Nationalist government was particularly active in censoring films. Following the confiscation of Japanese film facilities, the govern- ment sought to gain ideological control over the film industry. By February 1946, it had set up a censorship bureau and published a list of 46 items that could not be shown in films. See Cheng Jihua, Zhongguo dianying fazhan shi, pp. 154–59. 67 Paul Pickowicz, “Victory as Defeat,” p. 369. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 189

Although postwar filmmakers had links with left-wing cultural circles, many of them had worked during the war years for Nationalist govern- ment cultural organizations in the interior, where they promoted the war effort. Commenting on the ambivalent nature of postwar film, Pickowicz writes: “The lines between official and unofficial, state and private, elite and popular, commerce and art, and loyalty and disloyalty are too blurry here to be accounted for by any ready-made theory of popular culture. . . .”68 Likewise, Bret Sutcliffe argues that the complex ideological underpinnings of The Spring River Flows East belie later characterizations of the film as “progressive” and left-wing: “As a film full of overlap and ruptures at the intersection of discourses, Spring River stands as an intriguing example of the shifting ideological tensions to be found in the continued re- assessment of Chinese film history.”69 Apart from their ideological complexity, postwar films crossed a variety of generic and cultural boundaries. Despite the fact that these films were extremely popular, many directors had close ties with literary and dra- matic circles. As Yingjin Zhang notes, “films by literary people” dominated during this period when many playwrights entered the film industry, bringing about “cross-fertilization between cinema, drama, and literature in postwar China.”70 Similarly, as in the case of Fei Mu, a number of film directors focused on producing stage dramas during the war years, partly as a result of the poor production environment for films. Moreover, although filmmakers were influenced by Hollywood and by European film, like Fei Mu, they drew from traditional literature and aes- thetics. For example, the title of Eight Thousand Miles of Clouds and Moon alludes to the Song dynasty poem “The River Runs Red” (Man jiang hong 满江红) by General Yue Fei 岳飞 (1103–42). In this poem, he recounts his sense of failure despite having fought and won countless battles: “Thirty years of work and fame—like dust and dirt; eight thousand miles of road—like clouds and moon” (三十功名尘与土，八千里路云和月).71 Similarly, the title of The Spring River Flows East was inspired by a line from a song lyric by Li Yu 李煜 (937–78), the last emperor of the South- ern Tang dynasty (937–965), which he wrote while in captivity following

68 Ibid., p. 395. 69 Bret Sutcliffe, “A spring river flows east: ‘progressive’ ideology and gender representation.” 70 Yingjin Zhang, Chinese National Cinema, p. 104. Zhang observes that the 1930s was also dominated by films made by literary figures, although he emphasizes the influence of drama in the postwar period. 71 See Leonard Ng’s translation of Yue Fei, “The River Runs Red,” accessed July 20, 2012, http://rainybluedawn.com/translations/chinese/manjianghong.htm. 190 chapter four the overthrow of the dynasty. Written to the tune “Lady Yu” (Yu meiren 虞美人), the poem reflects both Li Yu’s memories of better times and regret for his present predicament. The last two lines of the song appear on the screen at the beginning of the film: “How much sorrow can one man bear? As much as a river of spring water flowing east” (问君能有几 多愁，恰似一江春水向东流).72 Bret Sutcliffe also points out parallels between the plot of the film and the popular Yuan dynasty (1271–1368) opera The Lute (Pipa ji 琵琶记), which tells the story of a scholar who leaves his wife and aging parents to journey to the capital to take the imperial examinations. After passing the examinations, he marries the daughter of the prime minister.73 Apart from their ideological tensions and interweaving of traditional and modern themes, many postwar films are ambivalent in their social critique. Rather than depicting wartime violence in detail or representing the Japanese as evil aggressors, these films raise more questions than they answer about the meaning and causes of wartime suffering. Eight Thou- sand Miles of Cloud and Moon ends with a question mark projected onto a blank screen. This image is preceded by a scene in which the female pro- tagonist Lingyu gives birth to a baby girl. However, it is unclear whether Lingyu is healthy enough to survive, or how she and her husband will be able to raise the child, since they have no money and have cut their ties with their extended family members in Shanghai. Also, before the ques- tion mark, text appears on the screen, urging viewers to reflect on their own role in determining Lingyu’s fate if she were to die: “Whether the fate of this cultural fighter [wenhua zhanshi 文化战士] in our society is to live or to die, wise audience, please examine your consciences. If her fate is to die, then are we all responsible?” In this passage, Shi Dongshan refers to Lu Xun’s conception of the intellectual as a lone fighter in the face of social oppression. Interest- ingly, though, his “cultural fighter” is female rather than male, and is also a mother. Shi’s treatment of the mother as heroine has links with earlier

72 See Mark Alexander’s translation of Li Yu, “Oh When Will Autumn Moon and Spring Flowers End” (春花秋月何时了), accessed July 20, 2012, http://www.chinese-poems .com/ye.html. 73 See Bret Sutcliffe’s discussion in “A spring river flows east: ‘progressive’ ideology and gender representation.” In 1956, Zheng Junli denied that the film was based on this earlier opera. For a translation of The Lute into English, see Jean Mulligan, tr., Kao Ming’s Pipa ji—The Lute (New York: Columbia University Press 1980). A film adaptation of The Lute was made in Shanghai in 1939, when many other costume dramas, such as Mulan Joins the Army (1939), were produced. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 191 prewar films, such as Wu Yonggang’s 吴永刚 (1907–82) The Goddess (Shennü 神女; 1934) and Cai Chusheng’s New Woman (Xin nüxing 新女性; 1934), although the victimization of the female protagonists in these films is perhaps emphasized over their role as “fighters.” As Bret Suttcliffe and Paul Pickowicz have shown, the portrayal of weak male characters in postwar film was frequently offset by strong female roles.74 Postwar film was thus characterized not only by ideological ambivalence and generic boundary crossings, but also by a reversal of traditional gender roles.75 As in the case of Shi Dongshan’s allusion to Lu Xun, postwar film retained many links with May Fourth culture and with prewar films from the 1930s and 1940s. Chinese critics generally view the cinema of the post- war period as a continuation of 1930s film in terms of its social critique and portrayal of the suffering of the lower classes.76 To a certain extent, this characterization is accurate, particularly with respect to films pro- duced during the latter civil war period, such as Crows and Sparrows and Myriad of Light. Especially when compared to wartime propaganda films like Sun Yu’s 孙瑜 (1900–90) The Sky Rider (Changkong wanli 长空万里; 1940) or Bu Wancang’s 卜万苍 (1903–74) Mulan Joins the Army (Mulan congjun 木兰从军; 1939), postwar films evince a return to the indepen- dent critical spirit of the May Fourth era. Moreover, the dispiriting por- trayal of victory as defeat echoes similarly tragic themes found in prewar films, such as Yuan Muzhi’s 袁牧之 (1909–78) Plunder of Peach and Plum (Taoli jie 桃李劫; 1934) and The Goddess. Like The Spring River Flows East, these works conclude on a note of despair. At the end of Plunder of Peach and Plum, the male protagonist Tao’s 桃 wife Li 李 dies of illness, and shortly afterwards he is executed after he is unfairly blamed for the death of a policeman. In The Goddess, a prostitute who sells her body to support her child is sentenced to 12 years in prison after she kills her pimp who has stolen all her money. Yet, despite parallels with the prewar period, Chinese postwar films are arguably more ambivalent in their treatment of the causes of social ills, and uncertain in their portrayal of the future. At the end of The Goddess, the Shanghai prostitute, played by famous actress Ruan Lingyu 阮玲玉

74 See Bret Sutcliffe’s discussion of changing gender norms in postwar film in his “A spring river flows east: ‘progressive’ ideology and gender representation.” Also, see Paul Pickowicz, “Victory as Defeat,” pp. 388–89. 75 For an analysis of changing gender norms over the course of the war period, see Carolyn FitzGerald, “Mandarin Ducks at the Battlefield: Ouyang Yuqian’s Shifting Recon- figurations of Nora and Mulan,” CHINOPERL Papers No. 29 (2010): 45–104. 76 See Ding Yaping, Yingxiang Zhongguo: Zhongguo dianying yishu, pp. 73–91. 192 chapter four

(1910–35), is cheered somewhat when the principal of her son’s school tells her that he will take care of him. In the final scene of Plunder of Peach and Plum, the famous “Graduation Song” (Biye ge 毕业歌), expressing the students’ patriotism and their aspirations to reform society, is played. While this choice of music provides an ironic contrast to the tragic story portrayed in the film, it nonetheless serves as a reminder of May Fourth idealism and hope for a better future through social reform. In a simi- lar fashion, New Woman ends with the tragic suicide of Wei Ming 伟明 after she refuses to sell herself into prostitution to buy medicine for her daughter, who subsequently succumbs to pneumonia. Still, the final scene ends with a glimmer of hope as Wei Ming’s factory colleague Li Aying 李阿英 marches in step with the other workers singing patriotic songs. By contrast, despite the allusion to Lu Xun in Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon, the text that rolls at the end of film fails to conjure themes of hope. Indeed, the question mark that concludes this film, Sufen’s suicide in The Spring River Flows East, and the isolated figures of Yuwen and Liyan on the ruined city wall all convey an unrelenting hopelessness and uncer- tainty about the future that lies ahead.

Between Memory and Reality

People sense that everything about their everyday lives is a little out of order, out of order to a terrifying degree. All of us must live within a certain historical era, but this era sinks away from us like a shadow, and we feel we have been abandoned. In order to confirm our own existence, we need to take hold of something real, of something most fundamental, and to that end we seek the help of an ancient memory, a memory clearer and closer to our hearts than anything we might see gazing into the future. And this gives rise to a strange apprehension about the reality surrounding us. We begin to suspect that this is an absurd and antiquated world, dark and bright at the same time. Between memory and reality there are awkward discrepancies, producing a solemn but subtle agitation, an intense but as yet indefinable struggle.77 Although Spring in a Small Town focuses on the plight of the modern land- lord Liyan, the film is told largely from the perspective of his wife Yuwen, who assumes the role of narrator. In the opening scene, as Zhichen walks into town from the train station, her voice announces: “He came

77 Eileen Chang, “Writing of One’s Own,” pp. 17–18; Zhang Ailing, “Ziji de wenzhang,” p. 285. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 193 from the train station. He walked through the city wall.”78 Here, Yuwen’s voiceover is unsettling because it is removed from her character who is in another room and could not have seen Zhichen coming. Nevertheless, she describes his arrival and the meeting with her husband in detail, adding: “He knows his way around Liyan’s house so well.” And near the end of the film, when Yuwen is outside with Zhichen, Liyan enters her room and her voiceover states: “The first time he’s been inside my room in years.” In such instances, Yuwen’s voice is in one scene while her character is in another location altogether. As with the split and unstable narrators and speakers in works by Mu Dan and Wang Zengqi, here her voice conveys the sense of self as alienated Other. Although Yuwen’s voiceover is sometimes detached from her character, at other times it expresses her inner thoughts and emotions. For example, when Yuwen goes out to meet the newly arrived Zhichen, her voiceover switches from third-person narration to addressing Zhichen directly in the second-person. “He couldn’t have known that I married Liyan. Why have you come? What point was there in coming? How can I face you now?” While Yuwen the character politely remains silent as her husband and former lover engage in conversation, her voiceover expresses her inner despair and yearning to communicate with Zhichen. In this way, her voice dramatizes a clash between her inner emotions (qing 情) and her sense of propriety (li 礼). As Wei Wei recalls, Fei Mu instructed her to embody this psychological tension in her performance, advising her to “begin with emotion and stop at propriety” (fa hu qing, zhi hu li 发乎情止乎礼).79 By referring to Zhichen alternately in the third and second-person, Yuwen’s voiceover demonstrates an unstable deictic relationship with respect to the other characters. Also, in this scene her voice inhabits an ambivalent temporal frame. Following Zhichen’s arrival, the voiceover comments, “I had no idea that he would come.” Although Yuwen the char- acter has “no idea” that Zhichen would come, Yuwen the narrator appar- ently knows much more and describes his arrival in detail. Andrew Jones translates this passage into the past tense because there is a temporal dis- tance between Yuwen the narrator and the events being described in the film. However, as with Wang Zengqi’s stream-of-consciousness narration,

78 For the Chinese film script of Spring in a Small Town, see Wu Zhongli, ed., Xiaocheng zhi chun de dianying meixue, pp. 104–44. See also Andrew Jones, tr., Spring in a Small Town, accessed June 10, 2010, http://mclc.osu.edu/rc/pubs/spring/default.htm; all translations of the film script in this chapter are drawn from Jones’ online translation. 79 Huang Ailing, “Fang Wei Wei,” p. 203. 194 chapter four the tense used in the original is ambiguous due to the uninflected nature of the Chinese language. One way of interpreting this scene, and the film in general, is to assume that Yuwen is recounting events that occurred in the past. In particular, Fei Mu’s use of both flash-forward and flashback suggests that the entire film can be understood as a memory that runs repeatedly through Yuwen’s mind as she walks along the bomb-scarred wall. Nonetheless, although Yuwen the narrator and Yuwen the character exist in different time frames, Fei Mu emphasizes the immediacy of both of their voices. As in Wang Zengqi’s stories such as “Revenge” and “Chance Encounter,” Fei Mu repeatedly use the adverb “now” and the duration particle zhe 着. Yuwen’s narration thus emphasizes the presentness of the past, traces of which lie everywhere in the ruins of war. Attempting to capture this immediacy, Jones translates most of the screenplay into the present tense. However, his translation does not read as smoothly as the original as a result of the awkward shifts in tense necessitated by English grammar. While the entire film can thus be interpreted as a memory unfolding in Yuwen’s consciousness, at times she actively attempts to forget the past. In one scene, she sits by the window in her sister-in-law’s room and talks to herself: “The sun feels especially pleasant sitting in this room. I’ve long since forgotten the past. I’ll never think about anything again.” Walk- ing along the city wall, Yuwen again tries to set the past aside: “Living in a small town, living a life where nothing ever changes. . . . My mind is empty.” Clearly, her claim that “nothing changes” ignores the destruction of war all around her, and says more about Yuwen’s “empty” life and her deep yearning to forget the past. The marked contrast between Yuwen’s desire to forget the past and continue with her familiar daily activities and the hollowed-out ruins she inhabits fills the movie with a haunting pathos. Yet, despite her longing for oblivion, Yuwen is continually drawn back to the past as every day she walks “with no particular destination in mind” along the crumbling wall that serves as the mise-en-scène of the obliter- ated past. The arrival of Zhichen acts as a catalyst that brings to the surface memories and smoldering passions she has tried to forget. Throughout his visit, she wavers between clinging to these memories and trying to dis- tance herself from Zhichen. In many scenes, the two appear to be engaged in a kind of dance, moving close to one another only to shy away and then come together again. While Zhichen arrives wearing a suit and represent- ing all that is new and Westernized, Liyan, with his crumbling house and decrepit body, embodies the old society. On an allegorical level, the film between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 195 thus depicts the heroine vacillating between past and present, old and new, oblivion and a compulsive attachment to the past. To use clinical terminology, Yuwen exhibits signs of post-traumatic stress disorder char- acterized by “a symptomological dialectic of hypermnesia and amnesia” wherein “memories are not mastered, but rather are experienced as invol- untary, hallucinatory repetitions, or, alternatively, are blocked.”80 In some respects, Yuwen’s obsession with the past also resembles Freud’s description of melancholia. In his essay, “Mourning and Melan- cholia,” which he wrote in 1917 shortly before the end of World War I, Freud describes the workings of the condition. In particular, he distin- guishes “normal mourning,” a distressing process whereby a bereaved per- son learns to live with the loss of a loved one, from “melancholia,” a state in which one remains obsessed and haunted by the past and compulsively attached to a lost object of love.81 In contrast to the communist master narrative of the evils of the old society and the progress of the new, Yuwen clings obsessively to beautiful memories of the past and of her romance with Zhichen. In this regard, she resembles Liyan, who Yuwen claims “can never forget the splendor of the past” and suffers from “neurosis.” In his essay “In Search of Chinese Film Style(s) and Technique(s),” James Udden observes that a number of postwar French films use a simi- lar technique of highly subjective voiceover. In particular, Udden cites two examples, Jean–Pierre Melville’s Silence of the Sea (1949) and Robert Bresson’s Diary of a Country Priest (1950). Udden comments: “Perhaps this new sort of voice-over was the best way to express a postwar angst that no existing cinematic norm of the time could quite muster, but this could only be theorized, not proven.”82 Udden’s hypothesis that this new style of psychological voiceover was developed in both European and Chinese film to express emotions specific to the postwar period is very suggestive. However, the films he discusses were all produced after Fei Mu’s mas- terpiece, which Udden regards as pioneering this technique. As Udden remarks, “What is undeniable is that Fei Mu did this with no real model or

80 Joshua Hirsch, “Post-Traumatic Cinema and the Holocaust Documentary,” in Ann Kaplan and Ban Wang, eds., Trauma and Cinema: Cross-Cultural Explorations (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2004), p. 116. 81 Sigmund Freud, “Mourning and Melancholia,” in The Standard Edition of the Com- plete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, James Strachey, tr., 24 vols. (London: The Hogarth Press, 1953), XXI: 239–60. See also the discussion in Dominick LaCapra, History and Memory after Auschwitz (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998), p. 183. 82 James Udden, “In Search of Chinese Film Style(s) and Technique(s),” in Yingjin Zhang, ed., A Companion to Chinese Cinema (West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons, 2012), p. 269. 196 chapter four precedence, nor even real outlet.”83 Indeed, Yuwen’s voiceover serves as testament not only to Fei Mu’s skill at portraying psychological interiority, but also to his stylistic ingenuity. One possibility is that Fei Mu’s inspiration for Yuwen’s complex voice was drawn from traditional aesthetics. In her article “The Aesthetics and Moral Politics of Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town,” Susan Daruvala observes that Yuwen’s haunting voiceover can be understood within the context of traditional “boudoir poetry” (gui yuan shi 闺怨诗). She sum- marizes the characteristics of boudoir poetry, which flourished between the 10th and 13th centuries: It frequently depicts a once-beautiful woman, sleepless, cold and alone in her room at night, perhaps watching a candle melt into tears. Outside, fall- ing leaves or rain speak of the passing of time and intensify her pining for her lover, who has long since departed. In Fei Mu’s film, many of the tropes of such poetry are present: moonlight, orchids, a candle, and the refined interiors with their screens and pillows and curtains.84 Daruvala also quotes Grace Fong’s discussion of the tropes used in bou- doir poetry in her analysis of the 13th-century poet Wu Wenying 吴文英 (1200–60): Frequent transposition between reality (actual experience) and the illusory experience of dream and reverie, vision and flashback is a pronounced fea- ture of these love poems. As the development, or movement, of the poem is primarily guided by memory, emotional association, and sense percep- tion, rather than any apparent logic, time sequence is often disrupted and spatial viewpoint shifted without any clear demarcation: the poem moves backwards and forwards between reminiscence and description, between past and present.85 These various descriptions of the genre of boudoir poetry characterize not only the indoor setting of the film, but also Yuwen’s confused psyche

83 Ibid. 84 Susan Daruvala, “The Aesthetics and Moral Politics of Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town,” p. 175. Daruvala also cites Shi Qi’s 石琪 article, “Linglong miaoqu de xuanwai zhiyin—Xiaocheng zhi chun” 玲珑妙趣的宣外之音小城之春 (Exquisite, Wonderfully Evocative Overtones—Spring in a Small Town), in which Shi argues that Fei Mu inherited and developed the tradition of using boudoir laments to express feelings and convey alle- gorical meaning. See Shi Qi, “Linglong miaoqu de xuanwai zhiyin—Xiaocheng zhi chun,” in Huang Ailing, ed., Shiren daoyan, pp. 295–300. 85 Grace S. Fong, Wu Wenying and the Art of Southern Song Ci Poetry (Princeton: Prince­ ton University Press, 1987), p. 105; cited in Susan Daruvala, “The Aesthetics and Moral Politics of Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town,” p. 176. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 197 marked by the “frequent transposition between reality (actual experience) and the illusory experience of dream and reverie, vision and flashback.” Yuwen’s voiceover narration can also be interpreted in the context of earlier palace poetry (gongti shi 宫体诗), which arose during the Southern dynasty (420–589) and was later imitated by such Tang dynasty poets as Li Shangyin 李商隐 (812–58) and Wen Tingyun 温庭筠 (812–70).86 Paul Rouzer observes in his essay “Watching the Voyeurs: Palace Poetry and the Yuefu of Wen Tingyun,” that boudoir poetry self-consciously referred back to palace poetry, which also employed tropes derived from the Book of Songs. Rouzer comments that “late Tang poets could also use palace poetry as a way of commenting on the genre itself or to point consciously to the historical circumstances that produced it—cultivated court life in the South during the fifth and sixth centuries.”87 In so doing, they used the abandoned woman in the boudoir as an allegorical figure to convey their personal frustration with their political careers, or sorrow over sepa- ration from friends or personal loneliness. However, they did so in order to evoke a shared knowledge of a common cultural tradition as a kind of language through which to communicate with other literati. Specifically, “the poem is seen as a communication to the zhiji 知己 [the friend] who knows oneself,” in keeping with the Chinese poetic conception, stemming from the Book of Songs, that “poetry expresses what is on the mind” (shi yan zhi 诗言志). Describing both the authorship and readership of this form of poetry, Rouzer comments: Palace poetry love poems are then primarily poems of a male social world, written for aesthetic and erotic appreciation and meant to demonstrate mastery of the world—of the world of language, of wealth, and status, and of women.88

86 Chen Mo, Fei Mu dianying lungao, p. 386. 87 Ronald Miao, “Palace-Style Poetry: The Courtly Treatment of Glamour and Love,” in Ronald Miao and Marie Chan, eds., Studies in Chinese Poetry and Poetics (San Francisco: Chinese Materials Center, Inc., 1978), p. 14. 88 Ibid., p. 21. Martin Huang also notes that in traditional lyric poetry, “A common poetic practice was the allegorical use of the figure of a deserted courtesan or wife to poeticize the male literati poet’s own frustrations in his political career.” Martin Huang, Literati and Self-Re/Presentation: Autobiographical Sensibility in the Eighteenth-Century Chi- nese Novel (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1995), p. 81. On the use of the female voice in traditional poetry and literature, see Maija Bell, “Imitation, Ventriloquism, Cross-Dressing, Impersonation: Men Writing as Women,” in her Gendered Persona and Poetic Voice: The Abandoned Woman in Early Chinese Song Lyrics (New York: Lexington Books, 2004), pp. 28–43. Bell also analyzes Huang’s discussion. See ibid., p. 9. 198 chapter four

Interpreted in the context of palace poetry and boudoir poems, Fei Mu employs Yuwen’s voice as a lyric means to express his own dissatisfaction with modern political realities and reach out to his fellow intellectuals through evoking a shared cultural tradition. One particular scene takes on new meaning in accordance with this interpretation of the film as a form of poetic communication between like-minded intellectuals or “soul mates.” In Zhichen’s room, a painting hanging on the wall has an inscrip- tion reading: “Yu Boya Destroys his Zither out of Respect for his Soul Mate” (Yu Boya shuai qin xie zhiyin 俞伯牙摔琴谢知音). This painting refers to the story of Yu Boya 俞伯牙, a government minister skilled at playing the zither, and a woodcutter named Zhong Ziqi 钟子期 who appreciated Yu Boya’s music despite their difference in social status. After Zhong Ziqi died, Yu Boya destroyed his zither because he believed that no one could appreciate his music anymore. However, the reference to a “soul mate” in the inscription can be read as black humor, alluding to the lack of intimacy and understanding between the protagonists. Although Zhichen and Liyan are friends, Zhichen does not possess any medication that can heal his sick comrade. Likewise, Yuwen is bound by the restraints of propriety and unable to express her true feelings to either Zhichen or Liyan. Rather than evoking a shared cultural tradition as a form of communication between like-minded intellectuals, Yuwen’s disoriented voice expresses alienation, in particular alienation between friends and family members. Moreover, through the implicit allusion to the poetic traditions of palace and boudoir poetry, Yuwen’s voice evokes images of the grandeur of the great palaces of the past. However, such images remain in stark contrast to the ruins she inhabits and serve as a reminder of the destruction of the old society. Fei Mu’s handling of Yuwen’s voiceover could also be interpreted as a continuation of his neo-traditionalist project. Just as he previously combined Western film techniques with Chinese art and drew parallels between Chinese and Western philosophy, he here combines traditional and modernist film noir aesthetics in his creation of Yuwen’s distinc- tive voice. Indeed, viewed in the context of modernist film techniques emphasizing interiority, boudoir poetry can be seen as very “modern” in its experimentation with divergent temporal and narrative frames and blurring of the line between dream and reality. Fei Mu thus succeeds in drawing attention to “modernity in tradition” (i.e., the modernist aspects of boudoir poetry). Yet, at the same time, his allusion to boudoir and palace poetry highlights the absence of “tradition in modernity” and the reduction of the past to ruins. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 199

Additionally, Yuwen’s voiceover implicitly raises issues about the rep- resentation of traumatic memory, and specifically memories of the War of Resistance. How is it possible to portray the memory of something one has tried to block because it is too horrible to remember? Yet, how can the attempt not be made to narrate or make sense of the past when its traces and impact are still felt everywhere? Searching for a language to depict the suffering of war and the sense that “everything about [people’s] everyday lives is a little out of order, out of order to a terrifying degree,” Fei Mu employs the lyric voice of the woman in the boudoir. As Yuwen’s voice shuttles between divergent temporal and narrative frames, as well as between modernist and traditional aesthetics and the genres of film and poetry, she gives voice to the “indefinable struggle” and “awkward discrepancies” between memory and reality experienced by people living in the aftermath of the War of Resistance and on the eve of the Commu- nist Revolution.

The Roaming Lens

While Fei Mu employs Yuwen’s voiceover to narrate the film, he frequently positions the camera at a low angle that mimics the view of the invalid Liyan, who is often seen sitting or reclining. As Li Cheuk-to observes in his essay, “Spring in a Small Town: Mastery and Restraint,” “In order to look at Zhang and Yuwen, the spectator must, like the husband, raise his eyes and, like him, is overcome by a feeling of inferiority and sadness.”89 Just as the figure of Yuwen is split between the two perspectives of her voiceover narration and her character in the film, the film is divided between the dual perspectives of Liyan and Yuwen. In one scene, Fei Mu recreates the visual perspective of Liyan by not only using a low camera angle, but also by positioning the camera behind Liyan’s bed curtain. As he lies in bed trying to sleep, Yuwen and Zhichen alternately enter his room looking for his sleeping pills, and their shad- ows loom across the curtain. Like Liyan, the audience is unaware of who is entering the room and sees only their large shadows (Figs. 4.6–4.8). Through his experimentation with low camera angles and light and shadow, Fei Mu succeeds in recreating a sense of powerlessness and entrapment in the face of unknown intruders—a theme introduced when

89 Cheuk-to Li, “Spring in a Small Town: Mastery and Restraint,” Cinemaya 49 (2000): 61. 200 chapter four

Zhichen first arrives at the house, walking effortlessly through the bombed wall rather than entering through the front gate. Fei Mu employs other modernist film noir techniques, such as dis- solves, in order to represent the psychological disorientation of his char- acters. In one scene where Zhichen and Yuwen are seen talking together on the wall, Fei Mu uses three dissolves, undermining a linear concept of time and further slowing the film’s already languorous pace. Despite the apparent calm on Yuwen’s face, these dissolves suggest her emotion- ally unstable state and submerged passions as she appears to be fading in and out of consciousness.90 Similarly, Fei Mu uses dissolve montages in shots of Yuwen standing on top of the wall. In particular, he overlaps sepa- rate takes as he dissolves between them, briefly creating two simultane- ous images of Yuwen on the screen. Through this technique, he produces a ghostly doubling effect that mirrors the splitting of her consciousness between her voiceover and character and the divided perspective in the film between Yuwen and Liyan. In addition, Fei Mu recreates the visual perspective of his characters through his experimentation with long take cinematography. Just as Yuwen returns each day to meander along the collapsing city wall and Liyan hides himself amidst the ruins of the Dai estate where “no one can find him,” Fei Mu’s camera repeatedly returns to both these scenes. Given

Fig. 4.6

90 See Cheuk-to Li’s analysis of this scene in ibid. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 201

Fig. 4.7

Fig. 4.8 Figs. 4.6–4.8. Fei Mu positions the camera behind Liyan’s bed curtain to film Zhichen’s shadow as he enters Liyan’s bedroom. 202 chapter four the film’s minimalist aesthetic, lingering shots of ruins—rather than an action-packed plot—become a central focus of the film. For example, near the beginning of the film, there is a long take of the garden in which Liyan is sitting. Old Huang pokes his head through a hole in a wall as he looks for Liyan and then walks around the wall to talk to him. How- ever, the camera does not follow Lao Huang around the wall. Instead, it moves forward to peer through the gap in the wall at the sickly Liyan set against a backdrop of ruins. In so doing, Fei Mu’s camera evinces its ongo- ing fascination with not only ruins, but also with gaps or lacunae. Like his experimentation with low camera angles and dissolves, Fei Mu’s long takes recreate the disoriented visual perspective of the film’s characters as they contemplate the ruins of their hometown. As Ban Wang argues, the long take can be interpreted as a metaphor for traumatized visuality: The long take’s material connection with physical reality is striking. The camera seems to be staring into an abyss of misery and pain, seemingly unable to get on with the story, it records every detail and gesture and takes in every perceivable trace, hue, and shape. As if haunted by a dream recur- rence of [a] shocking event, the camera cannot help bearing witness to what has been out there. The long take thus functions as a metaphor for the trau- matized patient, who when asked to tell a coherent story is repeatedly and helplessly seized by a singular persistent image.91 Ban Wang’s analysis here refers to the use of the long take in the early Republican-era film Plunder of Peach and Plum. In particular, Wang draws attention to two scenes in the film that employ this technique—one where a student who is to be unjustly executed is dragged to the police station, and another in which the protagonist Tao’s wife Li falls down the stairs in their cheap and unsafe apartment shortly after giving birth. The employ- ment of the long take to convey traumatized visuality in both pre- and postwar films once again situates postwar films within a lineage of films dating from the 1930s. However, Udden’s study of Chinese film aesthetics indicates that the long take was used more extensively in films from the 1940s than in films from the previous decade. Out of a sample of 14 films from 1933 to 1948, Udden found that Spring in a Small Town had the longest average

91 Ban Wang, Illuminations from the Past: Trauma, Memory, and History in Modern China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004), p. 89. Wang makes a similar argument in his “Trauma, Visuality, and History in Chinese Literature and Film,” in Ann Kaplan and Ban Wang, eds., Trauma and Cinema: Cross-Cultural Explorations, p. 238. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 203 shot length of 24.5 seconds,92 with some shots as long as 2 minutes and 15 seconds.93 His research also shows that, overall, films from the 1940s have longer shots compared to earlier films. For example, whereas the average shot length of Little Toys (Xiao wanyi 小玩意; 1933) is 8.8 seconds, and 8.6 seconds for The Goddess, in the postwar film Dream of the Red Chamber (Honglou meng 红楼梦; 1944) the figure is 15.9 seconds, with 16.5 seconds in Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and Moon.94 Udden’s sam- pling is not extensive enough to reach more than tentative conclusions, and his study shows variation in shot length among wartime and postwar films. Thus, whereas the average length of shots for the prewar film Spring Silkworms (Chun can 春蚕; 1933) is 17.6 seconds, that for The Spring River Flows East is 11.2 seconds. Nonetheless, despite the need for additional studies on this topic, longer shots in postwar film could be understood in part as an expression of traumatized visuality in films from this period. Also worthy of note is that Udden’s findings corroborate Barry Salt’s extensive analysis of long takes in Hollywood films during the 1930s and 1940s, which shows that the shot length increased during this period from an average of 8.5 to 10.5 seconds.95 Similarly, Chris Berry describes a trend towards the long take in post-World War II European cinema. According to Berry, this should be understood as an attempt to portray a sense hope- lessness in the wake of war. As Berry points out, the massive destruction and “falling away of faith in the modern project” brought about by World War II and the Holocaust made it difficult for directors to accept the per- spective of time-as-movement or time-as-progress.96 As such, the long take with its protracted gaze, often into empty space, serves to accurately

92 James Udden, “In Search of Chinese Film Style(s) and Technique(s),” p. 266. 93 For a discussion of Fei Mu’s employment of the long take, see Ding Yaping, Ying­ xiang Zhongguo: Zhongguo dianying yishu, pp. 354–62. 94 James Udden, “In Search of Chinese Film Style(s) and Technique(s),” p. 266. 95 Barry Salt, Film Style and Technology: History and Analysis (London: Starword, 1992), p. 231. Udden cites Salt’s analysis in his study. See James Udden, “In Search of Chinese Film Style(s) and Technique(s),” p. 266. 96 Chris Berry, “Xiao Wu: Watching Time Go By,” p. 252. Also, Berry states that his argument is inspired by Gilles Deleuze’s writings on the “time-image” (i.e., the long take) in the post-WWII cinema, and the “movement-image” (which conveys the concept of time-as-movement or time-as-progress) in prewar film. See ibid., pp. 251–52. As Berry comments, an example of the “time-image” would be “Ozu’s famous pillow shots” that “might be understood as standing outside logical time-as-movement.” See ibid., p. 251. For Deleuze’s studies of the movement-image and time-image, see Gilles Deleuze, Cinema 1: The Movement-Image, Hugh Tomlinson, and Barbara Habberjam, trs. (Minneapolis: Uni- versity of Minnesota Press, 1986), and Cinema 2: The Time-Image, Hugh Tomlinson, and Robert Galeta, trs. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1989). 204 chapter four convey a sense of purposelessness and the nonprogressive passage of time experienced by people living in the wake of war. This reading of the long take as linked to a lack of faith in time-as-progress accords with Fei Mu’s convoluted portrayal of time in Spring in a Small Town and also with his rejection of the perspective of the “enlightened” modern intellectual. In addition, it concurs with the film’s preoccupation with ruins, a focus also found in European wartime intellectual Walter Benjamin’s (1892–1940) unfinished work Arcades Project. As Susan Buck- Morss argues in her essay “Historical Nature: Ruin,” Benjamin’s allegorical treatment of ruins in the Arcades Project shows how “the crumbling of the monuments that were built to signify the immortality of civilization becomes proof, rather, of its transiency.”97 Nonetheless, while Fei Mu’s long takes convey a traumatized visuality and a sense of hopelessness in the wake of total war, he also employs the technique to create a more vivid portrait of everyday life. In a film that lacks a sense of heightened drama, the slow-moving or stationary camera in Spring in a Small Town observes the characters as they move at their own pace and engage in everyday activities. In one long take, where Yuwen and Zhichen walk together back to the Dai estate, a chicken is seen crossing the camera frame behind them. Although the shot was tech- nically “ruined” by this unexpected addition, Fei Mu decided to keep it as he felt that it heightened the scene’s realism (Fig. 4.9).98 Similarly, in the case of the drinking scene at the younger sister’s birthday party, Wei Wei recalls that Fei Mu sought to produce a natural atmosphere, and asked the actors to drink tea and play guessing games all that afternoon while he shot 480 feet of film in one go.99 Fei Mu’s use of the technique to create a realistic sense of everyday life also reflects the thinking of other theorists from the postwar period. In Andre Bazin’s postwar essay “An Aesthetic of Reality: Neorealism,” he argues that through the use of the long take in Citizen Kane (1941), “Orson Wells restored to cinematographic illusion a fundamental quality of reality—its continuity.”100

97 Susan Buck-Morss, The Dialectics of Seeing: Walter Benjamin and the Arcades Project (Massachusetts: MIT Press, 1989), p. 164. 98 See Chen Mo, Fei Mu dianying lungao, p. 426. 99 Huang Ailing, “Fang Wei Wei,” p. 201. 100 See Andre Bazin, “An Aesthetic of Reality: Neorealism,” in Hugh Gray, tr., What is Cinema? 2 vols. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971), II: 28; cited in Chris Berry, “Xiao Wu: Watching Time Go By,” in Chris Berry, ed., Chinese Films in Focus II (London: British Film Institute, 2008), p. 252. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 205

Fig. 4.9. Long take of Yuwen and Zhichen with a chicken walking in the foreground.

Fei Mu’s cinematography thus combines a realist aesthetic, expressing a sense of normal everyday life, with a modernist film noir aesthetic emphasizing interiority and traumatic consciousness. For example, his long take shots of Yuwen walking on the ruined city wall appear on the surface to be a realistic representation of her daily activity of buying gro- ceries or medicine. Yet, through his deployment of mid-scene dissolves, flash-forward, and flashback, Fei Mu informs the viewer that her wander- ings are an expression of her disoriented psyche and melancholic attach- ment to the past. In a way reminiscent of Alfred Hitchcock’s (1899–1980) films, Fei Mu juxtaposes everyday reality with suggestions of the terror and violence lurking beneath such normalcy. Fei Mu’s cinematography arguably produces an even greater tension through its masterfully under- stated portrayal of daily life undercut by techniques designed to convey schizophrenic doubling and traumatic memory. Despite his use of realist and modernist aesthetics, Fei Mu’s cinematog- raphy is informed as well by traditional aesthetics. Indeed, some Chinese critics have argued that the long take embodies a quintessentially Chinese aesthetic. In his book The Roaming Lens (Jingyou 镜游), Lin Niantong links the use of the long take to the aesthetic of “unrestrained roaming” 206 chapter four

(you 游) found in traditional Chinese art, particularly in scroll painting.101 Lin writes: The camera moving like a handscroll unrolling is aimed at releasing imagi- nation. In Han Shangyi’s words, “The manipulation of the camera is dictated by ‘feeling’ and not by ‘scenery.’ ” He continues, “Scenery is at the service of feeling. Imagination arises when the meaning beyond words and the music beyond notes are captured.”102 Lin argues that not only does the movement of the camera mimic that of a handscroll unrolling, but also offers important cues to viewers: “the audience should be tempted to let their imagination ‘roam’ and ‘tour’ therein” as they watch the film. This analysis has not gone unchallenged. Udden’s study of Chinese film aesthetics refutes Lin’s argument for the existence of a quintessentially Chinese film aesthetic. In particular, he finds that although shot lengths in Chinese films are longer than those in Hollywood films, they are comparable with and in some case shorter than shot lengths in European films.103 Udden also shows that Chinese direc- tors who employ the long take are not thereby more likely to use camera motion to implement the aesthetic of “roaming.”104 However, Udden does admit that Spring in a Small Town is distinc- tive compared to other modern Chinese films. Apart from the fact that Fei Mu’s film has the longest shot length of any of the films he analyzes, over 60 percent of the shots in the film are taken by a moving camera.105 Udden argues that much of this movement is directly linked to the actions of characters in the film—in contrast to the notion of unrestrained roam- ing or the unrolling of a scroll. Nor does Fei Mu’s cinematography have affiliations with other aspects of Chinese aesthetics as outlined by Lin, such as the concept of flatness, imitating the multiple-point perspective of landscape painting. Rather, Fei Mu uses close-ups in many scenes.

101 See Lin Niantong 林年同, Jingyou (Hong Kong: Su Ye, 1985); see also Lin Niantong, “Zhongguo dianying de kongjian yishi” 中国电影的空间意识 (Consciousness of Space in Chinese Film), E hu 109 (July 1984): 42–50. 102 Lin Niantong, “A Study of the Theories of Chinese Cinema in Their Relationship to Classical Aesthetics,” Modern Chinese Literature 1.2 (1985): 188. This essay was originally published as “Zhongguo dianying de yishu xingshi yu meixue sixiang” 中国电影的艺术 形式与美学思想 (The Artistic Form of Chinese Film and Aesthetic Thought), Bafang 2 (1980), and republished in Lin Niantong, Zhongguo dianying meixue 中国电影美学 (The Aesthetics of Chinese Cinema; Taibei: Yunchen wenhua, 1991), pp. 7–38. 103 James Udden, “In Search of Chinese Film Style(s) and Technique(s),” p. 266. 104 Ibid., pp. 266–67. 105 Ibid., p. 266. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 207

For example, when Yuwen visits Zhichen’s room at night, Fei Mu employs close-ups to film her walking feet. In the first scene, she stops briefly, held back by propriety; in the next scene, she walks quickly; and in the third shot, she stumbles, having drunk too much at the little sister’s birthday.106 Nonetheless, given Fei Mu’s penchant for the long take and a slow-moving camera, a case can be made that his cinematography indeed embodies the traditional aesthetic of roaming as defined by Lin Niantong.107 This is not surprising given Fei Mu’s claims that he hoped to produce a kind of “national painting” in his films, and sought to recreate the “bleak mood of ancient China” through his cinematography in Spring in a Small Town. Fei Mu’s intention of drawing on the roaming aesthetic of landscape painting is evident in the opening scene of Spring in a Small Town, where the camera pans laterally across the scene, giving the impression of an unfurling scroll. The small figure of Yuwen then appears, as if seen from a distance against the line of the broken city wall. This scene is reminiscent of the contrast found in traditional landscape painting between a small human figure and a large-scale landscape, suggesting the theme of har- mony between man and nature—although in this case Fei Mu portrays a female figure. Following the Chinese tradition of inscribing landscape painting with poetry, many critics have provided traditional verse to accompany Fei’s cinematography.108 In her “Home and Nation Amid the Rubble: Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town and Jia Zhangke’s Still Life,” Jie Li argues that Du Fu’s “Spring Prospect” (Chun wang 春望; 757) is represented in the open- ing scene of the film. Written during the An Lushan Rebellion (An Shi zhi luan 安史之乱; 755–63), which occurred during the Tang dynasty and greatly weakened the central government, Du Fu’s poem expresses his sorrow over the devastation of war: The nation shattered, mountains and river remain; City in spring, grass and trees burgeoning. Feeling the times, blossoms draw tears; Hating separation, birds alarm the heart.

106 See Yingjin Zhang’s analysis of this scene in Chinese National Cinema, p. 110. 107 Also, Fei Mu employs mostly medium shots throughout the film in keeping with Lin Niantong’s assertion that a Chinese film aesthetic is characterized by the use of medium shots. 108 For example, Chen Mo argues that Fei Mu’s cinematography reflects the poetry of Li Shangyin. In particular, Chen claims that the film contains echoes of Li Shangyin’s “Untitled Poem” (Wuti 无题) in its depiction of images of candles, orchids, wine, wind, and thoughts of regret for the past. Chen Mo, Fei Mu dianying lungao, p. 386. 208 chapter four

Beacon fires three months in succession, A letter from home worth ten thousand in gold. White hairs, fewer for the scratching, soon too few to hold a hairpin up.109 国破山河在， 城春草木深。 感时花溅泪， 恨别鸟惊心 烽火连三月 家书抵万金 白首搔更短 浑欲不胜簪110 Li comments: “The first two lines of the poem are visualized in the open- ing credits sequence of Spring in a Small Town: sweeping pans of a ruined yet continuous city wall, its gaps filled by the budding growths of wild bushes in spring.”111 Here Li interprets the opening scene allegorically as a representation of the devastation wreaked on China during the War of Resistance, a calamity that implicitly alludes to the An Lushan Rebellion. Li also argues that Fei Mu’s use of dissolve montage creates “a blending of multiple views of the same landscape that destabilizes the one-point perspective of the photographic image, so that each set of shots comes to resemble a Chinese painting, where the far and the near coexist.”112 Thus, although Fei Mu’s film is not characterized by flatness, it still creates an effect similar to that of an ink-and-wash painting.113 In addition, Fei Mu’s cinematography reflects his effort to match emo- tion and setting according to the poetic concept of the “fusion of scene and emotion,” and the bleak ruins mirror the broken lives of the charac- ters that inhabit them. At times, the characters blend so well with the background against which they are framed that they appear to become

109 Du Fu, The Selected Poems of Du Fu, Burton Watson, tr. (New York: Columbia Uni- versity Press, 2002), p. 30. 110 Du Fu, Du Fu shixuan, p. 70. 111 Jie Li, “Home and Nation Amid the Rubble: Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town and Jia Zhangke’s Still Life,” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture 21. 2 (Fall 2009): 94. 112 In addition, Li compares Fei Mu’s cinematography to the “rhythmic nature” of tra- ditional Chinese art and calligraphy: “As articulated by the art historian Zong Baihua, Chinese painting and calligraphy present a ‘rhythmic nature’ created not from geometric concepts but from lights and shadows, the waves and undulations of rises and falls. This sense of rhythm is manifested through the uneven yet supple camera movements as well as the peculiar ‘dissolve-montage’ used throughout the film.” See ibid. 113 Ibid. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 209

Fig. 4.10. A sickly Liyan sits in the bombed ruins of his home in Spring in a Small Town. lost or engulfed by it. As Liyan observes about his decrepit body, which mirrors the broken ruins he inhabits: “I’m afraid my health [shenti 身体 (literally, body)] is like this house, destroyed beyond repair” (Fig. 4.10). These cultural connections notwithstanding, Fei Mu’s cinematography of ruins also conveys a dystopian sense of doom and agoraphobia that stands in marked contrast to the aesthetic ideals of balance and harmony found in traditional art. Likewise, the film’s resemblance to an unfurling scroll is undercut when Fei Mu employs modernist techniques such as oblique camera angles and frequent mid-scene dissolves. Similarly, his use of dis­ orienting camera angles and mid-scene dissolves disrupts the sense of “naturalness” and everyday life conveyed in many of his long-take shots. However, through his jarring juxtaposition of traditional and modernist aes- thetics, Fei Mu succeeds in heightening the emotional tension of the film. In addition, despite the fact that Fei Mu’s camera repeatedly dwells on ruptures and lacunae, he successfully employs the fusion of scene and emotion to express interiority. Like Mu Dan’s poems, Wang Zengqi’s sto- ries, and Ye Qianyu’s sketch-cartoons of Hong Kong and Chongqing, Fei Mu’s film can be understood as a series of evocative poetic scenes that express the artist’s emotional response to war and emphasize a sense of place rather than a strongly defined narrative or plot. Yet in contrast to the vivid and beautiful nature imagery in Wang Zengqi’s short stories, the oratorical chanting and singing that pervades Mu Dan’s poetry, and the humorous portrayal of wartime life in Ye Qianyu’s cartoons, Fei Mu’s cinematography of postwar life is characterized by a slow and languorous rhythm, and by a deep melancholy elicited through the stark and mono- chrome aesthetics of film noir. 210 chapter four

Equivocal Contrasts

There are very few people, after all, who are either extremely perverse or extremely enlightened. Times as weighty as these do not allow for easy enlightenment. In the past few years, people have gone on living their lives, and even their madness seems measured . . . They are not heroes, but they are of the majority who actually bear the weight of the times. As equivocal as they may be, they are also in earnest about their lives. They lack tragedy; all they have is desolation. Tragedy is a kind of closure, while desolation is a form of revelation.114 Apart from incorporating elements of traditional Chinese art and poetry, Spring in a Small Town is also deeply influenced by Chinese theater. Fei Mu’s use of the long take has links with theater, and he employed this technique when filming uninterrupted sequences of performance of tra- ditional opera.115 Li Cheuk-to explains the connection between Fei Mu’s work in traditional theater and his use of the long take: “The aesthetic of long takes, serene and two dimensional, emanates from the theatre.”116 Similarly, the stylized movements and hand gestures of the actors in Spring in a Small Town draw on traditional Chinese theater. Actress Wei Wei recalls that the director instructed her to model her movements on Beijing opera performer Mei Lanfang.117 Also, Fei Mu’s use of props such as an orchid, a scarf, and a candle recall the use of similar items for sym- bolic purposes in Chinese opera. Moreover, the handling of the credits at the beginning of the movie, where each characters appears on the screen followed by an inscription with their name and role in the film, has been compared to stage introductions in traditional opera.118 In addition to its minimalist plot and combining of divergent tempo- ral, narrative, and cinematic perspectives, Spring in a Small Town thus also crosses generic boundaries as it interweaves elements of film, poetry, painting, and traditional theatre. In this sense, the film can be understood as another example of the wartime aesthetics of dissolution. However, Fei Mu’s approach to the aesthetics of dissolution is distinctive and is

114 Eileen Chang, “Writing of One’s Own,” p. 17; Zhang Ailing, “Ziji de wenzhang,” p. 285. 115 See Chen Mo, Fei Mu dianying lungao, pp. 266–91. 116 Cheuk-to Li, “Spring in a Small Town: Mastery and Restraint,” p. 60. 117 Huang Ailing, “Fang Wei Wei,” p. 200. 118 Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town is categorized by some scholars as a Chinese opera film. See, for example, Gao Xiaojian 高小健, Zhongguo xiqu dianying shi 中国戏曲电 影史 (A History of Chinese Opera Films; Beijing: Wenhua yishu, 2005), pp. 111–12. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 211 achieved through creating a series of contrasts that he plays off against one another. For example, rather than prioritizing either emotion or pro- priety, Fei Mu dramatizes the tension between them, as encapsulated in his injunction to Wei Wei to “begin with emotion and stop at propriety.” The interplay between emotion and propriety more broadly parallels another set of oppositions in the film between film noir techniques like the voiceover intended to convey interiority and the stylized theatrical- ity of traditional drama. In turn, this contrast echoes the broader tension between traditional and modernist aesthetics in Fei Mu’s cinematography and use of voiceover. Furthermore, Fei Mu sets up still more contrasts—between forgetting and remembering, light and shadow, Yuwen’s voiceover and the low cam- era angle (from Liyan’s perspective), the lost past and the present, and the spring setting and the desolate scene of ruins. Likewise, Fei Mu juxta- poses characters—the modern doctor versus the sickly Liyan, or Yuwen and Dai Xiu, who is the same age Yuwen was when she first met Zhichen. However, Fei Mu does not set his characters in stark opposition to one another as either heroes or villains. Rather, he depicts them as ordinary people, struggling in their different ways to come to terms with the legacy of war. Fei Mu’s use of contrast in some ways resembles what Nicole Huang refers to as Eileen Chang’s “aesthetics of liminality.” In her analysis of Chang’s essays from the 1940s, Nicole Huang traces the recurrent image of the “balcony at dusk” (huanghun de yangtai 黄昏的阳台),119 a site where Chang’s I-narrators often appear. Huang argues that from this vantage point, characterized by “a transitional moment between day and night (dusk) and a transitional space between one’s own home and the out- side world (balcony),” Chang’s narrators are able to attain a glimpse of “a greater vision of everyday life and historical transformations.”120 Chang demonstrates her fascination with numerous liminal sites such as the dusk, the balcony, the illusory realms between memory and reality, the brief moments between past and present, and the intersection between life and work, fiction and poetry, stage movements and everyday events.121 In a similar fashion, Fei Mu focuses his story on the “in-between” area between tradition and modernity, as well as between characters, in the

119 Nicole Huang, Women, War, and Domesticity, p. 132. 120 Ibid., p. 134. 121 Ibid., p. 135. 212 chapter four lapses of their faulty memories, in the deteriorating walls of their homes and city, and in the chasm between the present and a past that can never be recovered. In some respects, Fei Mu’s representation of postwar life amidst ruins shares an affinity with Wang Zengqi’s employment of the “aesthetics of the shard” in his postwar native-soil fiction. Yet, unlike Wang Zengqi’s narra- tor who reinvents the lost past, Fei Mu dwells more on the unsettling con- trast between the present and the lost past. In doing so, he draws in part from a practice in traditional lyric poetry of juxtaposing imagery. Du Fu’s “Spring Prospect,” for example, sets images of the shattered nation against the beautiful natural scenery of “grass and trees burgeoning.” Du Fu also sets up further contrasts between “a letter from home worth ten thousand in gold” and the decrepit appearance of the poetic speaker whose white hairs are “too few to hold a hairpin up,” as well as between the larger concerns of a country at war and the personal sadness and aging of the speaker. Through such contrasts between the devastation of the nation and the individual suffering of the poetic speaker, Du Fu highlights the pathos of the destruction resulting from war. Spring in a Small Town also contains parallels to Su Shi’s song lyric “A Spring Scene,” which, according to screenwriter Li Tianji, Fei Mu recited to him the first time they met to discuss revisions to his script.122 Like Fei Mu’s film, Su Shi’s poem expresses themes of a melancholy springtime, unrequited love, and sadness over the passage of time. Although there are disagreements about the composition date of “A Spring Scene,” it is gener- ally agreed that it was written during the poet’s second exile to Huizhou (modern-day Guangzhou province) in 1094–97.123 The petals have fallen and their red faded, but the green apricots are still small. When the swallow takes flight, green water winds around the homestead. Catkins on the willow branches dwindle with the blowing wind; Where at the ends of the earth is no sweet grass to be found?

122 Li Tianji, “Wei le fanwan ganshang dianying,” pp. 334–35. 123 Su Shi 苏轼, Su Shi ci biannian jiaozhu 苏轼词编年校注 (Su Shi’s Song Lyrics Arranged by Date of Composition, Collated and Annotated), Zou Tongqing 邹同庆 and Wang Zongtang 王宗堂, eds., 3 vols. (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2002), II: 754. This song lyric was composed to the tune “Butterfly Longs for the Flower” (Die lian hua 蝶恋花). According to some accounts, Su Shi’s concubine Zhaoyun 朝云 (1062–95) accompanied him into his distant exile and performed this song lyric in Huizhou several days before she died from illness. between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 213

Within the walls a swing, outside the walls a path. Outside the wall a wanderer; within the walls a beautiful woman laughs. Her laughter gradually grows faint, the sound dies away. One who cares is troubled by one who cares not. 花褪残红青杏小。 燕子飞时，绿水人家绕。 枝上柳绵吹又少， 天涯何处无芳草！ 墙里秋千墙外道。 墙外行人，墙里佳人笑。 笑渐不闻声渐悄， 多情却被无情恼。 124 On the surface, the song contains beautiful images of spring, including red flowers, green apricots, flowing water, green grass, a swallow in flight (symbolizing spring), and the laughter of a beautiful girl. However, the season is late spring. The green apricots will soon change color, but are not yet ripe, and the falling, faded red petals and wind-blown catkins serve as reminders of the passage of time. In addition, the blowing catkins mirror the flowing motion of water around the homestead and parallel the wan- dering traveler who appears in the second stanza. Walking past the home- stead, the traveler hears the beautiful sound of a woman’s laughter as she amuses herself on a swing. Separated from her by a wall, he comforts him- self with the thought that there are beautiful women everywhere. As the wanderer asks rhetorically, “Where at the ends of the earth is there no sweet grass [i.e., beautiful women] to be found?” Nonetheless, he is still upset by his unrequited emotion for this alluring woman, and the last line of the poem expresses this frustration: “One who cares is troubled by one who cares not.” Like Fei Mu’s film, Su Shi’s poem revolves around a series of juxtaposi- tions. As in the case of Eileen Chang’s “equivocal” contrast between “scal- lion green and peach red,” Su Shi sets up a comparison between newly ripened green apricots and the faded red color of spring blossoms. In addi- tion, he juxtaposes the blowing wind with flowing water, and the unre- quited passion of the traveler with the happy laughter of the woman who does not even notice him. Similarly, the first stanza, composed mostly of nature imagery, is set in opposition to the second stanza, which portrays the inner emotions of the traveler. The contrasts in the poem are in turn

124 Ibid., p. 753. 214 chapter four organized around the image of the wall in the second stanza that divides the man from the object of his desire. Su Shi’s song lyric also shares other similarities with Fei Mu’s film. Like Spring in a Small Town and Du Fu’s “Spring Prospect,” the poem features a desolate spring landscape characterized by loss and separation. In this sense, the poem bears an affinity as well to The Spring River Flows East. Furthermore, both Fei Mu’s film and Su Shi’s poem focus on the image of a wall. Indeed, the opening shot of the flowing river, city wall, and spring scenery closely parallels the imagery in Su Shi’s poem. Likewise, both film and poem contain the theme of separation from the object of one’s affec- tion. While in Su Shi’s case the traveler’s unfulfilled love could be read as a metaphor for forced exile and separation from the provincial capital and its ruler, Yuwen’s lament in Spring in a Small Town could be inter- preted as a national allegory, expressing sadness over the destruction of the old society. Moreover, Fei Mu’s film, like Su Shi’s poem, features a blowing wind. “What wind blows you here?” Liyan asks Zhichen when he meets him for the first time after 10 years of separation. Zhichen responds: “The east wind, the south wind, and the northwest wind!” Despite these parallels between Spring in a Small Town and Su Shi’s song lyric, in some ways “A Spring Scene” bears a closer resemblance to Li Tianji’s original script. Just as Su Shi portrays the male perspective of the traveler, Li Tianji’s script is narrated from the point of view of the young, progressive intellectual. And like Su Shi’s wanderer who comforts himself by moving on to seek other “sweet grass,” Li Tianji’s Zhichen embarks on a hopeful journey at the end of the film as he strides away from home towards the sunlight. Nonetheless, reciting Su Shi’s poem during their first meeting provided Fei Mu with a catalyst through which he made major changes to Li’s script. While Li’s script initially alluded to revolutionary themes, by bringing it into dialogue with Su Shi’s poem, Fei Mu replaced Li’s concerns with lyric themes of sadness over the passage of time, for- saken love as political allegory, and lonely wanderings. Not only did Fei Mu’s film transform Li’s original script, but it also rein- vented the imagery of “A Spring Scene.” In the place of Su Shi’s depiction of the bright, albeit fading colors of spring, Fei Mu deployed a disorienting black and white film noir aesthetic. Rather than portraying a homestead surrounded by a wall, Fei Mu filmed the bombed ruins of a mansion and city wall. Moreover, Fei Mu replaced the perspective of the male trav- eler with that of a female narrator, and substituted the happily laughing woman in Su Shi’s poem with the traumatized figure of Yuwen. In con- trast to Su Shi’s wanderer who has the freedom to wander to the end of between forgetting and the repetitions of memory 215 the earth, and unlike the beautiful woman within the walls of his poem, Yuwen is a liminal figure. Occupying a space neither inside nor outside the former city wall, she instead roams endlessly along its ruins. Through his portrayal of the wandering figure of Yuwen, who can nei- ther accompany Zhichen as he heads towards a bright future nor return to her home as it was before the war, Fei Mu portrays a cultural impasse— the result of a lack of faith in Westernized modernity and an inability to return to a past that has been reduced to ruins. Clearly, Fei Mu longed to find harmony between tradition and modernity, as evidenced by his portrayals of “modern sages” and his theories on traditional aesthetics and modern film. However, the power and artistry of Spring in a Small Town lies not in its unproblematic adherence to a signature national aes- thetic grounded in tradition, but rather in its juxtaposition of traditional and modernist aesthetics. It also stems from the film’s vivid psychological portrayal of the traumatic rupture between past and present experienced by people during the postwar period, and from its elegiac expression of yearning for the society and culture that had been destroyed by war and now lay in ruins. Moreover, the tension portrayed in the film between new and old reflects not only postwar realities, but also the schizophrenic political sit- uation Fei Mu witnessed as China’s civil war unfolded around him. Prior to filming Spring in a Small Town, Fei Mu spent two years directing Majes- tic Mountains and Rivers (Jinxiu jiangshan 锦绣江山), a film depicting the harmonious resolution of the conflict between the Nationalists and the Communist Party. However, as a result of financial problems as well as widespread criticism, he was unable to finish this project.125 Commenting on the failure of the film and Fei Mu’s hope for resolution between war- ring factions, Cheng Jihua tersely noted that “negative bourgeois delusions of this kind were shattered.”126 Though he longed to help find a peaceful resolution to the battles between warring political factions in Shanghai, Fei Mu was ultimately rejected by both right- and left-wing directors alike, who held him in con- tempt and suspicion.127 Following the release of Spring in a Small Town, Fei Mu went to work in Hong Kong and co-founded Dragon Horse Films (Longma dianying 龙马电影). Attempting to return to China following

125 See Wei Wei’s discussion of Majestic Mountains and Rivers in Huang Ailing, “Fang Wei Wei,” pp. 202–203. 126 Cheng Jihua, Zhongguo dianying fazhanshi, p. 270. 127 Huang Ailing, “Fang Wei Wei,” pp. 202–203. 216 chapter four the end of the civil war in 1949, he was given the cold shoulder by many left-wing workers in the film industry. Required to write a self-criticism, he refused and returned to Hong Kong where he died in 1951 of heart failure. The awkward position in which Fei Mu found himself as a modern film- maker trained in Western theory, and someone who had produced films under the auspices of the Nationalist government, was shared by other directors from this period. Shi Dongshan became a target of political criti- cism and committed suicide in 1955, at which time, according to one of his sons, his suicide note was confiscated by Premier Zhou Enlai 周恩来 (1898–1976). Cai Chusheng died in 1968 from the harsh treatment he received during the Cultural Revolution, and Zheng Junli died from mal- treatment in prison in 1969.128

128 See Pickowicz, “Victory as Defeat,” pp. 369–72. CHAPTER FIVE

FEI MING’S AFTER MR. NEVERWAS RIDES A PLANE: WARTIME AUTOBIOGRAPHY AS HISTORY

In his self-reflexively titled postwar essay, “Essay” (Sanwen 散文; 1946), Fei Ming described a dramatic shift in his views on writing that had occurred since the War of Resistance: I now only like facts. I do not like to imagine. If I really must write an article, then I can only write an essay. I definitely cannot write another piece of fiction. Therefore when a friend asked me to write a piece of fiction, one could say that he didn’t understand me, even though in my heart I was very grateful for his sincerity.1 The friend Fei Ming referred to in this essay was Zhu Guangqian, edi- tor of the Shanghai journal The Literary Magazine (Wenxue zazhi 文学 杂志), who had asked him to write a novel for serialization in the maga- zine. Despite Fei Ming’s proclamation of his unwillingness to write fic- tion again, he eventually accepted Zhu’s offer, and the following year he wrote his longest novel, After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane. The novel was serialized in The Literary Magazine beginning in June 1947 and ran until November 1948, when printing of the journal ceased. After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane was never formally completed, and the unfinished manu- script was not published as a single volume until 1997.2 Like Fei Ming’s earlier novel The Biography of Mr. Neverwas (Moxuyou xiansheng zhuan 莫须有先生传; 1932), After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane is framed as a biography of the author’s fictionalized alter ego, Mr. Neverwas (Moxuyou xiansheng 莫须有先生).3 Also, reminiscent of The Biography of

1 Fei Ming, “Sanwen,” in Feng Jiannan ed., Fei Ming sanwen xuanji, p. 90. 2 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou 莫须有先生坐飞机以后 (After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane), in Ni Wei 倪伟, ed., Fang zhi ji 纺织记 (A Record of Spinning Thread; Zhuhai: Zhuhai, 1997), pp. 131–362; Fei Ming’s postwar novel was republished in 2003 as Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou 莫须有先生坐飞机以后 (After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane), in Moxuyou xianshengzhuan 莫须有先生传 (The Biography of Mr. Nev- erwas; Guilin: Shifan daxue, 2003), pp. 113–348. All references to Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou are to the 2003 edition. 3 I follow both Haiming Liu and Edward Gunn in translating Moxuyou xiansheng as Mr. Neverwas. The phrase moxuyou 莫须有 was originally used by Song Prime Minister Qin Gui 秦桧 when he was asked for evidence of Yue Fei’s 岳飞 guilt before the latter’s 218 chapter five

Mr. Neverwas, Fei Ming employs a first-person narrator who refers to the author’s fictionalized self in the third-person. The book is thus in fact a thinly disguised memoir of Fei Ming’s wartime displacement to his home- town of Huangmei in Hubei province. Prior to the outbreak of war, Fei Ming taught at Peking University, but his position as a lecturer rather than a professor did not entitle him to go to Lianda. As a result, he returned to his hometown where he taught at a local elementary school. The essen- tially plotless novel focuses on Mr. Neverwas’s daily life during the war, including anecdotes of his experiences teaching and his interactions with local townspeople, along with descriptions of air-raids and Japanese bombing. These vignettes of everyday wartime life are in turn interspersed with essay-like reflections on a wide array of topics, including traditional literature, Chinese philosophy, regional history, family ancestry, religion, and wartime education. However, although the novel is very loosely structured, the narrator announces in the introductory chapter that it is intended to be read as a kind of “history” (lishi 历史)—based completely on “fact” (shishi 事实) and written to promote the “national spirit” (minzu jingshen 民族精神).4 Fei Ming’s attempt to produce a realistic wartime history and foster nationalist consciousness represented a dramatic change from his prewar writings. During the 1920s and 1930s, he had established his reputation as a writer of poetry, essays, and modernist fiction; he was best known for his fiction, including his collections of short stories, Tales of the Bamboo Grove (Zhulin de gushi 竹林的故事; 1925), Peach Garden (Taoyuan 桃园; 1928), and Date (Zao 枣; 1931), and his novels Bridge (Qiao 桥; 1931) and The Biography of Mr. Neverwas. These works were described by his teacher Zhou Zuoren 周作人 (1885–1967) as “abstruse” (huise 晦涩),5 and were characterized by evocative, lyrical imagery, and the frequent portrayal execution. In this context, moxuyou means “there is no need” (for such evidence). The term is also frequently used to mean “baseless” or “groundless.” One way of interpreting Fei Ming’s use of the term as a name to address his alter ego would be as an indication of the relative unimportance of his life. Viewed in this light, his wartime history becomes merely a record of the everyday life of an ordinary person. For Haiming Liu’s discussion of Fei Ming’s earlier novel The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, which he translates as The Life of Mr. Neverwas, see Haiming Liu, “Transformation of Childhood Experience: Rainer Maria Rilke and Fei Ming,” Ph.D. dissertation, Yale University, New Haven, 2001, pp. 223–33. For Edward Gunn’s comments on The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, see his Rewriting Chinese, pp. 128–29. 4 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 115. 5 See Zhou Zuoren, Zhou Zuoren sanwen chao 周作人散文钞 (Selected Essays of Zhou Zuoren; Shanghai: Kaiming shudian, 1932), p. 123. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 219 of dreams. Fei Ming’s shift from his earlier focus on dreams and the imagi- nation to a preoccupation with representing “reality” and “history” is a striking one, and provides a useful case study for understanding changes in Chinese modernism during the war and postwar periods. Despite these changes in his writing style, Fei Ming’s postwar novel contains parallels to his earlier works, which were known for their stylistic innovations and intermixing of poetry, fiction, and the essay. In a similar fashion, his postwar novel not only includes elements of autobiography, biography, history, fiction, and non-fiction, but also appropriates material from a variety of traditional genres, such as the formal essay, historical commentary, and “random jottings” (biji 笔记). After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane is thus characterized by a tension between formal looseness and stylistic play on the one hand, and a thematic focus on the collective and the cause of national salvation on the other. Moreover, on the ideological level, the novel is very diverse, and the narrator’s essay-like commentary draws from an eclectic combination of Marxist, Buddhist, Confucian, and Daoist thought. Prior to the war, Fei Ming’s writings were deeply influenced by his readings of Daoist, Confu- cian, and Buddhist classics, as well as by his unique interpretations of tra- ditional literature, in particular Tang dynasty poetry. However, he did not begin to adopt Marxist ideology until the war period. Fei Ming’s chang- ing political views were representative of many intellectuals who moved increasingly leftward during and after the War of Resistance—although unlike many wartime poets Fei Ming did not seek to popularize his works and produce literature for the masses. The formal and ideological tensions in his novel are in turn emblematic of the dramatic social changes taking place on the eve of the Chinese Communist Revolution. In the first section of this chapter, I analyze Fei Ming’s reworking of his wartime memoir into a work of “biographical history” that seeks to educate readers about the evils of Western modernization. Next, I show how Fei Ming’s loose, essay-like style of writing and focus on history has parallels with other long fiction from the war period. In the third section, I compare After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane to Fei Ming’s two earlier novels, The Biography of Mr. Neverwas and Bridge, and show how his literary style shifted in response to the exigencies of war. In the fourth part, I examine Fei Ming’s transition from his prewar “aesthetics of mutual implication,”6

6 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 192. 220 chapter five combining Western modernism and traditional literary influences, to a postwar aesthetics of dissolution characterized by an even more diverse intermixing of modernist, traditional, and realist aesthetics. In the fifth section, I discuss the author’s experimentation with narrative perspective to position the self as kind of historical figure, using a technique charac- terized by Dorrit Cohn as “distanced self-narration.” Finally, I argue that the novel can also be understood as a reworking of the native-soil genre into a spatialized conception of history rooted in collective memory. In order to clarify Fei Ming’s changing approach to writing about his native region during and after the war, I provide a reading of his 1939 autobio- graphical essay “Fifth Patriarch Temple” (Wuzu si 五祖寺), in dialogue with Chapter Fifteen of After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, also titled “Fifth Patriarch Temple.”

Alternative Forms of Wartime History

In the introductory chapter of After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, Fei Ming’s narrator launches into a discussion about the generic classification of the novel. Announcing that his previous novel about Mr. Neverwas, The Biog- raphy of Mr. Neverwas, is a piece of fiction rather than a true biography, he asserts that, to the contrary, the present work is a biography in which all the facts presented are true: For a long time Mr. Neverwas wanted to put a notice in the paper to announce that, speaking truthfully, After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane is completely based on fact . . . It [the novel] could be called history. It is also simply a piece of philosophy. Originally, according to Hegel’s theories, his- tory is philosophy. Let’s follow custom and consider After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane a biography.7 According to Fei Ming’s narrator, apart from combining elements of biography, autobiography, and history, the novel is also a work of phi- losophy. Yet, although Mr. Neverwas claims that the contents of the novel are “completely truthful,” the narrator subsequently cites Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel’s (1770–1831) assertion that “History is all false, apart from the names; fiction is all true, except for the names.”8

7 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 114. 8 Ibid. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 221

Fei Ming’s introductory chapter thus raises more questions than it answers about the generic status of the novel. Why does the narrator call this fictionalized autobiography a piece of history? If Fei Ming really wanted to write an account of the war “based completely on fact,” then why does he not write about himself in the first-person instead of writing a biography about a person named Mr. Neverwas? Does the narrator agree with the statement he quotes that all history is false? If so, how could After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane be a history that is completely based on fact? Does the author perhaps intend his novel to serve as a kind of fiction that is all true “except for the names”? Rather than answering these questions, the first chapter poses the generic status of the book as a question and problematizes the definition of history. Not only in the introduction, but also throughout the novel, Fei Ming raises questions about the meaning of history and the veracity of traditional historiography. Describing the hardships of wartime life, Mr. Neverwas observes that “for the people living here, each day is like a year, a year of 360 days; one’s body suffers and time seems to pass very slowly.”9 In contrast to such prolonged suffering, “future historians will just write it [wartime history] down in one stroke.”10 Thus, according to Mr. Never- was, historians are cut off from the living realities of the periods that they write about, and traditional historiography cannot adequately capture the breadth of human experience and suffering that constitutes history. Yet, despite his critique of traditional historiography, throughout the novel the narrator repeatedly affirms the importance of history and asserts that “if people do not love history, then human life is without meaning, and human life can definitely not attain happiness.”11 Likewise, he adds, “failing to respect one’s history is the same as failing to respect national society.”12 In addition, as we have seen, Fei Ming treats his novel as a kind of history. Specifically, he transforms his memoir into a biography, a genre that makes up a significant proportion of traditional Chinese histo- riography. Not only does the narrator announce in the first chapter that the novel could be considered a biography, but After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane also follows the protocol of traditional biography by providing infor- mation on the subject’s ancestry, significant events and anecdotes from

9 Ibid., p. 127. 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid., p. 307. 12 Ibid., p. 304. 222 chapter five his childhood, and official positions held.13 Moreover, the novel includes many sample passages and quotations from Mr. Neverwas’s writings, both from the war period, and from his childhood.14 Taken together, these details are described as a “record” (jizai 记载) of Mr. Neverwas’s youth.15 Also, as with traditional biographies, Fei Ming’s novel reveals a preoccu- pation with evidential studies (kaozhengxue 考证学).16 In fact, the first line of the novel refers to this subject: After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane—with respect to this subject, we have a problem with evidential studies. As for “Mr. Neverwas,” that is not a problem—we have the famous Biography of Mr. Neverwas as evidence. How- ever, . . . although the person Mr. Neverwas (i.e. Moxuyou xiansheng 莫须有 先生 [Mr. Mo Xuyou]) exists, is his last name really Mo 莫?17 Reminiscent of Lu Xun’s satirical treatment of Ah Q’s name in the preface to “The True Story of Ah Q,” Fei Ming parodies the intertextual citing of names and prior texts as a means of verifying historical information in traditional biographies. Clearly the existence of the novel The Biography of Mr. Neverwas does not prove the real-life existence of Fei Ming’s fiction- alized alter ego. Yet, through these opening remarks, the author informs the reader that the novel is a kind of biographical history. Indeed, Fei Ming intends his hybrid autobiography/biography to serve as a form of history, although at the same time, Mr. Neverwas questions the status of his wartime experiences as history. For example, on one occasion when Mr. Neverwas is shown running to take shelter from Japanese bombing, he asks himself: “Is the reality before my eyes really history?” Subsequently, he concludes that he is indeed engaged in watching history unfold and comments: “Now is precisely a moment of history.”18 In place of the stock forms of historiography that he critiques as removed from wartime realities, Fei Ming thus presents his autobiograph- ical wartime experiences as a form of history. Much of the novel deals with Mr. Neverwas’s daily activities of teaching, writing, and spending

13 For a discussion of the protocol of traditional biography and the crucial role of biography in Chinese historiography, see David Nivison, “Aspects of Traditional Chinese Biography,” Journal of Asian Studies 21.4. (Aug. 1962): 457–63. 14 For example, the narrator quotes in full an essay written by Mr. Neverwas during middle school about his experience of reading The Four Books (Sishu 四书). See Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, pp. 163–65. He also cites an essay by Mr. Neverwas titled “Release Ferociousness” (Fang chang 放猖). See ibid., pp. 200–202. 15 See ibid., p. 116. 16 See also the narrator’s discussion of evidential studies in ibid., p. 307. 17 Ibid., p. 114. 18 Ibid., p. 127. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 223 time with his family, along with his and the narrator’s thoughts and reflec- tions on the war. The novel also vividly depicts everyday life amidst the constant fear of bombing and attack. As the narrator recalls, “the phrase on everyone’s lips” was “Japanese planes are here!” (Riben lao de feiji lai le 日本佬的飞机来了).19 Although Mr. Neverwas initially dismisses rumors in the summer of 1939 that a Japanese airplane has fallen nearby in Sai Laozu 赛老祖, shortly afterwards Japanese forces arrived to recover the plane and bombed the local area, including a number of temples. While such bombing becomes a normal part of wartime life, the lives of many ordinary people in Huangmei are profoundly damaged by the war. After the bombing and occupation of Huangmei by enemy troops, Fei Ming writes that by the end of the war the town becomes uninhabitable.20 Also, the lives of ordinary people in his hometown are beset with suffering. For example, he recounts the story of a 40-year-old businessman who devel- ops convulsions as a result of living in constant fear. In addition, he recalls the case of a 60-year-old woman who is raped by Japanese troops after her son abandons her as “useless” (fei wu 废物) because her bound feet make it impossible for her to run.21 Having witnessed atrocities committed against people in Huangmei, Mr. Neverwas feels a moral responsibility to write about his wartime expe- riences. As the narrator explains in the introductory chapter, Fei Ming’s fictional Other, Mr. Neverwas, both the protagonist and author of After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, felt “compelled to leave a record” of what he experienced during the war: Therefore, this book is basically the result of what Mr. Neverwas had a desire to write to give to Chinese people to read after he flew in a plane—even though it describes events that happened before he went up in the plane and is a record of wartime refuge [binanji 避难记]. He is afraid that after Chinese intellectuals take rides in airplanes, they will forget the state of the nation; since he shared the lives of the people so intimately, he feels com- pelled to leave a record.22 In the opening chapter, the narrator also cites Mr. Neverwas’ revelations about the dangers of mechanized modernity. According to Mr. Neverwas, he gained these insights following a plane ride taken after the end of the war:

19 Ibid., p. 129. 20 Ibid., p. 128. 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid., p. 116. 224 chapter five

That time after I rode a plane I had a major insight into the problem of the relationship between humans and machines . . . In the future, the world will not have religion, nor will it have art, and it will also not have science. It will only have machines. People will have no relation to one another. Even people in the street won’t speak to one another. Everyone will just be people inside a machine, people inside a dream.23 Although Mr. Neverwas’s aversion to planes developed during the war years when he lived under constant threat of bombing, his views on the dangers of science and technology do not crystallize until after the war. While, on the one hand, Fei Ming’s history is intended as a “record of wartime refuge,” it is also written as a warning to readers about the devastation produced in the wake of Western-inspired industrialization and modernization. Mr. Neverwas concludes that “countries that have sophisticated machinery are not necessarily blessed.”24 More generally, Fei Ming’s preoccupation with history is framed as a reaction against the May Fourth movement’s wholehearted embracing of evolutionary theory and its faith in modernity as progress. “History is definitely not a history of animals,” the narrator pontificates: “It is a history of the moral frame- work of the human heart (xin 心). The current evolutionary theory is just an idea of its time, with no basis in truth.”25 Like Liang Qichao and other post-World War I neo-traditionalists, Fei Ming’s narrator blames evolu- tionary theory as a cause of rampant militarism and war, arguing that “knowledge only makes weapons of mass destruction more formidable. Evolutionary theory is the source of modern warfare.”26 To head off the rise of militarism, Fei Ming emphasizes the importance of studying not only history, but also philosophy and what he calls “the moral framework of the human heart,” further claiming that philosophy is itself a form of history. When in the passage cited above the narrator observes that “according to Hegel’s theories, history is philosophy,” Mr. Neverwas comments that “Hegel’s observation that history is philosophy really has a point. Chinese history is precisely Chinese philosophy.”27 In keeping with the narrator’s claim that the novel can be viewed as “simply a piece of philosophy,” Fei Ming draws heavily from Confucian philoso- phy. According to Wu Xiaodong, the novel contains over 100 references

23 Ibid., pp. 114–15. 24 Ibid., p. 115. 25 Ibid., p. 307. 26 Ibid., p. 345. 27 Ibid., p. 115. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 225 to Confucius.28 In one passage, for example, the narrator cites II.11 of The Analects (Lunyu 论语), in which Confucius comments that “a person who reviews the old and thereby learns the new can become a teacher” (wengu zhixin keyi wei shi ye 温故知新、可以为师也).29 Confucius says “review the old and thereby learn the new.” Mr. Neverwas was very comforted by Confucius’s words. Mr. Neverwas reviewed the old and thereby learned the new as a means of affirming Confucius. The old is history. The new is today. History and today both make the world. Both make up human life. How could it be that one is correct, while the other is incorrect? In the past, weren’t people also parents? Don’t parents need to be benevolent? In the past, didn’t people also need to interact with others? And isn’t the basis of interaction trust?30 In his analysis of Confucius’ writings, the narrator interprets this pas- sage as specifically relating to the importance of history. Substituting the phrase “the old” with “history” and “the new” with “today,” the narrator concludes that only by understanding history and traditional philosophy does it become possible to understand modern realities. Fei Ming thus advocates a cyclical vision of history according to which past and present are intimately connected, and “history and today both make the world.” The narrator also asserts the importance of the moral values promul- gated by traditional philosophy, including benevolence and trustworthi- ness, which he sees as an antidote to the senseless violence and cruelty of war. Following Confucius’s admonition to “review the old and thereby learn the new,” the narrator reinterprets Confucian thought in dialogue with a variety of other ideologies, both traditional and modern. For exam- ple, he argues that Confucius, Laozi, and Mencius should be considered

28 Wu Xiaodong 吴晓东, “Zhanluan niandai de linglei shuxie—Shilun Fei Ming de Mouyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou” 战乱年代的另类书写试论废名的莫须有先生坐 飞机以后 (Another Way of Writing in a Time of War: A Discussion of Fei Ming’s After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane), accessed June 9, 2011, http://www.chinese-thought.org/ whyj/003656.htm. 29 See Cai Xiqin 蔡希勤, Lai Bo 赖波, and Xia Yuhe 夏玉和, eds., Lunyu 论语 (The Analects; Beijing: Huayu jiaoxue, 1994), p. 19. Cai Xiqin, Lai Bo, and Xia Yuhe translate this passage: “If one is able to acquire new knowledge by reviewing old knowledge, he is quali- fied to be a tutor.” See ibid. Burton Watson translates this passage as “Be thoroughly versed in the old, and understand the new—then you can be a teacher.” See Burton Watson, tr., The Analects of Confucius (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), p. 21. David Hinton translates this passage as “If you can revive the ancient and use it to understand the mod- ern, then you are worthy to be a teacher.” See David Hinton, tr., The Analects (Washington D.C.: Counterpoint, 1998), p. 14. 30 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 345. 226 chapter five

Communist (gongchan zhuyi 共产主义) in light of their concern for the common people, claiming that the sages are “representatives of the farmers” (nongmin de daibiao 农民的代表).31 In this passage, the nar- rator not only espouses Marxist ideology, but also alludes to Daoist thought through his mention of Laozi. Similarly, he refers to the Daoist concept of “non-action” (wuwei 无为) when he comments that “Chinese sages take the course of non-action” (Zhongguo de shengren shi wuwei 中国的圣人是无为).32 Moreover, the narrator reinterprets Confucian- ism in dialogue with Buddhism, arguing that apart from Confucius’s prac- tice of eating meat and using meat for sacrifices, in other respects his philosophy is entirely in harmony with Buddhist practice.33 Fei Ming’s narrator thus combines Confucian ideology with an eclectic mix of Marx- ist, Daoist, and Buddhist thought. In doing so, he advocates a return to traditional morality and the benevolent leadership provided by the sages of the past, at the same time as he critiques modern intellectuals for hav- ing failed the peasantry through their poor leadership.34 Similarly, in his opening monologue, Mr. Neverwas vehemently accuses China’s leaders of oppressing the people: They [the common people (lao baixing 老百姓)] need field cultivation and water irrigation works, but officials fail to provide these for them. What they give is exploitation, and force them into poverty and sickness. . . .35 In some respects, Fei Ming emulates Confucian historiographers through composing a biographical history framed within philosophical commen- tary. Likewise, by combining fiction with history and philosophy, he fol- lows the ancient dictum that “literature, history, and philosophy are not

31 Ibid., p. 305. Likewise, the narrator’s discussion of Mr. Neverwas’s ancestry is shaped by a Marxist sensitivity to class divisions, and he comments that Mr. Neverwas’s family is “middle class” (zhongchan jieji 中产阶级). See ibid., p. 310. 32 Ibid., p. 305. 33 Ibid., p. 346. For a discussion of Buddhist themes in Fei Ming’s novel, see Ji Zhenxing 吉贞杏, “ ‘Wuzu si’ Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou zhi yi zhang li de Fojiao secai” 五祖 寺莫须有先生坐飞机以后之一章里的佛教色彩 (Buddhist Elements in the Fifth Patri- arch Chapter of After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane), in Qian Liqun, ed., Duihua yu manyou, pp. 301–305. Also, see Haiming Liu, “Fei Ming’s Poetics of Representation: Dream, Fantasy, Illusion, and Alayavijnana,” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture 13.2 (Fall 2001): 47–51. 34 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuofeiji yihou, p. 306. Elsewhere in the novel, Fei Ming exhorts Chinese intellectuals to take responsibility in adopting a leadership role with respect to the peasantry: “Chinese intellectuals should really be ashamed because the rul- ing class are the intellectuals. We must understand the Chinese peasantry. We must rescue the Chinese peasant class.” See ibid., p. 130. 35 Ibid., p. 115. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 227 to be separated” (wen shi zhe bufen jia 文史哲不分家).36 Furthermore, in his efforts to educate his readers about the philosophical traditions of the past, Fei Ming’s novel embodies the traditional didactic function of “litera- ture as the embodiment of moral instruction” (wen yi zai dao 文以载道). Yet at the same time, he diverges from traditional historians with his focus on Marxism and his creative melding of Confucian, Marxist, Buddhist, and Daoist thought. In addition, he provides a unique interpretation of tra- ditional thought in the context of nationalism when he argues that “our sages are precisely the representatives of our national consciousness.”37 Fei Ming’s practice of reframing his autobiographical wartime experi- ence as national history can be seen as another example of the wartime “historicization” of subjectivity and reflects his growing awareness of the national collective. Mr. Neverwas repeatedly asserts the need to “save the nation” and foster the “national spirit” and “national consciousness.”38 As he claims, “If we are going to save the nation, then we must first be self- aware. In order to do this, we must first examine our own philosophy.”39 Yet, apart from reflecting his growing national consciousness, Fei Ming’s prioritization of history also voices serious questions about the negative effects of Western, mechanized modernity. Moreover, it expresses a para- doxical yearning for both Marxist revolution and reconnection to the ven- erated philosophical traditions of the past, arguing that Marxism, given its concern for the well-being of the common man, is a modern version of Confucian thought.

Essay-Like Novels

Although Fei Ming’s narrator claims that his novel is intended to be read as a national history, it does not construct history as a teleological narra- tive, but rather interweaves a diverse mix of genres and ideologies in its portrayal of everyday life. In addition to drawing from biography, auto- biography, philosophy, and history, the novel employs an essay-like style as the narrator discourses on a wide variety of topics, ranging from class

36 For a discussion of this maxim, see “Xueshu suowei ‘wen shi zhe bu fenjia’ ” 学术 所谓文史哲不分家 (The Academic Dictum that “specialists in literature, history, and philosophy should not be distinguished”), accessed July 20, 2011, http://www.tianya.cn/ publicforum/content/no01/1/387640.shtml. 37 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 115. 38 Ibid. 39 Ibid. 228 chapter five exploitation to the Confucian sages, to the writing of the novel itself. In keeping with Fei Ming’s postwar rejection of fiction and his claim that he would thenceforward only write essays, it is possible to read the entire novel as a series of essays that seek to make sense of his wartime experi- ences within a larger historical and philosophical context. The loose, essay-like quality of Fei Ming’s writing, which interweaves divergent genres and is organized around a vocal first-person narrator, is in some ways very similar to the essay-like style employed by Mu Dan and Wang Zengqi. Also, the formal looseness of Fei Ming’s writing sug- gests parallels to other wartime novelists. Although, as discussed in the introduction, many novelists strove to produce propaganda to promote the war effort, not all were successful in their attempts to do so. In the postscript to the first novel in his three-part series Fire (Huo 火; 1940–45), Ba Jin described what he regarded as an unsuccessful attempt to produce wartime propaganda in this work: In writing this novel, I wanted not only to communicate my fervor and indignation but to stimulate other people’s courage and strengthen their faith. I also wanted them to see from the activities of these simple youths the hope for a new China. Frankly I wanted to write a work of propaganda. But after I completed these eighteen chapters, I realized that I have failed in my task.40 Frustrated by their attempts at writing propaganda, particularly during the latter years of the War of Resistance and the ensuing civil war, an increasing number of writers set themselves to producing essay-like nov- els that gave voice to a widespread disillusionment with wartime hero- ics. As with Fei Ming’s novel, Lu Ling’s 路翎 (1923–94) Children of the Rich (Caizhu di ernümen 财主的儿女们; 1945) features a talkative and opinionated narrator who, critic Yunzhong Shu notes, expresses himself in a “Tolstoyan voice with categorical statements, often on such big issues as history, social reality, individuality, and most importantly, philosophy of living.”41 However, in contrast to Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910), Lu Ling’s narrator frequently changes his mind and expresses doubt and uncer- tainty about his own pontifications, while even the plot is disordered. Moreover, the novel’s generic status is ambivalent, and Kang Liu argues that it represents a combination of the bildungsroman and the family

40 C.T. Hsia, A History of Modern Chinese Fiction, Third Edition, p. 376; for the original, see Ba Jin, Huo (Fuzhou: Fujian remin, 1985), p. 250. 41 Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front, p. 133. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 229 chronicle, although it arguably also contains elements of reportage.42 As Shu observes, “with its attention focused more on the discursive than on the narrative,”43 the novel is not organized around any clearly defined plot and reveals “clear unconcern about the structural unity” of the work.44 Likewise, in his analysis of Ji Pang’s 冀汸 (1920–) novel Night Travelers (Zou yelu de renmen 走夜路的人们; 1950), Shu comments that “the dispersed, multiplying story lines and, especially the non-closure at the end turn Night Travelers into an interrogative text”45 that is “marked by absence of teleological design.”46 Another example of an essay-like novel from the latter years of the war is Xiao Hong’s Tales of Hulan River (Hulan he zhuan 呼兰河传; 1940), which consists of loosely organized reminiscences from her childhood spent in her native region. Steven Day comments on the book’s form: “Though classified as a novel, the work also reads like a traditional essay and a poetic sensibility is inscribed, often quite visually through imagery, in the many lyrical passages that make up much of the novel.”47 In his preface to the novel, Mu Dan discusses its loose formal structure: Some readers may not regard Tales of Hulan River as a novel. They may argue: No single thread runs through the whole book, the stories and characters in it are disconnected fragments, the work is not an integrated whole. Others may look upon Tales of Hulan River as an autobiography of an unorthodox sort. To my mind, the fact that it is not an orthodox autobiography is all to the good and gives it an added interest.48 Yet another example of essay-like fiction-writing from this period is Shi Tuo’s novella Shanghai Correspondences (Shanghai shouzha 上海手札; 1941). Written in an episodic style, where “each chapter stands alone as a

42 See Kang Liu, “Mixed Style in Lu Ling’s Novel Children of the Rich: Family Chroni- cle and Bildungsroman,” Modern Chinese Literature 7.1 (1993): 61–87. Also, Kirk Denton describes how Lu Ling’s fiction crosses the boundaries between traditional myth and cos- mology, as well as modernist modes of representing consciousness, such as fragmentation and montage. See Chapter Four, “The Politics of Style and the Narrative Representation of Mind,” and Chapter Seven, “The Power of the People: Myth and Cosmology in Children of the Rich and Hungry Guo Su’e,” in Kirk Denton, The Problematic of Self, pp. 158–178, and pp. 191–220 respectively. 43 Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front, p. 133. 44 Ibid., p. 140. 45 Ibid., p. 159. 46 Ibid., p. 164. 47 Steven Day, “Heroes without a Battlefield,” p. 141. 48 Mu Dan, “Preface to Tales of the Hulan River,” in Xiao Hong, The Field of Life and Death and Tales of Hulan River, Howard Goldblatt, tr. (Boston: Cheng and Tsui, 2002), p. 100. 230 chapter five discrete narrative unit, having little apparent connection to what precedes or follows it,”49 the novella is focalized around a dramatized narrator and portrays everyday life in wartime Shanghai. Describing the loose, hybrid form of the work, Day argues that Shi Tuo’s formal experiments serve to draw attention to themselves and raise questions about the generic divide between the historiographical and the fictive: Ostensibly epistolary in both name and form, Shanghai Correspondence (lit- erally ‘Shanghai personal letters’) is actually cobbled together from different literary styles and genres, namely travelogue [youji] 游记, the essay [san- wen] 散文, satirical essay [zawen] 杂文, reportage [baogao wenxue] 报告 文学, fiction, as well as realia such as newspaper articles. The net effect of such generic hybridity and juxtaposition of styles is, I argue, to draw atten- tion to or to show the nature of such forms; it thus challenges readers to consider what constitutes the categorical divisions that separate historio- graphical and fictive, or public and private, accounts of historical experience and the narrative forms associated with them.50 Likewise, poet Feng Zhi’s novella Wu Zixu 伍子胥 (1944), is written in a lyric and essay-like style. Feng’s novella is based on the legend of Wu Zixu, a paragon of filial piety in Chinese tradition, whose life is recoun- ted in early historical texts such as The Zuo Commentary (Zuozhuan 左传; 4th century BC), Conversations of the States (Guoyu 国语; 5th century BC), Master Lü’s Spring and Autumn Annals (Lü shi chunqiu 吕 氏春秋; 3rd century BC), and The Records of the Historian. However, in Feng’s version, only part of the story is told and Feng omits Wu’s achieve- ment of his revenge. Instead, he focuses on creating a vivid psychological portrayal of the protagonist’s rootlessness as he travels as an exile through southwest China, a journey that mirrors Feng’s own wartime displace- ment to Kunming. Indeed, Feng’s representation of Wu Zixu has parallels to his autobiographical account of his flight to the southwest narrated in his memoir “Recollections of Kunming” (Kunming wangshi 昆明往事; 1986).51 As Feng Zhi recalls in this work, his travels through southwest China enabled him to experience a new connection to Chinese history, especially when he considered famous literary figures such as the Tang poet Du Fu, who described his wartime exile to the southwest in poems

49 Steven Day, “Heroes without a Battlefield,” p. 109. 50 Ibid., p. 115. 51 See Feng Zhi, “Kunming wangshi” 昆明往事 (Recollections of Kunming), in Feng Zhi quanji, IV: 343. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 231 about the An Lushan Rebellion.52 Feng’s novella is thus written as a kind of (auto) biographical history within the tradition of historical writing on Wu Zixu. The book has also been interpreted by Chinese scholars as a veiled historical account of the War of Resistance,53 and Feng himself described the novella in his postscript as a “realistic” account of the “suf- ferings of the Chinese people in recent years.”54 In a similar fashion, Shi Tuo and Lu Ling’s novels can also be treated as a form of history. Yet, as with Feng Zhi’s lyric, essay-like style and Fei Ming’s interweaving of biography, philosophy, and autobiography, their approach to representing history is unconventional and formally experi- mental. Whereas Shi Tuo “challenges his readers to consider what consti- tutes the categorical divisions that separate historiographical and fictive, or public and private, accounts of historical experience and the narrative forms associated with them,” Shu argues that Lu Ling situates his national history within “the domestic and personal realms”: An aggregate of happenings, big and small, history . . . takes place at different levels and along different, often unrelated, trajectories. In view of Leo Tol- stoy’s influence on Children of Wealth, we may argue that Lu Ling’s atomi- zation of history pushes the Tolstoyan thesis a step further: history should be viewed as an infinitely large number of infinitesimally small actions by ordinary people. However, while the Russian master still manages to create a grand epic with his panoramic view of a whole country in an entire era, not to mention the loving description and acceptance of a way of life in its totality, Lu Ling channels his novel almost exclusively into the domestic and personal realms.55 Lu Ling was thus influenced by Tolstoy to conceive of history as “an infi- nitely large number of infinitesimally small actions by ordinary people.” Yet, unlike Tolstoy, he was apparently unable to interweave the fates of individuals into a coherent narrative of the larger nation-state. While Shu views Lu Ling’s approach to writing history as a reworking of Tolstoy, he claims that Lu Ling’s novel should also be understood as a reaction against

52 Feng comments that he thought particularly of Du Fu and his poem “Chengdu fu” 成都府 (Rhymeprose on Chengdu) when he traveled through Chengdu. Feng Zhi, “Kunming wangshi,” p. 343. Feng was inspired by this new sense of connection to Du Fu to write an in-depth study of his life and works during the war. See Feng Zhi, Du Fu zhuan 杜甫传 (Biography of Du Fu; Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1958). 53 See Jiang Qinguo 蒋勤国, Feng Zhi pingzhuan 冯至评传 (A Biography of Feng Zhi with Commentary; Beijing: Renmin, 1991), pp. 200–01. 54 Feng Zhi, “Wu Zixu hou ji” 伍子胥后记 (Postscript to Wu Zixu), in Feng Zhi quanji, III: 427. 55 Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front, p. 138. 232 chapter five

“the entrenchment of Marxist historical schemata in Chinese literary realism.”56 In particular, Shu argues that the loose plot and lack of struc- tural coherence of Children of the Rich “constitute a challenge to literary realism premised on the philosophical concept of ‘totality,’ a mode best exemplified by Mao Dun.”57 In contrast to this view, David Wang has shown that Mao Dun’s histori- cal novels from the 1920s and 1930s are characterized by gaps and uncer- tainties. The inconclusive nature of Mao Dun’s fiction is partly attested to by incomplete and abandoned novels like Rainbow (Hong 红; 1930) and Midnight (Ziye 子夜; 1933). Moreover, Wang draws attention to the divide between what Mao Dun set out to accomplish in his fiction and what he actually achieved: It [Mao Dun’s fictional voice] may turn itself against that which it intends to valorize. This brings to mind the irony that his novel Eclipse [Shi 蚀; 1930] was most bitterly attacked for failing to tell the prescribed truths of History not by political rightists but by Mao Dun’s fellow critics; that his capitalist archvillain in the epic Midnight wins the reader’s sympathy; and that his Village trilogy [Nongcun sanbu qu 农村三部曲; 1933] . . . betrays nostalgia for the ethics of pre-revolutionary days.58 His fellow leftists were especially critical of Mao Dun’s trilogy Eclipse, which dealt with the failed CCP revolution of 1927 and depicted the young revolutionaries in a negative light. As Wang comments, the aborted revo- lution left Mao Dun very disillusioned, and at this time he lost his CCP membership under circumstances that remain unclear: The 1927 revolution and its immediate suppression showed Mao Dun the gaps between political belief and political reality, between party mandate and personal conviction. These gaps can even be historically vindicated by his temporary loss of touch with the party, which later resulted in his permanent ejection from the CCP. To write novels at this juncture, there- fore, must have represented for Mao Dun not a mere pastime in reclusion but a means to review and rationalize the gaps, to narrate coherently what otherwise might have been seen as broken and illogical.59 In some respects, the structural and stylistic looseness of wartime and postwar historical fiction, and the ideological tensions it betrays, can be seen as an extension of Mao Dun’s earlier emplotted histories. As in Mao

56 Ibid., p. 139. 57 Ibid., p. 140. 58 David Wang, Fictional Realism in Twentieth-Century China, p. 31. 59 Ibid. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 233

Dun’s fiction, the formal ruptures and inconclusiveness that mark these works reflect the difficulties associated with forcing the chaotic realities of modern Chinese history into a coherent narrative framework. More generally, according to Russian theorist Mikhail Bakhtin (1895–1975), the novel form is inherently marked by contradiction and conflict between differing ideologies and languages, or what he terms heteroglossia. Heteroglossia . . . is another’s speech in another’s language, serving to express authorial intentions but in a refracted way. Such speech constitutes a spe- cial type of double-voiced discourse. . . . all the while these two voices are dialogically interrelated, they—as it were—know about each other (just as two exchanges in a dialogue know of each other and are structured in this mutual knowledge of each other); it is as if they actually hold a conversation with each other.60 Indeed, Bakhtin’s notion of heteroglossia might shed some light on the complex relationship between the divided voices of Fei Ming’s narrator, as well as on the interactions between narrators and characters in Chinese wartime novels, particularly works by Lu Ling. Also, Bakhtin’s concept of “double-voiced discourse,” or the unresolved contradictions between divergent worldviews, accurately describes the ideological tensions that characterize this wartime fiction. Nonetheless, what is striking about many works of historical fiction from the latter years of the War of Resistance and postwar period is the novelists’ refusal to smooth out ideological tensions in order to produce a more coherent teleological vision of history, and their employment instead of loosely organized plots and an essay-like style. Whereas Mao Dun attempted to “review and rationalize” the gaps between Marxist ide- ology and lived experience, in contrast, writers like Fei Ming, Shi Tuo, and Lu Ling sought to expose the inadequacy of various forms of histori- ography to make sense of modern history. In a similar vein, in his essay “On the Lessons of History” (Lun lishi de jiaoxun 论历史的教训), Feng Zhi comments on the “limited value” of historical sources for fiction writ- ers and contends that Chinese scholars often mistakenly “abandon reality and instead consult historical sources.”61 As with Fei Ming, his fictional- ized history can thus be understood in terms of the prioritization of fiction and a looser essayistic style of writing over traditional historiography.

60 Mikhail Bakhtin, “Discourse in the Novel,” in his The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays, Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist, trs. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981), p. 324. 61 Feng Zhi, “On the Lessons of History” (Lun lishi de jiaoxun 论历史的教训), in Feng Zhi quanji, V: 102. 234 chapter five

Yet, at the same time, another commonality between many writers from this period is that they shared the desire to write long fiction dealing with the topic of Chinese history. In their study of modern Chinese literature from 1917 to 1949, Qian Liqun, Wen Rumin, and Wu Fuhui observe that the war and postwar periods witnessed an outpouring of medium-length and longer fictional works, a phenomenon they regard as indicative of the maturation of modern Chinese fiction.62 In their study, they analyze the work not only of authors already discussed in this chapter (Lu Ling, Shi Tuo, Xiao Hong, and Feng Zhi), but also fiction by writers such as Qian Zhongshu 钱锺书 (1910–98), Zhao Shuli 赵树理 (1906–70), Ding Ling, Ba Jin, Lao She, Ai Wu 艾芜 (1904–92), Sha Ding 沙汀 (1904–92), Duanmu Hongliang, Eileen Chang, and others. Some of the works discussed, such as Xiao Hong’s Tales of the Hunan River and her wartime novel Mabole (马伯乐; 1941), do not specifically deal with aspects of Chinese history. Overall, however, the war years witnessed a dramatic increase in longer fiction that sought to portray a larger social canvas. This trend can be linked to the wartime “historicization” of subjectivity, and to efforts on the part of individual writers to contextualize their own wartime experiences within the history of the national collective. This turn towards long fiction reflected a shift in consciousness from the prewar period. Although writers such as Mao Dun, Lao She, Ba Jin, and Shen Congwen published novels during the 1920s and 1930s, the early Republican era was largely dominated by the short story and essay. This change in focus to longer fiction on historical subjects is especially apparent in the cases of Fei Ming and Feng Zhi, who had previously writ- ten mostly poetry and shorter works. Other writers also turned to pro- ducing longer works; a case in point is Ding Ling, who had previously written short stories, and who published her first novel The Sun Shines on the Sanggan River (Taiyang zhao zai Sangganhe shang 太阳照在桑 干河上; 1948) after the War of Resistance. In his study of evolutionary thinking in modern China, Andrew Jones observes that scholars often ask why modern China’s most famous writer, Lu Xun, never wrote a novel. Although Jones does not seek an answer to this question, he argues that Lu Xun’s preference for shorter fiction should be understood as a histori- cally determined response to the fragmentation and political crisis that marked Republican-era Shanghai:

62 See Qian Liqun, Wen Rumin, and Wu Fuhui, eds., Zhongguo xiandai wenxue sanshi nian, p. 491. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 235

I do, however, want to suggest that Lu Xun’s marked preference for short forms can and should be understood historically, both in terms of the day-to- day economics of providing copy to the print industry, and perhaps the dif- ficulties of producing a sustained narrative effort in an era of ever-increasing temporal fragmentation and political crisis. In an urban environment such as Shanghai, subject to the vagaries of global markets, political emergency, and imperialist violence, in other words, the long arc of history might well be overwhelmed by quotidian shock, and extensive plot development yield to the immediate contingency of more mobile forms.63 The attempts by wartime and postwar writers at extensive plot develop- ment were likewise “overwhelmed by quotidian shock.” Like Mao Dun, some writers attempted to piece together the fragmentation of wartime life into a teleological narrative. Ding Ling, for example, followed Mao’s dictates by integrating Marxist ideology into her narrative of rural land reform in The Sun Shines on the Sanggan River. Yi-tsi Feuerwerker sum- marizes the author’s aims: Through the integration of character and community, setting and imagery, action and plot, The Sun Shines on the Sanggan River seeks to construct a working model of historical forces in operation; it gives us a microcosm of the quintessential revolutionary experience in which the present world is transformed by the activation of mass struggle into the world to come.64 However, in contrast to Ding Ling’s “microcosm of the quintessential rev- olutionary experience,” works by such writers as Fei Ming, Lu Ling, Feng Zhi, and Shi Tuo are characterized by the tension between a yearning to write history, on the one hand, and an inability to find closure in the midst of wartime crisis, on the other. Indeed, many novels from this period have incomplete plots and lack formal conclusion. Feng Zhi’s Wu Zixu, for example, ends with the protagonist wandering in exile rather than achiev- ing revenge; in his postscript, the author explicitly describes his novella as “unfinished.”65 Likewise, Mao Dan’s novel Maple Leaves (Shuangye hong si eryue hua 霜叶红似二月花; 1943) was intended as a trilogy, although only the first volume was ever completed. In his postscript to the new edition of the first novel, Mao Dun explained that the remaining volumes

63 Andrew Jones, Developmental Fairy Tales: Evolutionary Thinking and Modern Chinese Culture (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 2011), p. 13. 64 Yi-tsi Feuerwerker, Ding Ling’s Fiction: Ideology and Narrative in Modern Chinese Lit- erature (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982), p. 142. See Feuerwerker’s analysis of this novel in her chapter “The Sun Shines on the Sanggan River: Literature as History,” in ibid., pp. 122–43. 65 Feng Zhi, “Wu Zixu houji,” pp. 426–27. 236 chapter five in the trilogy would show that even though the “frost” of the counterrevo- lution made the maple leaves look red, the true revolution would soon come to fruition.66 Nonetheless, there are no revolutionaries in the first volume, which focuses predominantly on rural life in a small community where communism is a distant rumor. Similarly, Shen’s Long River (Chang he 长河; 1943) was initially intended to comprise four volumes, but only the first was completed. David Wang observes: “incidental references all point to one possibility, that the novel would end with disaster befalling [the town of] Lujiaping.”67 By failing to end the novel, Wang argues that Shen succeeded in “prolong[ing] the disappearing present.”68 These uncompleted novels reflect an unwillingness or inability to find closure, as well as uncertainty about the future on the eve of the Chinese Communist Revolution, coupled with nostalgia for the “disappearing pres- ent.” Like these other works, the last chapter of After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane lacks a formal ending and portrays Mr. Neverwas returning to work on his writing. Finally, the narrator concludes with some reflections on the importance of spiritual self-cultivation: “The above [a comparison between Confucian and Buddhist thought] is a discussion about reason [jiang daoli 讲道理]. In fact, one should not discuss reason, but rather discuss spiri- tual cultivation [jiang xiuxing 讲修行].”69 As the narrator comments, all of the truth or reason (daoli 道理) that he has come to understand over the past 24 years was learned through spiritual training.70 Arguably, the ending of Fei Ming’s novel negates not only the previous passage, as the narrator suggests, but also the entire novel, which is framed by the narrator’s philosophical commentary that attempts to make ratio- nal sense of the war period. Like Lu Ling’s narrator in Children of the Rich, Fei Ming’s narrator thus has a propensity for changing his mind. In addi- tion, he expresses a kind of nihilistic self-doubt as he attempts to present an historical account of the war period, and at the same time questions whether it is possible to construct a coherent account of the chaos and horrors of war.

66 Mao Dun, “Shuang ye hong si erhue hua xin ban houji” 霜叶红似二月花新版后记 (Postscript to the New Edition of Maple Leaves as Red as February Flowers), in Tang Jinhai 唐金海, ed., Mao Dun zhuanji 矛盾专集 (Collection of Writings by and about Mao Dun), 4 vols. (Fuhou: Fujian renmin chubanshe, 1983), I: 980–11. 67 David Wang, Fictional Realism in Twentieth-Century China, p. 276. 68 Ibid., p. 280. 69 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 346. 70 Ibid. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 237

Fei Ming’s Change

Fei Ming’s preoccupation with writing history and promoting national consciousness in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane in many ways repre- sents a dramatic shift away from his earlier writings, which are charac- terized by a focus on dreams and imagination rather than larger social realities. Describing the apolitical nature of Fei Ming’s early works, Ningyi Li writes: Fei Ming is one of the few writers of the early twentieth century who could liberate himself from [the] utilitarian and social purposes of literature. . . . At the same time, he frees himself from the burden of revealing realistic problems and awakening the common people’s consciousness of a modern society, as advocated by most May Fourth period writers.71 As we have seen, Fei Ming described his changing views on his writing in “Essay.” Further insights are given in a letter he wrote to his mentor Zhou Zuoren, in which he claimed that he considered fiction to be a kind of “fraud”: I used to write fiction, but I now avoid writing fiction, because fiction on the one hand needs to be truthful—truthful, but also intimate [qinqie 亲切]—and on the other hand it needs to have a form. However, form approaches fraud. If one puts a lot of effort into it, it is harder for the essay to be intimate.72 Fei Ming’s rejection of fiction and fictional form constituted a critique and disavowal of his former works, which had been predominantly fictional writings characterized by a modernist sense of stylistic play. In many of his essays, Fei Ming emphatically criticized his earlier works. In “Essay,” he makes derogatory comments about his former writings, asserting that the stories “Laundering Mothers” (Huanyi mu 浣衣母) and “Willows on the River” (He shang liu 河上柳) in Bamboo Grove “are not worth looking at again.”73 Mr. Neverwas serves as a mouthpiece for the author when he says, “I now read [The Biography of Mr. Neverwas] and feel ashamed.”74 Mr. Neverwas also states that he finds his former biography/autobiography

71 Ningyi Li, “Fei Ming’s Short Stories: A Poetry of Folk Elements,” Studies on Asia Series II 2.2 (Fall 2005): 124. 72 Zhou Zuoren, “Mingzhi wenxue zhi zhuiyi,” in Qian Liqun, ed., Ershi shiji Zhongguo xiaoshuo lilun ziliao, p. 363. 73 Fei Ming, “Sanwen,” p. 90. 74 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 113. 238 chapter five

“laughable”75 and hopes in the future to produce works with more “educa- tional value.” He claims that The Biography of Mr. Neverwas is excessively “self-centered,” and in contrast he hopes that After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane “will not serve the self, but rather serve others” (bu yao wei ji, yao wei ren 不要为己，要为人).76 Fei Ming’s views on writing began to shift during the 1930s after he became involved in anti-Japanese student movements while lecturing at Peking University. During the War of Resistance, Fei Ming’s understanding of the role of literature continued to evolve as a result of witnessing war- time atrocities, and in response to his experiences teaching elementary school in Huangmei. In an “added note” ( fuji 附记) to his essay “The Fifth Patriarch Temple,” Fei Ming describes how teaching in a regional school inspired him to re-evaluate his early works. Due to a lack of supplies and textbooks in the interior, he was forced to compile his own teaching mate- rials. Yet, as he searched through his writings to find materials to use in class, he discovered that his stories lacked “educational value,” and that none of them could be adapted for classroom use. He therefore realized that he needed to start from scratch, writing works that could be eas- ily understood by his students and that “children would enjoy reading.”77 Like Mu Dan, Ye Qianyu, and Wang Zengqi, Fei Ming’s concept of his role in society as a modern intellectual underwent a shift as a result of his wartime experiences working in the interior, which motivated him to make his work more accessible to ordinary people. Fei Ming’s 1932 novel, The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, provides a useful frame of reference for understanding the changes in his writing prompted by his experience of war. On the one hand, there are many parallels between this book and his postwar novel on Mr. Neverwas. Both “biog- raphies” are in fact autobiographies and are situated in his hometown of Huangmei. Moreover, both works are characterized by a preoccupation with stylistic experimentation and a psychological focus on portraying the thoughts of Fei Ming’s alter ego, Mr. Neverwas. However, the open- ing lines of the later novel differ significantly from the beginning of The Biography of Mr. Neverwas:

75 Ibid., p. 199. 76 Ibid. 77 Fei Ming, “Wuzu si” 五祖寺 (Fifth Patriarch Temple), in Feiming sanwen xuanji, p. 81. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 239

Mr. Neverwas—such a person does not exist under the heavens. You are not relying on anything to fabricate, isn’t that so? Because I was bored and everyone is now beginning a “camel grass” [luotuo cao 骆驼草] of their own, I needed to write an essay. I thought I should best start writing my Biogra- phy of Mr. Neverwas. For a long time I wanted to craft a biography for Mr. Neverwas. When I said this, I made people confused. Does this person really exist? It’s best not to concern yourself with this too much. Whether I say he does or he doesn’t, isn’t it all the same? So long as I don’t trick you, it’s fine. Actually, whether or not I cheat you is my business. It has nothing to do with you.78 Like After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, The Biography of Mr. Neverwas opens with a metafictional commentary on the writing of the novel. Yet, whereas the later novel begins with the narrator discussing “evidential studies” and elaborating on his plans to write wartime history, The Biography of Mr. Neverwas starts with the narrator explaining that he wrote the book as a means of dispelling boredom. In addition, he claims that he wrote it for a publishing forum or “camel grass,” a reference to the short-lived weekly journal Camel Grass edited by Zhou Zuoren in 1930. According to Susan Daruvala, Zhou announced that the journal “would not deal with poli- tics but with literature, ideas, antiquities, and ‘leisurely conversation.’ ”79 Through this reference to Zhou’s journal, Fei Ming asserts the non-politi- cal nature of his literary endeavors. In contrast to After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, which focuses on questions of history and national consciousness, here the narrator makes no claims to portray social realities or to achieve any higher educational goal. Fei Ming’s focus on the individual figure of Mr. Neverwas, rather than on the national collective, is also reflected in his use of narrative perspec- tive. The narrator in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane begins the novel in the first-person plural, with the assertion: “After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane—with respect to this subject, we have a problem with evidential studies.”80 By contrast, The Biography of Mr. Neverwas is written predomi- nantly in the first-person singular, as in the opening lines of the novel. In fact, whereas the first-person singular pronoun is used 18 times on the first page of The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, it appears only four times on

78 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zhuan, p. 7. 79 See Susan Daruvala, Zhou Zuoren and an Alternative Chinese Response to Modernity (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000), p. 4. 80 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 113. 240 chapter five the first page of Fei Ming’s postwar novel, and in these instances it is set off in quotes.81 Yet another stylistic difference between the two novels is that The Biog- raphy of Mr. Neverwas is more abstruse and difficult than Fei Ming’s later novel. The opening paragraph of the last chapter, titled “The Biography of Mr. Neverwas Could be Burned” (Moxuyou xiansheng zhuan ke fubing 莫须有先生传可付丙), provides a good example of Fei Ming’s opaque writing style: Spoken up to here, a person who was hard of hearing called out a sound. Mr. Neverwas didn’t say anything. Mr. Neverwas already felt that there was an omen present. Under the heavens, there was definitely someone who had died of an illness. However, I need to rouse up some energy and calm down a bit, and see exactly what my attitude is towards life. I heard an old lady calling out the sound “wa.” She couldn’t help being a bit frightening, as if she were following the style of a tragic song. Actually, I thought about it carefully—that was a thoroughly stimulating effect. I was not at all moved, really. Ever since I came tumbling down into the world, I have been this way. Ever since I was born, I was curious about death. There is nothing else that is more worthy of my not getting tired with the world than death. It is the realm [jingjie 境界] that I like to imagine best. However, I never think about it. It is just a fleeting glance made in passing. I don’t like to look at coffins, but I am not like my friends who are afraid to look at coffins. I just feel that it is an ugly weapon. What I imagine of death is just an imagination. It is a stroke of experience.82 Rather than attending to larger historical realities, the narrator here focuses on the self and on Mr. Neverwas’s meandering thoughts on death. As Shu- mei Shih observes, Fei Ming’s earlier fiction focuses on the “psychological experiences of introspective characters.”83 Another characteristic of Fei Ming’s writing in The Biography of Mr. Neverwas is that it is filled with non-sequiturs. The narrator alternates between describing the mysterious sound made by an old lady and discussing Mr. Neverwas’s thoughts on death without explaining how the two subjects are connected. Edward Gunn comments with respect to the disjunctive, disorganized nature of The Biography of Mr. Neverwas: “the mind of this self-absorbed, feckless character is the only organizing feature of the story, and that in itself is a

81 I count here by pages rather than paragraph, as the paragraphs in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane are very long and often stretch for several pages without a break. 82 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zhuan, p. 103. 83 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 95. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 241 study in the vagaries of association.”84 Fei Ming himself was self-conscious about the opaque quality of his prose. In the preface, he stated: “Now The Biography of Mr. Neverwas is published, and almost the entire nation is asking me to write a preface because it is hard to understand.”85 While the passage quoted above reflects Fei Ming’s abstruse style, it also demonstrates his fascination with the unseen and the imagination, in this case the narrator’s conception of the experience of death as a kind of “poetic realm.” In a similar fashion, later in the chapter, the narrator compares death to “blank space” (kongbai 空白).86 This focus on imagi- nation is prevalent in many of Fei Ming’s early works. For example, in an inscription preceding the preface of Tales of the Bamboo Grove, Fei Ming quotes Baudelaire’s prose poem “Windows” (Les Fenêtres): “When a person looks through an open window, he will never see as many things as when he looks at a closed window. There is nothing more profound, more mysterious, more fecund, more dazzling than a window lit by a candle.”87 Similarly, in his essay “Writing on Miscellaneous Topics” (Sui bi 随笔; 1930), Fei Ming likens poetry to “the painting of dreams” (hua meng 画梦).88 And, in “Telling of Dreams” (Shuo Meng 说梦), Fei Ming asserts that the function of literature is not to represent reality, but rather to create a “world out of dreams,” in which art becomes a kind of dream in action.89 Fei Ming’s novel Bridge is a particularly good example of the focus on dreams and lyrical imagery in his earlier writings. The character Cheng Xiaolin 程小林 is a mouthpiece for Fei Ming’s own conception of dreams when he states, “I don’t feel that life is as real as dreams, but I do feel the reality and the beauty of dreams.”90 The fairy-tale-like beginning of

84 Edward Gunn, Rewriting Chinese, p. 128. With respect to the structure of Fei Ming’s prewar writings in general, Gunn notes that “Feng’s writing creates an anarchy that leads away from the existing structures of organized narrative and intellectual discourse, and that keeps on distancing itself from such expectation.” See ibid. 85 Fei Ming, “Moxuyou xiansheng zhuan xu” 莫须有先生专序 (Preface to Biography of Mr. Neverwas), in Zhi An 止庵, ed., Fei Ming wenji 废名文集 (Collected Works of Fei Ming; Beijing: Dongfang, 2000), p. 123. 86 Ibid., p. 104. 87 Shu-mei Shih’s translation of Baudelaire’s poem in The Lure of the Modern (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001), p. 200. For the original poem, see Charles Baudelaire, Petits Poèmes en Prose, Melvin Zimmerman, ed. (Manchester: University of Manchester Press, 1968), p. 65. 88 Feng Ming, “Sui bi” 随笔 (Writing on Miscellaneous Topics), in Fei Ming wenji, p. 107. 89 Fei Ming, “Shuo Meng” 说梦 (Telling of Dreams), in Fei Ming wenji, p. 56. 90 Fei Ming, Qiao 桥 (Bridge; Shanghai: Kaiming shudian, 1932), p. 355. 242 chapter five the novel differs from the opening paragraphs of both The Biography of Mr. Neverwas and After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane: Before I begin to tell my story, I always like to recall another short story. This story comes from a village by the sea far away. A village, a fire in the mid- dle of the night, a 12-year-old child woken from his dreams by his mother. She told him to go with the female messenger and hide at his uncle’s. And the messenger made him get some sleep right away. Otherwise tomorrow he would be uncomfortable. The messenger encouraged the boy to start walk- ing. The boy’s mother tried to catch up from behind. Another girl wanted to go with them. This girl—her father just had this one child. He was in the middle of saving things from the fire. He wanted to move his furniture through the window. At that point, the three of them walked to their destination. From this place it was just possible to see the fire. They went up to the window and looked in that direction. This was a scene that they would never be able to forget. The sea and mountains in the distance all reflected [the light from the fire]. Were it not for the stars in the sky, it was as if it were already day.91 Whereas the narrator in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane claims to be relating a truthful history about the war period, here the narrator tells a story within a story about “a village by the sea far away.” Recalling the image of a “window lit by a candle” in his translation of Baudelaire, Fei Ming’s description of a fire reflected on the distant mountains and sea cre- ates a mystical image that stimulates the imagination rather than claim- ing any connection with social realities. In addition, the opening chapter of Bridge provides an example of what Shu-mei Shih refers to as Fei Ming’s aesthetics of “mutual mediation” or “mutual implication,” whereby he seeks to bring traditional Chinese aes- thetics and Western modernism into dialogue with one another.92 For example, by beginning his story with another imbedded story, Fei Ming is following the model of the traditional vernacular story (huaben 话本), which also deploys an “introduction” ( yinzi 引子) or “mirroring story that serves as a foreshadowing, comparison, and contrast to the main story.”93 At the same time, through adding a narrator who self-consciously refers to himself as the narrator and tells a story within a story, Fei Ming also includes elements of metafiction inspired by modernist literary aesthetics. Also, the embedded story allows him to experiments with three divergent

91 Ibid., pp. 1–2. 92 Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 192. 93 Ibid., p. 195. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 243 temporal frames—the narrative time, the story time of the introductory story, and the story time of the main body of the novel. Moreover, the opening chapter is characterized by both modernist and traditional aes- thetics in that it “is humorously and self-reflexively titled ‘The First Chap- ter’ [di yi hui 第一回].”94 Discussing Fei Ming’s aesthetics of “mutual mediation,” Shih shows that Fei Ming’s neo-traditionalism has parallels with other members of the Bei- jing School. Like Wang Zengqi, who sought to “fuse together” Western and Chinese culture, and reminiscent of Fei Mu’s films on the “modern sage,” Fei Ming’s early writings were also inspired by a desire to reposition China’s native traditions within a global context. Indeed, Fei Ming’s early works bear the imprint of a broad array of Western, Chinese, modern, and traditional writers and schools of thought, including the novels of George Eliot (1819–80), Thomas Hardy (1840–1928), and Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616), as well as Chinese classics like Zhuangzi, the Analects, and Tang dynasty poetry. Likewise, Fei Ming’s interest in dreams was shaped by a variety of cultural influences. In part, his valorization of dreams was an outgrowth of his faith in Mahayana Buddhism, which posits the world as “all ideation” with no ontological basis. However, his views on dreams were also inspired by Baudelaire and Shakespeare.95 In this regard, Fei Ming’s earlier works such as Bridge also bear a resem- blance to his later novels After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane and The Biog- raphy of Mr. Neverwas, which similarly bring together a diverse array of modernist and traditional cultural elements. After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane deploys a metafictional narrator, although at the same time it bor- rows from traditional philosophy, biography, and evidential studies. Like- wise, much of The Biography of Mr. Neverwas is written in a modernist stream-of-consciousness style, even as it includes references to traditional poetry and draws on Buddhist and Daoist thought. A further commonality between all three works is that they are all set in Fei Ming’s native region of Huangmei. However, in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane Fei Ming radically reconfigures his portrayal of Huangmei as he attempts to write wartime history. In contrast to Bridge, in which Huangmei is depicted as a mystical dream world seen from the perspec- tive of a child, in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, the region is the scene

94 Ibid. 95 For an in-depth discussion of Fei Ming’s view on dreams, see Haiming Liu, “Fei Ming’s Poetics of Representation,” pp. 30–71. 244 chapter five of wartime bombing and destruction. And whereas in The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, Mr. Neverwas writes in order to entertain himself and pro- duce material for a literary society, Fei Ming’s postwar novel is driven by an urgent sense of social mission and his autobiographical experiences are framed within the context of Marxist ideology. While in his earlier fiction Fei Ming writes about the sorrows and joys of ordinary people in his hometown and about the innocence of youth, in his postwar novel he portrays the people of Huangmei as victims of foreign aggression and government exploitation. Like Fei Ming, many wartime writers and artists moved politically leftward during the war and postwar periods. Although Mu Dan, Wang Zengqi, Ye Qianyu, and Fei Mu did not embrace Marxism during the war, as previously discussed, close ties existed between university intellectuals and artistic circles at Yan’an. In his study of Xinan Lianda, John Israel describes how growing dissatisfaction during the latter years of the War of Resistance led to the radicalization of intellectuals and students. A good example of such political transformation is the poet Wen Yiduo, who early in his career was a member of the Crescent Moon Society, a literary group that advocated “art for art’s sake.” Like Fei Ming, Wang Zengqi, and Zhou Zuoren, he is regarded by literary historians as a neo-traditionalist intel- lectual of the Beijing School. Following the outbreak of war, Wen accepted the government mandate to retreat to Kunming and spent much of the war period working on exegetical studies of classical poetry. However, he grew increasingly disaffected with the Nationalist regime over the course of the war as a result of witnessing widespread poverty and gov- ernment corruption. John Israel describes Wen’s angry reaction to one incident of brutality against a conscripted soldier: One day while walking with a student, Wen suddenly dashed ahead, shout- ing, “Take your hands off him!” A soldier, thin as a rail and weak from illness, had collapsed by the roadside and his officer was whipping him to make him get up. Observing that the voice of protest had come from a bearded middle-aged man in a long gown, the officer looked at Wen with a twisted grin and told him in the most abusive way to mind his own business. Wen demanded, “Don’t you have a father and a brother of your own? Is it possible that you lack the least spark of humanity?”96

96 John Israel, Lianda, p. 336. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 245

Although the officer refrained from setting his men on Wen Yiduo after discovering that he was a professor at Xinan Lianda, Wen was deeply shaken by what he had witnessed. Afterwards, he returned home shout- ing the words “Too inhuman!” over and over again. By the end of the war, Wen had become increasingly vocal in his criticism of the government and wrote essays and gave speeches criticizing the Nationalists. Asked to train students as translators to serve in the US military, he used an Eng- lish translation of Karl Marx’s (1818–83) The Communist Manifesto (1848) to help his students learn English.97 Wen argued that Marx’s classic was an excellent text for language-teaching and that the Chinese government would lose face if it became known that students from its most presti- gious university had not read this important work. During Nationalist army commander Qiu Qingquan’s 邱清泉 (1902–49) visit to Kunming to hold a “current events discussion” about China’s future, Wen stood up and shouted that the only solution to China’s problems was revolution.98 Symbolist poet and essayist He Qifang is another example of a former Beijing School neo-conservative who became radicalized during the war period. As Bonnie McDougall observes in the introduction to her edited and translated collection of works by him, “the outbreak of war had a pro- found impact on He Qifang, radically affecting his outlook on literature and life.”99 Like Wen Yiduo, He Qifang had once been a member of the Crescent Moon Society and sought to defend literature from the demands of politics and revolution. However, his views on the role of literature in society underwent a shift from the early 1930s following his graduation from Bejing University. In 1938, the year after the outbreak of the War of Resistance, He Qifang made a trek to the Communist citadel. During the following year, he accompanied the Eighth Route Army and wrote propa- ganda to support the war effort; one such article, “The Tragedy of the Japa- nese,” was based on the diaries of captured Japanese soldiers. Following Mao’s Yan’an Forum in 1942, He embraced Mao’s view of literature as a tool in the proletariat revolution. In her introduction, McDougall explains her decision to only include work produced prior to 1942: The story of He Qifang’s gradual acceptance of communist direction and his emergence as a party and academic bureaucrat is so foreign to this earlier life

97 Ibid., p. 349. 98 Ibid. 99 He Qifang, Paths in Dream, Bonnie McDougall, tr., and ed. (St. Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1976), p. 10. 246 chapter five

that it is difficult to reconcile the two in one context. This volume therefore contains only a selection from his early writing and his own account of his life up to 1942.100 In a similar fashion, Qian Liqun comments on the dramatic stylistic change in Fei Ming’s work during the postwar period and argues that this was “too great, too fast. His rejection of his earlier interests was too comprehensive”: It is easy to whip up debate about the fact that Fei Ming gave up his experi- mentation with Tang quatrains to take up fiction, and did not again explore the boundaries of poetry or blank space [kongbai]. Admittedly, this made Fei Ming’s writing easier to understand. It is especially apparent when com- pared to The Biography of Mr. Neverwas. However, it is as if the reader has lost something. In general, we feel that Fei Ming made the transition too quickly. In the forties, a lot of writers were making the change (or change was bubbling away inside them). This so-called change can be seen as a departure from (or development of ) one’s original mode of writing.101 Indeed, the shift from Fei Ming’s former focus on lyricism and dreamlike imagination to his preoccupation with reality, history, and Marxism is a dramatic one. Nonetheless, as previously mentioned, both Fei Ming’s pre- and postwar works are characterized by innovative experimentation with a variety of traditional and modern forms. Through attempting to write an experimental form of autobiographical “history,” Fei Ming did not simply make a stylistic choice to explore a new mode of writing. Rather, his shift in focus occurred after he taught in the interior and witnessed wartime destruction suffered by his native region, experiences that forced him to reassess his role as an intellectual and educator in Chinese society. More- over, his artistic choices were informed by deeply ingrained traditional, Confucian views about the didactic function of literature and the responsi- bility of the educated elite to serve as benevolent leaders of the masses.

Realism and the Aesthetics of Dissolution

Fei Ming’s efforts to write wartime history in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane were more generally part of his focus on “reality” (xianshi 现实)102

100 Ibid., p. 28. 101 Qian Liqun, ed., Duihua yu manyou: sishi niandai xiaoshuo yanjiu, p. 314. 102 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 126. In addition, the narrator often uses the term “actuality” (shiji 实际). See, for example, ibid., p. 337. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 247 and “facts” (shishi 事实),103 and his concomitant determination to “write realistically” (xieshi 写实).104 Apart from claiming that the novel is “com- pletely truthful,” Fei Ming’s narrator also characterizes Mr. Neverwas’s essays as “realistic.”105 Similarly, Mr. Neverwas repeatedly exhorts his students in Huangmei to adhere to the tenets of realism.106 In one scene, Mr. Neverwas criticizes his students and tells them: “I am always encour- aging you to write realistically. If an essay is realistic, then it can stand on its own.”107 In addition, Mr. Neverwas seeks out examples of realist writing in tra- ditional literature. In Chapter 8, he discusses the poem “Picking Lotuses South of the Yangtze” (Jiangnan ke cailian 江南可采莲), from Guo Maoq- ian’s 郭茂倩 (1041–99) Collection of Music Bureau Poems (Yuefu shiji 乐府 诗集), with his students. He comments: “This poem is written like some- thing you children would write. I like it a lot. If you write an essay this way, it will be realistic. . . .”108 In the same lesson, he discusses Li Yu’s 李 鱼 (1611–80) “exemplary essays” “Willow” (Yang liu 杨柳), “Bamboo” (Zhu 竹), and “Lotus Leaves” (He ye 荷叶), which he praises for their fidelity to everyday realities.109 In particular, he singles out “Lotus Leaves” as “a good model for training students to write essays,” as it discusses the uses of lotus leaves in daily life—such as wrapping and carrying back items from the store. In addition, he commends one of his students for an essay on lotus leaves inspired by Li Liweng. The narrator notes: “Mr. Never- was really admired his [the student’s] realism. If it weren’t realistic, he wouldn’t have been able to exercise his imagination in this way.”110 Nonetheless, although Fei Ming repeatedly advocates the importance of realism, his postwar novel diverges in many ways from the Western realist novel. In his The Red and the Black, Stendhal makes a well-known com- parison of the realist novel to a “mirror walking down the road,” reflecting everything in its path.111 As Marston Anderson discusses in his The Limits of Realism, according to this paradigm, the realist novel renounces any

103 Ibid., pp. 114, 198, 303. 104 Ibid., p. 165. 105 Ibid., p. 165. 106 Ibid., pp. 197, 340. 107 Ibid., p. 197. 108 Ibid., p. 193. 109 Also, Fei Ming claims that “Lotus Leaves” is more interesting than Lin Daiyu’s 林黛玉 poetry in Dream of the Red Chamber. See ibid. 110 Ibid. 111 Stendhal, Le Rouge et le Noire (Paris: Editions Gallimard, 1972), p. 414; cited in Marston Anderson, The Limits of Realism, p. 10. 248 chapter five connection to the author’s imagination and “predicates for the author an autonomous platform of objective observation, a station that in theory is similar to that of the social scientist.”112 Apart from denying its relation to the author, the realist novel also negates any correlation to previous texts and instead asserts its “fundamental novelty.” Anderson explains: Realist fiction assumes a gap not only between text and author but also between individual texts and all earlier literature. Crucial to the truth claim of realism is the proposition that the work is directly imitative of life rather than derivative of other texts. This means that a realist text must not only deny its origin in the imagination of the author but disavow as well its indebtedness to traditional literary models; it must assert a fundamental novelty.113 In contrast to the Western model of the realist novel, Fei Ming does not erect a strict division between author and text in his semi-autobiographi- cal novel about Mr. Neverwas. Instead of simply mirroring wartime reali- ties, his novel focuses self-referentially on the process of writing. Nor does Fei Ming disavow his “indebtedness to traditional literary models.” Rather, he frequently cites the writings of Confucian philosophers and advocates a cyclical concept of history as found in traditional Chinese thought. In addition, he alludes to a vast array of texts from pre-modern literature, such as The Book of Songs, the poetry of Tao Yuanming, the essays of Han Yu, and Sima Qian’s Records of the Historian, to name but a few. However, Fei Ming also sets up a barrier (albeit one that he repeat- edly tears down) between text and author by referring to the writing self in the third-person. Moreover, the novel includes many realistic details about wartime Huangmei and, according to Wu Xiaodong and Zhang Jibing, it functions as a rich source of regional Hubei history during this period.114 Moreover, in the opening chapter, Fei Ming’s narrator asserts the “fundamental novelty” of After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane as a realist text with respect to Mr. Neverwas’s previous writings, which he claims are fictional. Fei Ming’s postwar novel thus upholds the tenets of realism at the same time as it flouts and rejects them through self-conscious for- mal experimentation and heavy borrowing from traditional literature and aesthetics. Whereas Fei Ming’s prewar “aesthetics of mutual implication”

112 Marston Anderson, The Limits of Realism, p. 24. 113 Ibid. 114 See Wu Xiaodong, “Zhanluan niandai de linglei shuxie”; Zhang Jibing 张吉兵, Kang- zhan shiqi Fei Ming lun 抗战时期废名论 (A Discussion of Fei Ming during the War of Resistance; Wuhan: Huazhong shifan daxue, 2008), pp. 1–14. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 249 allows him to combine traditional and modernist forms, After Mr. Never- was Rides a Plane brings together an even more diverse combination of realist, modernist, and traditional aesthetics. Discussing Fei Ming’s “aes- thetics of mutual implication,” Shu-mei Shih argues that his earlier works “def[y] realism through flattening out the difference between the real and the represented,” along with the dichotomy between East and West and modern and tradition, thereby making cultures “mutable like realities.” Shih writes: In conclusion, the aesthetics of mutual implication encompasses both the cross-cultural dimension of China-West negotiation and corresponding modernist literary techniques, and the philosophical-aesthetic dimension of a theory of representation that defies realism through flattening out the difference between the real and the represented, the external and the internal, the tangible and the reflected. In this scheme of things, cultures are mutable like realities. Essentialist, hierarchical, and oppositional con- ceptions of cultural differences are to be thoroughly rejected, while the dichotomy between modernity and tradition is also revealed to be false and irrelevant. What in May Fourth discourse was constructed as “traditional” is reinscribed with a modern as well as universal characteristic that rejects the May Fourth attempt to particularize Chinese culture.115 In contrast to his former “aesthetics of mutual implication,” in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane Fei Ming does not seek to “defy realism,” nor does he “thoroughly reject” conceptions of cultural difference in favor of a global vision of modernity. Instead, he prioritizes traditional forms as better suited to representing native realities, just as he promotes the study of traditional Chinese philosophy as necessary for achieving national sal- vation. In one scene, for example, the narrator discusses Mr. Neverwas’s preference for the traditional essay, stemming from the fact that essays “put the emphasis on reality” and have “educational value”: The literature that Mr. Neverwas likes must have educational value—thus he likes essays and doesn’t like fiction. Essays put the emphasis on reality, put the emphasis on life, and do not seek to order and arrange. . . .116 Apart from the traditional essay, philosophy, biography, and historiogra- phy, Fei Ming experiments with a wide array of other traditional genres. In his essay “Another Kind of Writing in a Time of War: A Discussion of Fei Ming’s After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane” (Zhanluan niandai de linglei

115 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 203. 116 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 198. 250 chapter five shuxie—Shilun Fei Ming de Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou 战乱 年代的另类书写试论废名的莫须有先生坐飞机以后), Wu Xiaodong argues that Fei Ming “not only surpassed his former self, but also out- stripped literary history” through his innovative formal experimentation in the novel: Fei Ming can be said to have found a way of writing that collects many things together, combining history, literature, religion, morality, education, and ethics into a single pot. The content of the novel is myriad. It includes historical commentary [shilun 史论], talks on poetry [shihua 诗话], random thoughts [zagan 杂感], literary allusions, personal experience [tiwu 体悟], and atmosphere [qingjing 情境]. . . . All of these are brought together in the novel. Fei Ming not only surpassed his former self, but he also outstripped literary history, and not just for the forties. It can be said that in the entire history of Chinese literature, he provided a kind of literary form that no one else could have contributed.117 While Fei Ming’s metafictional commentary on poetry falls into the tradi- tional Chinese genre of “talks on poetry,” his philosophical reflections on wartime history can be categorized as “historical commentary,” and his discussions on a variety of topics, ranging from philosophy to wartime edu- cation, can be viewed as examples of the genre of “random thoughts.” Another traditional form that Fei Ming advocated is “random jottings,” or the biji, a genre of traditional Chinese literature that consists of anec- dotes, quotations, random musings, philological speculations, and literary criticism. In “Essay,” Fei Ming describes his yearning to write a biji in order to capture the “truth” and “realities” of his childhood: Right now, I really want to write a short biji to recapture the memory of all those truths [i.e., the events of his childhood]. Actually, speaking of reality, the truth and my so-called realities have already been completely altered by the transformations of the world [canghai sangtian 沧海桑田 (literally, blue seas where there used to be mulberry fields)]. The environment of my youth has completely changed because it has experienced so much chaos.118 Fei Ming’s novel also can be read as a biji, given that it brings together an eclectic combination of anecdotes, quotations, random reflections, philo- logical speculations, and literary criticism. Through appropriating mate- rial from such loose and hybrid forms drawn from traditional culture, Fei Ming seeks to represent the chaotic realities of his subject rather than

117 Wu Xiaodong, “Zhanluan niandai de linglei shuxie.” 118 Fei Ming, “Sanwen,” p. 281. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 251 artificially “ordering and arranging” events into a tight-knit plot. Yet at the same time, Fei Ming discovers that his “so-called realities” have been utterly transformed by events happening on a much larger scale. His post- war writings thus evince a tension between a preoccupation with realism, facts, and truth, on the one hand, and a heightened awareness of the elu- siveness of “reality” in the midst of wartime destruction on the other. Nonetheless, Fei Ming’s novel repeatedly expresses the author’s com- mitment to using realist literature as a tool to both represent larger histor- ical realities and reform society. While Mr. Neverwas teaches his students about realism in order to help them write socially engaged literature, the narrator seeks to educate his readers about the evils of mechanized modernity and about the need to gain wisdom from the ancient sages of the past. Fei Ming’s advocacy of realism as a tool with which to educate and reform society recalls the attitudes of earlier May Fourth intellectu- als. However, unlike the May Fourth writers, Fei Ming offers a forceful critique of the evils of Western science and technology, and makes a more conscious attempt to redefine realism in the context of traditional aesthetics. In this sense, Fei Ming resembles other wartime modernists discussed in this study. Wang Zengqi’s narrator claims that his story “Old Lu” is a combination of realism and a lament; Fei Mu argues that Chinese film should strive to both “express meaning” and “express reality”; Ye Qianyu comments that his series Wartime Chongqing represents a combination of “something in his imagination” and “something he had seen with his eyes.” Similarly, although Fei Ming’s narrator repeatedly emphasizes that the novel is realistic, he does not attempt to follow the example of West- ern realism comprehensively. Rather, he concludes that “there is no need to be too realistic. We should let the air flow a bit.”119

Distanced Self-Narration

In his attempt to produce a realistic wartime “history,” Fei Ming not only experiments with a wide variety of traditional forms, but also employs a first-person narrator who consistently refers to the author’s fictionalized self in the third-person. Rather than presenting a straightforward mem- oir of the war period, Fei Ming thus treats the self as a kind of historical

119 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 117. 252 chapter five figure and contextualizes his wartime experiences within a larger histori- cal framework. In this regard, After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane has some parallels to The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, where Fei Ming deploys a bio- graphical format to write (in the third-person) about his life in Huangmei. Yet, as we have seen, in the earlier novel the author frequently slips into the first-person, without adding quotation marks to demarcate the shift, when describing Mr. Neverwas’s inner thoughts.120 By contrast, in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, Fei Ming consistently refers to Mr. Neverwas in the third-person and adds quotation marks when quoting him directly. In so doing, he creates a more rigid division between the narrator and his protagonist, and deploys a narrative mode that Dorrit Cohn describes in her study Transparent Minds as “distanced self-narration.” As Cohn observes, first-person autobiographical novels generally focus on the pro- cess of narration and on the “narrating rather than experiencing selves”: In autobiographical novels the time of intensest self-reflection is more often the present rather than the past, so that the most memorable minds the genre has produced belong to narrating rather than experiencing selves. . . . consonant presentation of a past consciousness is dependent on self-efface- ment of the narrating voice, and few authors of autobiographical fiction have been willing or able to silence this voice completely.121 Cohn describes the advantages of distanced self-narration, as distinct from the strategies used in autobiographical novels: “for writers seeking to present the most complex inner adventures in the most direct possible manner, the consonant techniques in third-person narration offer obvi- ous advantages over the retrospective.”122 In keeping with Cohn’s observa- tions, Fei Ming’s use of the third-person draws attention to the “complex inner adventures” and thoughts of his protagonist during the war. In this way, he succeeds in producing a “psychobiography” of the wartime intel- lectual, rather than an autobiographically narrated retrospective of the war period. Nonetheless, instead of “silencing” his narrator, Fei Ming imbues him with a distinct personality and voice. Specifically, the narrator adopts the persona of an editor at work compiling Mr. Neverwas’s wartime

120 In the last chapter of The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, for example, the narrator alter- nately refers to Mr. Neverwas in the third-person and records his inner thoughts in the first-person, without adding any punctuation to mark this shift. See Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zhuan, p. 103. 121 Dorrit Cohn, Transparent Minds: Narrative Modes for Presenting Consciousness in Fiction. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978), p. 171. 122 Ibid. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 253 biography when in the opening chapter he comments that “The version I am basing [this text] on is After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane rather than Before Mr. Neverwas Takes a Plane.”123 While Fei Ming’s third-person narration of Mr. Neverwas’s life functions to separate the narrator from the events that he recounts, by situating this figure as an editor in the postwar period, the author produces a text that is doubly removed from Mr. Neverwas’s wartime experiences. The narra- tor further distances himself from a more intimate autobiographical form of narration by frequently addressing his readers in the first-person plu- ral. In the passage quoted above from the opening chapter, the narrator stresses the importance of studying philosophy: “If we are going to save the nation, then we must first be self-aware. In order to do this, we must first research our own philosophy.”124 In these references to collective sal- vation, the narrator appears to be addressing a larger, national audience. Yet, at other times the narrator more specifically targets an audience made up of intellectuals. In one passage, for example, he chastises an imagined readership of this kind, whom he addresses in the second-person plural: “Although they [tamen 他们; i.e., the peasantry] are afraid of you (plural) [nimen 你们; i.e., Chinese intellectuals], they don’t believe you (plural) at all.”125 The narrator thus shifts between writing about his experiences as an individual editor, holding a conversation with an imagined audience of intellectuals, and recounting in the third-person Mr. Neverwas’s inner thoughts and daily experiences from the war period. However, even though the narrator takes on a variety of divergent personae and inhabits a different temporal frame from his protagonist, Fei Ming creates some striking parallels between the voices of Mr. Neverwas and his narrator. In particular, Mr. Neverwas’s postwar reflections, which are quoted in a one-and-a-half-page monologue in the introductory chap- ter, are very similar to beliefs expressed throughout the novel by the narrator. Just as the narrator stresses the importance of traditional philos- ophy and claims that the Chinese sages are representatives of the people, Mr. Neverwas comments that “our sages are precisely the representatives of our national consciousness.”126 Also, like the narrator, Mr. Neverwas quotes Hegel’s History of Philosophy and promotes the study of philosophy

123 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 114. 124 Ibid., p. 115. 125 Ibid., p. 306. Then, in the following line, the narrator criticizes intellectuals, claim- ing, “Chinese intellectuals do not understand the roots of their nation. . . .” Ibid. 126 Ibid., p. 115. 254 chapter five as an antidote to the evils of Western mechanized modernity.127 More- over, in his postwar monologue Mr. Neverwas echoes the narrator when he interprets history from a Marxist perspective and criticizes China’s leadership for exploiting the people. The postwar narrator thus serves as a mouthpiece for Mr. Neverwas, who has seemingly gained a new perspective in the wake of the war on the exploitation of the poor and the evils of Westernized modernity. In a similar fashion, Fei Ming makes Mr. Neverwas both the author and the protagonist of his story,128 thereby breaking down the narrative boundar- ies between his protagonist and the author of the text and informing his readers that the novel is in fact an experimental autobiography. Indeed, not only do the narrator, author, and protagonist resemble one another, but these figures all bear an affinity to Fei Ming, who himself turned increasingly leftward in the wake of the war.129 By dividing the autobio- graphical self into three distinct voices, Fei Ming succeeds in dramatizing the shift between his wartime and postwar selves and presenting his war- time memoir within a leftist ideological framework. Fei Ming’s treatment of the self as Other and his splitting of the self into multiple voices has parallels to other works discussed in this study, including Wang Zengqi’s “Revenge” and Mu Dan’s “Lyric Poem in a Bomb Shelter.” Similarly, many wartime and postwar works of fiction by writers such as Lu Ling, Shi Tuo, Duanmu Hongliang, Bian Zhilin, Shen Cong- wen, and Mao Dun, also experiment with shifting narrative perspectives.130 Yunzhong Shu, for example, observes that Lu Ling “constantly changes the perspectives in his novel to reflect the polymorphism of life and the multiplicity of viewpoints on life.”131 As Shu notes, the narrator “tends to evaluate his characters categorically from an Olympian vantage point,

127 Ibid. 128 In the previously cited passage from the introductory chapter, the narrator states: “Therefore, this book is basically the result of what Mr. Neverwas had a desire to write to give to Chinese people to read after he flew in a plane—even though it describes events that happened before he went up in the plane and is a record of wartime sanctuary [binanji 避难记].” Ibid., p. 116. 129 See Zhang Jibing, Kangzhan shiqi Fei Ming lun, pp. 40–42. During the War of Resis- tance, Fei Ming also became a member of the Nationalist government. However, all educa- tors in Huangmei were required to do so, and Fei Ming was in fact on many occasions very critical of the Nationalist government. See ibid., pp. 102–103. 130 See the discussions of experimentation with narrative perspective in works by Lu Ling, Shi Tuo, Duanmu Hongliang, Bian Zhilin, and Shen Congwen in Qian Liquan, ed., Duihua yu manyou. David Wang provides an analysis of Mao Dun’s use of a framed diary narrative in his 1941 novel Putrefaction (Fushi 腐蚀). See David Wang, Fictional Realism in Twentieth-Century China, pp. 95–101. 131 Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front, p. 133. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 255 but this does not prevent him from identifying with them ideationally, psychologically, and emotionally at other times.”132 Steven Day has stud- ied Shi Tuo’s experimentation with a variety of narrative focalizations and voices, including transvocalization, metalepsis, and montage as a means of capturing the “ambiguity and indeterminacy of the liminal” in war- time life.133 In his analysis of Shi Tuo’s novella Master of Wuwang Village (Wuwangcun de guanzhu 无王村的管住; 1941), Day observes that the author shifts between first and third-person narrative voices to produce an effect that “combines the omniscience and cordial tone of the tradi- tional storyteller’s voice with the modern interiority of a self-conscious, dramatized narrator.”134 In a somewhat similar fashion, popular writer Zhao Shuli’s “The Rhymes of Li Youcai” (Li Youcai banhua 李有才板话; 1943) interweaves the per- spective of a first-person narrator with that of an omniscient third-person storyteller. In turn, the narrator’s voice mimics that of the clapper talker Li Youcai, who is featured as a character in the story. In her analysis of this story, Yi-tsi Feuerwerker shows how Zhao’s clapper talker functions on both diegetic and extra-diegetic levels, paralleling the ambivalent position of the narrator and the peasant writer himself, who exists simultaneously as “one of the masses” and as a critical consciousness from outside their world: Li Youcai functions as a mirror, an idealized self-image of the peasant writer, a literary species who can have it both ways: one who has the capacity to present the events of the story from a superior, authoritative stance of vision, knowledge and literary skills, yet somehow manages to maintain his identity as “one of the peasant masses.”135 Zhao Shuli’s clapper talker/narrator, Shi Tuo’s storyteller narrator, Lu Ling’s Tolstoyan narrator, and Fei Ming’s split narrator/protagonist/writer all illustrate a recurrent trope of wartime fiction—the tension between a

132 Ibid., p. 135. In addition, Kirk Denton has analyzed Lu Ling’s deployment of convo- luted and non-linear syntax to portray the divided psyches of his mad characters. See Kirk Denton, The Problematic of Self in Modern Chinese Literature, pp. 158–178. 133 See Day’s discussion of these techniques in his “Heroes without a Battlefield,” p. 80. See also Day’s analysis of Shi Tuo’s experimentation with narrative perspective in his dic- tionary entry, “Shi Tuo,” in Thomas Moran, ed., Chinese Fiction Writers 1900–1949 (Farm- ington Hills: Thomson Gale, 2006), p. 209. For example, Day notes that Shi Tuo’s story “Wuyan zhe” 无言者 (The Silent One; 1939) deploys the technique of fenshen fa 分身法 (disembodied consciousness) to portray the distant and traveling thoughts of a soldier lying on the battlefield. 134 Ibid. 135 Yitsi Feuerwerker, Ideology, Power, Text: Self-Representation and the Peasant “Other” in Modern Chinese Literature (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), p. 129. 256 chapter five distant omniscience and the modernist interiority of the I-narrator. More generally, this disparity reflects an attempt to grapple with the relation- ship between the self and the masses, or between the individual and larger social realities. As Nicole Huang has shown, Shanghai women writers such as Eileen Chang, Su Qing 苏青 (1917–82), and Pan Liudai 潘柳黛 (1920– 2001) also experimented with distanced self-narration as they sought to frame their autobiographical postwar writings within a larger social con- text. Huang observes that in these works “it is precisely such a figural consciousness or narrative distance that allows the first-person narrator to act as an ethnographer,” and thereby construct “a historical narrative that would give shape to one’s personal experience and memories of the war that had just ended.” Through employing such techniques, Shanghai women writers were able to “come to terms with all the cultural and polit- ical complexities of the larger historical context.”136 Likewise, in his analysis of Qiu Dongping’s 丘东平 (1919–41) report- age, Shu examines the combining of third-person omniscience with the perspective of a first-person narrator. Discussing Qiu’s “varying degrees of authorial intervention,” Shu argues that his works blur the divisions between reportage and May Fourth literature, and between the verisimi- lar and mimetic functions of literature: As it moves away from fact-bound first-person recollections of specific battlefield experience to third-person panoramic, omniscient narration, its focus shifts from the revelation of the truth of war to the reflection on long- standing problems in Chinese society reappearing in a different form under changed circumstances. In the meantime, its mimetic function also gives way to its verisimilar function, with the norms of verisimilitude derived from previous texts of critical realism. In choosing the Chinese army as a representative segment of a problematic society, Qiu Dongping in effect transplants a basic May Fourth assumption about Chinese society from real- ist fiction to reportage, an assumption reinforced by the increasing authorial intervention in his reportage.137 Although these texts are all examples of alternation between a first- person perspective and third-person omniscience, in other instances the

136 Nicole Huang, Women, War, Domesticity, p. 185. Similarly, Wang Zengqi employs a postwar first-person narrator in “Old Lu,” although Wang’s narrator does not switch into the third-person when addressing his wartime self. Xiao Hong also employs the tone of an ethnographer in her Tales of the Hulan River. 137 Yunzhong Shu, Buglers on the Home Front, p. 63. See also Yunzhong Shu’s description of a “multiplicity of viewpoints,” in A Long’s story, “Fighting at Zhabei,” in ibid., p. 69. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 257 question of the relationship between the individual ego and the collective is expressed as a conflict between the critical consciousness of the I-nar- rator and a growing awareness of the masses or “we.” As we have seen, Mu Dan’s poetic speakers frequently vacillate between first-person sin- gular and plural perspectives as they seek, somewhat unsuccessfully, to sublimate the self within the masses. Similarly, Wang Zengqi’s narrators shift between addressing readers in the first-person singular and plural, although they do not address a collective national audience. Fei Ming’s narrator speaks at times as an editor compiling Mr. Neverwas’s biography, while in other scenes he addresses a larger national audience. The fluidity of the narrator’s voice, as he wavers between interiority and omniscience and between the individual and the collective, thus reflects the complex- ity and ambivalence of Fei Ming’s growing nationalist sentiments. Moreover, the split consciousness of a narrator/protagonist who inhab- its two temporal frames (the wartime and postwar period) is emblematic of the social changes occurring in China during and after the War of Resis- tance. In this respect, Fei Ming’s divided narrator has parallels to Fei Mu’s postwar narrator Yuwen, whose schizophrenia grows out of her inability to let go of her idealized memories of society as it was before the war. Yet, whereas Yuwen grows increasingly confused as she laments the irrevo- cable loss of the past, Fei Ming’s postwar narrator embraces Marxism and denounces the evils of class oppression that marked the old social order. Fei Ming’s narrator thus personifies an alternative response to the Chinese Civil War. In this respect, he expresses a deep need felt by many postwar intellectuals to contextualize memories of the war not only within a larger historical context, but also within an ideological framework that would attach meaning to wartime suffering and posit hope in the future with the coming revolution.

The Fifth Patriarch Temple

A telling example of the way in which Fei Ming frames his memoir within a larger historical context through the technique of distanced self-narra- tion is found in Chapter Fifteen, titled “Fifth Patriarch Temple.” In this chapter, the narrator describes how Mr. Neverwas and his students are forced by occupying Japanese troops to evacuate their school in Huang- mei and relocate to the Fifth Patriarch Temple, before the temple itself is also bombed several months later. The narrator’s discussion of the Fifth Patriarch Temple in turn prompts Mr. Neverwas to philosophize about 258 chapter five the direction of national education during wartime, and the chapter ends with reflections on the temple’s historical, educational, religious, and cul- tural importance: Mr. Neverwas often thought that national education is a system that not only lacks any benefits or gain, but is also liable to cause positive harm, as in the case of the high school at the Fifth Patriarch Temple. When he was teach- ing physics there, not only were there no scientific instruments, but there were also no textbooks. The so-called textbooks were copied in [the town of] Huanggang. If the illustrations for experiments could not be reproduced, then they were simply not printed. As the War of Resistance dragged on, physics and chemistry came to resemble an eight-legged essay [ba guwen 八股文]. From an educational perspective, could what was offered at this high school compare to the educational meaning associated with the Fifth Patriarch Temple in those days [Mr. Neverwas’s childhood]? That was reli- gion, art, and history. The influence [of the temple] on this village and on Mr. Neverwas was profound.138 A comparison of this chapter with his 1939 autobiographical essay also titled “Fifth Patriarch Temple” sheds light on Fei Ming’s changing approach to writing about his native region during the war and postwar periods. In an “added note” to the essay, Fei Ming comments that he wrote it while teaching during the war after he realized the need to create works with educational value that could be easily understood and appreciated by children. Initially titled “When Father was a Child” (Fuqin zuo xiaohaizi de shihou 父亲做小孩子的时候), Fei Ming changed the title to “Fifth Patriarch Temple” when it was published after the war in 1946.139 The essay ends with Fei Ming’s reflections on his childhood memories of the journey home from the temple: The Fifth Patriarch Temple of my childhood actually has no relation to the present-day Fifth Patriarch Temple. However, I enjoy writing about this topic. The reason I like this topic, I’m afraid, is because of the journey home from the Fifth Patriarch Temple. Up to now, I’ve always remembered the journey home from the Fifth Patriarch Temple. Actually, I don’t remember anything. It’s as if I remember the weather. I remember that there were many bridges on the road. I remember the sand on the road.140 The focus of Fei Ming’s essay is the subject of memory, and in this short excerpt he uses the word “remember” ( ji 记) five times. However,

138 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 315. 139 Fei Ming, “Wuzu si,” p. 81. 140 Ibid., p. 80. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 259 reminiscent of Wang Zengqi’s dislocated narrator who cannot remember his native region, Fei Ming’s first-person narrator ends up discovering that “Actually, I don’t remember anything.” In fact, the narrator recalls some scenes from the past associated with the temple, such as monks beating “wooden fish” (mu yu 木鱼)141 while chanting scripture. Yet, he repeat- edly emphasizes the transiency and elusiveness of his memories with the use of such words as “seemingly” (fangfu 仿佛) and “as if ” (sihu 似乎). In turn, the narrator’s faulty memory is reflected in the shorter length of the essay, which is only three pages compared to the later 12-page chapter in the novel. Unlike the I-narrator in Fei Ming’s essay who fails to remember much about the temple or the journey to the temple apart from vague reminis- cences of bridges and sand, in his book chapter, Fei Ming writes a whole page on this subject. Describing Mr. Neverwas’s appreciation of the land- scape en route to the temple, the narrator comments that “he enjoyed the natural scenery and man-made structures, including bridges, temples, beaches, river embankments; the rattling sound of the carriage wheels was always in his ears. . . .”142 Whereas in the essay the first-person nar- rator can barely remember the temple and only mentions the Buddhist wooden fish once in passing, the narrator of Fei Ming’s novel devotes a whole page to his recollections of playing with these objects and knocking on them while chanting the phrase “A’mituofo” 阿弥陀佛.143 Along with interwoven memories from childhood and the war, and reflections on national education and the cultural significance of the tem- ple, Chapter Fifteen also provides a detailed account of folklore associated with the temple. Framing his discussion as a form of historical discourse, the narrator states: “Let’s talk first about the history of the Fifth Patri- arch Temple in Huangmei.”144 Next, he recounts a conversation with “the doctor of evidential study,” Hu Shi, about evidence he had unearthed in a French library suggesting that the mountain on which the temple was built was previously owned by Fei Ming’s ancestors.145 Also, he describes regional folklore associated with the temple and the Fifth Patriarch from

141 A wooden percussion instrument shaped like a fish and used by Mahayan Buddhist monks to keep their rhythm while chanting sutras during ritual services. 142 Fei Ming, Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji yihou, p. 310. 143 Ibid., p. 308. 144 Ibid., p. 307. 145 Although the present-day name of the mountain is East Mountain (Dongshan 东山), Hu Shi claims that his “evidential research” shows that during the Tang dynasty, it was called either Feng Mu Mountain 冯墓山 or Feng Mao Mountain 冯茂山. This suggests 260 chapter five the Tang dynasty, noting that the Fifth Patriarch Hongren (Wuzu Hon- gren dashi 五祖弘忍大师), the monk to whom the temple is dedicated, was indeed a real person. As he points out, historical sources verify the existence of the temple in Huangmei as far back as the Tang dynasty. Nonetheless, he observes that many of the stories associated with the Hongren and with the temple itself are fabricated. For example, he dis- cusses legends linked to the nearby site of “Washing Port” (Huangang 浣 港). Here the mother of The Fifth Patriarch supposedly threw him into the water, retrieving him and washing him at the site known as “Leav- ing Mother Pillar” (Limu dun 离母墩), where he later left his mother to become a monk. The Fifth Patriarch Temple thus functions in Fei Ming’s novel as a “site of memory” (lieu de mémoire), in relationship to which the author dis- cusses personal memories and cultural traditions linked to his hometown. In his essay “Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémoire,” Pierre Nora sets up a dialectic between collective memory rooted in traditions of the past and history as a record of change, and argues that the contem- porary preoccupation with “sites of memory” is the result of the “accelera- tion of history” and a sense of dislocation from the past: Our interest in lieux de mémoire where memory crystallizes and secretes itself has occurred at a particular historical moment, a turning point where consciousness of a break with the past is bound up with the sense that memory has been torn—but torn in such a way as to pose the problem of the embodiment of memory in certain sites where a sense of historical continuity persists.146 Indeed, whereas Fei Ming wrote his earlier essay on the Fifth Patriarch Temple prior to its bombing, he produced his postwar novel at a time when memory was “torn” as a result of the widespread destruction brought about by the War of Resistance. The narrator comments that not only the Fifth Patriarch Temple, but also other Buddhist sites, including Leav- ing Mother Pillar, were bombed during the war. Nonetheless, despite the physical destruction of Huangmei’s Buddhist sites, in contrast to the nar- rator of Fei Ming’s essay who remembers very little about the temple, the narrator of his wartime novel interweaves a rich tapestry of personal and

that the site of the temple was previously owned by Fei Ming’s (i.e. Feng Wenbing’s) own ancestors. See ibid. 146 Pierre Nora, “Between Memory and History,” p. 7. fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 261 collective cultural memories, including discussions of Buddhist legend, family ancestry, wartime experiences, and childhood memories linked to the site of the Fifth Patriarch Temple. In this sense, his focus on the temple can be interpreted as an effort to reconstruct “historical continu- ity” in the wake of wartime destruction. Yet, although Fei Ming describes his novel as history, it bears a closer resemblance to what Nora defines as collective memory, or “a past that ceaselessly reinvents tradition, linking the history of its ancestors to the undifferentiated time of heroes, origins, and myth.”147 Fei Ming’s portrayal of personal and collective memories linked to the site of his native region or hometown has parallels to many of his prewar fictional works, including The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, Tales of the Bam- boo Grove, and Bridge, all of which focus on his home region. As with his earlier works, his postwar novel contains characteristic themes of native- soil fiction, including “the passage of time; the clash between old and new values; yearning for the lost days of innocence or childhood; (re)encoun- ters with quaint, backward country figures; observations of customs, anxieties about impending change.”148 However, in contrast to his earlier works, Fei Ming’s postwar “history” catalogues a more extensive record of regional customs, legends, and religious traditions. In this sense, his novel reflects a more comprehensive effort to preserve collective memory in the wake of eight years of bombing and destruction wreaked upon his native region. Fei Ming’s focus on memory and his treatment of the theme of rural return resonates with other works discussed in this study, including Wang Zengqi’s “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck,” Mu Dan’s “Walking in the Wilderness,” and Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town. In fact, many war- time writers and artists depicted their native region in nostalgic terms. Other examples of wartime native-soil writings include Ai Wu’s Native Land (Guxiang 故乡; 1942), Xiao Hong’s Tales of the Hulan River, Sha Ding’s Recollections of a Homebound Journey (Huanxiang ji 还乡记; 1948), Duanmu Hongliang’s The Khorchin Grasslands (Ke’erqin qi caoyuan 科尔沁 旗草原; 1935), and Shen Congwen’s The Long River. As discussed in the introduction, the focus on rural topics or the “rural- ization” of wartime culture was a response to widespread displacement

147 Ibid., p. 8. 148 David Wang, Fictional Realism in Twentieth-Century China, p. 249. 262 chapter five of the civilian population, forcing writers and artists to move inland away from urban areas. On a deeper level, this trend also expressed a rejection of Westernized urban modernity and a yearning for reconnection to tradi- tions of the past. In Fei Ming’s case, his treatment of native-soil literature as a form of history also rejects a rigidly emplotted conception of his- tory and echoes Eileen Chang’s critique of H.G. Wells’s Outline of History as “too rationalized.” Rather, his essay-like history constructed around a sense of place bears a closer affinity to Fei Mu’s long takes of ruins in the small town of Songjiang, unfurling before the audience in the manner of a traditional scroll. Like Fei Mu’s cinematography, Fei Ming’s novel gives voice to a “falling away of faith in the modern project” and a yearning for the old society which has been reduced to ruins. Yet, whereas Fei Mu focuses on the ruins of the native land, full of a sense of sorrow and regret, Fei Ming takes on the task of reconstructing collective memory in the wake of bombing and destruction. While Fei Ming treats the personal and collective memory embedded in the site of the local temple as a form of history, his novel espouses other conflicting views of history, including a Marxist linear concept of history characterized by class struggle and a cyclical vision of history found in tra- ditional philosophy. Indeed, although After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane can be interpreted as Fei Ming’s search for “historical continuity,” the novel is characterized by a tension between the many genres, forms, narrative perspectives and ideologies that it embodies. For example, although the author repeatedly emphasizes the importance of the national collective, the novel focuses on the personal thoughts and memories of his protago- nist and on the philosophical reflections of his narrator. Likewise, despite Fei Ming’s emphasis on the need to make literature more accessible to a broader readership, his dense prose, filled with archaic expressions and allusions to pre-modern literature, would be accessible only to a highly educated, elite audience. Moreover, whereas he asserts the status of his novel as a realistic portrait of the war, much of it is devoted to literary analysis and discussions of Chinese philosophy and local legends linked to his native region. And although Fei Ming repeatedly stressed that he had changed his views on writing, his conception of Chinese history and culture remains in many ways strikingly conservative. Fei Ming’s embrace of realism during the war and postwar periods was thus fraught with contradictions as he attempted to record hard facts and realities, even as the world he had known was rapidly disappear- ing. Nonetheless, the fading away of the old society whetted his nostalgia fei ming’s after mr. neverwas rides a plane 263 for the cultural traditions of the past and inspired him to reinvent his own unique form of autobiographical/biographical history. In so doing, according to Wu Xiaodong, he surpassed even his own advanced formal experiments with this aesthetically and ideologically diverse novel. Some- what paradoxically, his desire to write history and produce realist litera- ture contextualized within larger social realities served as the impetus for Fei Ming to produce what is arguably his most stylistically complex and innovative work. Fei Ming’s propensity for combining a surprisingly wide array of genres, forms, and ideologies is in many ways unprecedented and is testament to the originality of his literary style and intellectual thought. Yet, his loose, essay-like style also has parallels to other wartime and postwar writers, as do his shifting and often contradictory views on writing and politics. As with Fei Mu and Wang Zengqi, the ideological and aesthetic tensions in Fei Ming’s novel reflect the difficult position of intellectuals in the midst of the growing Chinese Communist Revolution. Although Fei Ming sup- ported social and political change, like other writers and artists discussed in this study, he came from an elite background as the son of a landown- ing family. Also, he had been trained since childhood in traditional culture and aesthetics, and interpreted Marxism in terms of traditional Confucian thought, despite the revolution being premised on the destruction of the old society. At the same time, like many intellectuals, Fei Ming was heav- ily influenced by the culture and values of the West. However, the barbari- ties of war led him and other writers and artists to increasingly criticize what they saw as the evils of Westernized modernity. Not surprisingly, the divided autobiographical voice in Fei Ming’s novel has many parallels in fiction from this period. Apart from reflecting on the new postwar realities, Fei Ming’s evolv- ing style foreshadows the social changes that would ensue following the end of the Civil War. While his adoption of Marxism and realism pre- ceded the entrenched orthodoxy of socialist realism during the Mao years, his critique of Western modernity would subsequently be followed by a more thorough rejection of Western culture and modernism after 1949. As a result of these rapidly changing political realities, Fei Ming ceased writing fiction following the serialization of After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane in 1948. In 1952, several years after the CCP victory, Fei Ming was transferred from Peking University to a lesser-known university in the northeast, Changchun Northeastern University (Changchun Dongbei Daxue 长春东北大学) in Jilin Province. In 1956, he was made head of 264 chapter five the Chinese department there and, in 1963 he was appointed Jilin’s rep- resentative at the People’s Congress. During these years, he continued to teach and publish research on Chinese literature, including essays on Du Fu and material on Lu Xun, published in his collection Discussions with Youth on Lu Xun (Gen qingnian tan Lu Xun 跟青年谈鲁迅; 1956). In 1967, Fei Ming died of cancer just as the Cultural Revolution was gather- ing impetus throughout China.149

149 For biographical information on Fei Ming, see Haiming Liu, “Transformation of Childhood Experience,” pp. 134–43. EPILOGUE

SEARCHING FOR ROOTS: MODERNIST ECHOES IN THE POST-MAO ERA

With the end of the Mao era in 1976, China witnessed a dramatic “opening up” (kaifang 开放) to the West, both economically and culturally. In terms of the flow of ideas and artistic influences, it was reminiscent in some ways of the widespread importation and translation of Western litera- ture during the Republican period. In the wake of the reforms, it became ­possible to access not only Western literature, but also many works by Republican-era modernist writers and artists who had been banned dur- ing the Mao years. As a result, this period witnessed a revitalization of interest in earlier modernisms, particularly in the works of such writers as Shen Congwen, Eileen Chang, Shi Zhecun, Qian Zhongshu, Feng Zhi, and others. Although many intellectuals focused their attention on the legacy of the May Fourth era, wartime culture became a renewed object of study as well. Wartime works by Mu Dan, Fei Mu, Fei Ming, Ye Qianyu, and Wang Zengqi were all greeted with critical acclaim, and both Ye Qianyu and Wang Zengqi returned to their former careers of cartooning and writing short stories. In part, the rural imagery and themes in works discussed in this study resonated with young writers and artists, many of whom had been sent to labor in farming villages during the “Up to the Mountains, Down to the Countryside Movement” (shangshan xiaxiang 上山下乡) of the late 1960s and early 1970s.1 More generally, a renewed interest in the Republican era stemmed from widespread disillusionment with Maoist culture. In the wake of the Cultural Revolution, many writers and art- ists sought to break away from socialist realism and from what critic Li Tuo has characterized as “Maoist Discourse,” a heavily polemical style of writing shaped by Mao’s dialectical ideology.2 Searching for alternatives

1 For a discussion of the “Up to Mountains, Down to the Countryside Movement,” see Keith Schoppa, Revolution and its Past: Identities and Change in Modern Chinese History (New Jersey: Pearson Education, 2006), pp. 349–56. 2 See Li Tuo’s discussion of Maoist discourse in Li Tuo, “Resisting Writing,” Mary Scog- gin, tr., in Kang Liu and Xiaobing Tang, eds., Politics, Ideology, and Literary Discourse in Modern China (Durham: Duke University Press, 1993). Li describes how he made the 266 epilogue to the narrow, politicized function assigned to art and literature during the previous decades, writers and artists studied earlier modernisms in hope of reconnecting to their cultural roots and national traditions. At the same time, the appeal of the pre-Mao period was closely linked as well to its ties with Western culture as contemporary intellectuals sought to “walk towards the world” (zou xiang shijie 走向世界). Given the recent focus on the pre-Mao era, an understanding of this period is important for those seeking to trace a genealogy of Chinese mod- ernism from the Republican era up to the contemporary period, including both the so-called New Era (xin shiqi 新时期; 1976–89) and the postsocial- ist period of the 1990s and beyond. However, scholars have directed most of their attention into researching the impact of the May Fourth period on post-Mao culture. Ellen Widmer and David Wang’s From May Fourth to June Fourth, for example, explores the parallels between these two peri- ods, and examines the crucial influence of such May Fourth authors as Lu Xun, Yu Dafu, and Shen Congwen on contemporary writers.3 In her study High Culture Fever, Jing Wang also discusses the “haunting relation- ship” between the May Fourth period and contemporary Chinese culture evident in numerous discussions of the impact of the May Fourth tradi- tion during the mid-1980s. Just as the May Fourth period continues to haunt the historical con- sciousness of contemporary scholars and literary critics, wartime culture and history have also played a pivotal role in shaping the Chinese col- lective memory. Widespread anti-Japanese demonstrations in 2005 in reaction to the glossing over of wartime atrocities in a Japanese history textbook, and in opposition to a proposal to grant Japan a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, revealed the intensity of emotion invested in memories of the war.4 In addition, a constant stream of films,

unpleasant discovery that his own writing was rooted in Maoist discourse when he real- ized that it was littered with superlatives such as “ ‘the best,’ the ‘worst,’ the ‘absolutely right’ or the ‘utterly wrong’.” In an attempt to “resist writing through writing,” he sought to distance himself from the Communist dialectical logic inscribed in much modern Chinese literature after 1949 by changing his style. See ibid., p. 274. 3 See, for example, Jeffrey Kinkley, “Shen Congwen’s Legacy in Chinese Literature of the 1980s,” and Yi-tsi Feuerwerker, “Text, Intertext, and the Representation of the Writing Self in Lu Xun, Yu Dafu, and Wang Meng,” in Widmer and Wang, eds., From May Fourth to June Fourth: Fiction and Film in Twentieth-Century China, pp. 71–106, and pp. 194–220 respectively. 4 For an analysis of war memorials and their role in shaping collective memories of the war, see Kirk Denton, “Horror and Atrocity: Memory of Japanese Imperialism in Chinese Museums,” in Ching Kwan Lee and Guobin Yang, eds., Reinvisioning the Chinese Revolution: searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 267

TV dramas, documentaries, and oral histories keep alive memories of the War of Resistance fought against Japan.5 As discussed in the introduction, contemporary Chinese scholars and local research groups have produced a prodigious amount of research on wartime culture since the 1980s. Simi- larly, university alumni groups have published numerous cultural studies and reminiscences of this period and set up archives to preserve wartime cultural materials.6 In order to shed light on the cultural linkages between wartime mod- ernism and post-Mao culture, in this epilogue I explore contemporary critical responses to works by Mu Dan, Ye Qianyu, Wang Zengqi, Fei Mu, and Fei Ming, and examine their influence today. In addition, I give a brief overview of the experiences of these intellectuals during the Mao years, and discuss Ye Qianyu and Wang Zengqi’s return to cartooning and writing short stories during the 1980s and 1990s. In the final section, I then reflect on the important role of Republican-era modernism in the emergence of Chinese postmodernism. As a rapidly modernizing nation, which has at the same time been deeply influenced by global post­ modernity, China’s postsocialist culture is characterized by a complex mix

The Politics and Poetics of Collective Memories in Reform China (Washington: Wilson Center Press, 2007), pp. 245–86; see also Wu Hung, Remaking Beijing: Tiananmen Square and the Creation of Political Space (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). 5 Some examples of recent films on the War of Resistance are Flowers of War ( Jinling shisan chai 金陵十三钗; 2011), City of Life and Death (Nanjing, Nanjing 南京南京; 2009), and On the Tiahang Mountain (Taihang shan shang 太行山上; 2005). Recent TV series on the War of Resistance include Emergency on the Firing Line (Huoxian gaoji 火线告急; 2011) and Violent Drums at the Bridge (Qiao Longfeng 桥隆飙; 2010). For a discussion of anti-heroic portrayals of the War of Resistance in contemporary Taiwanese and Chinese fiction, see Steven Riep, “A War of Wounds: Disability, Disfigurement, and Anti-Heroic Portrayals of the War of Resistance against Japan,” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture 20.1 (Spring 2008): 129–72. 6 Publications produced by alumni groups for Xinan Lianda in both Yunnan and Beijing include: Yunnan Xinan Lianda xiaoyouhui 云南西南联大校友会 (Yunnan Xinan Lianda Alumni Assocation), Nanwang Lianda suiyue—Guoli Xinan Lianhe daxue zai Kun jianxiao liushi zhounian wenji 难忘联大岁月—国力西南联合大学在昆建校六十周年文集 (An Unforgettable Time—A Collection of Articles Commemorating the Sixtieth Anniver- sary of the Establishment of the National Southwest Associated University in Kunming; Kunming: Yunnan jiaoyu, 1998); Xinan Lianhe daxue Beijing xiaoyouhui 西南联大北京 校友会 (Beijing Southwest Associated University Alumni Group), Qingzhu Xinan Lianhe daxue chengli 65 nian jinian teji: Xinan Lianda Beijing xiaoyouhui jianxun di 32 qi 庆祝西南 联合大学成立65周年纪念特辑: 西南联大北京校友会简讯第32期 (Special Edition to Commemorate the 65th Anniversary of the Formation of Xinan Lianda: Southwest Asso- ciated University Beijing Alumni Group), vol. 32 (Beijing: n.p., 2002); Beida xiaoyouhui 北大校友会 (Beijing Alumni Association), Guoli Xinan Lianhe daxue: Babai xuezi congjun huiyi 国立西南联合大学八百学子从军回忆 (National Southwest Associated Univer- sity: Reminiscences of 800 Students who Joined the Army, Beijing, 2003). 268 epilogue of modernist and postmodernist aesthetics. Despite their adoption of a postmodern style, many contemporary writers and artists still conceive of themselves as working within an as yet incomplete modernist tradition. Indeed, the wartime aesthetics of dissolution presages the postmodern in its formal looseness and erasure of divisions between high and low culture as well as divergent genres, styles, and narrative points of view. Study of the war period is thus central not only to tracing a genealogy of modernism, but also to understanding the Chinese postmodern. Within the context of this epilogue, I do not attempt to fully delineate the complex genealogy of wartime art and literature in the New Era and postsocialist­ period. Nonetheless, I raise this important topic in hope of inspiring fur- ther discussion and research. Also, in this epilogue I continue in my quest to trace the routes tra- versed by wartime modernists, focusing here on the cultural passage- ways taken by their work in contemporary China. While the persecution of many Westernized intellectuals during the Mao era reflects the fate of modernism in this period, Wang and Ye’s resumption of their earlier careers in some ways parallels the return of Westernized cosmopolitan- ism to China during the 1980s. Indeed, Wang and Ye believed that they were continuing where they had left off in the 1940s. In this regard, they resemble those critics who view contemporary culture as an extension of the Republican-era.7

Mu Dan

During the late 1940s, Mu Dan studied at the University of Chicago, where he gained a Master’s degree in English literature. Returning to China in 1953, he became an associate professor of English in the department of For- eign Languages and Literature at Nankai University. However, two years later, he was attacked during the Anti-Rightist campaign, and was demoted to doing clerical work in the university library. Subsequently, he directed his efforts into literary translations of Aleksandr Pushkin’s (1799–1837)

7 In the introduction to his 1999 edited study, Duihua yu manyou, Qian Liqun cites Shen Congwen’s comment, made in the 1940s, that he hoped to write “twentieth-century classics” and “still have readers at the end of the twentieth century.” Drawing on Shen’s comments, Qian frames his study of fiction from the 1940s (including works by Bian Zhilin, Shen Congwen, Lu Ling, Eileen Chang, Fei Ming) as a kind of “dialogue” between critics and students at the end of the twentieth century and authors from the 1940s. See Qian Liqun, ed., Duihua yu manyou, p. 5. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 269

Eugene Onegin (1833), Lord Byron’s (1788–1824) Don Juan (1819–24), and selected poetry by Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822), and John Keats (1795–1821). In 1976, Mu Dan wrote 27 elegiac poems shortly before his death from a heart attack in 1977.8 In his essay “Mu Dan: Starting Point and Return Destination” (Mu Dan: Youlai yu guisu 穆旦由来与归宿), Wang Zuoliang recalls that many poets were impressed by the quality of Mu Dan’s translations. Wang sin- gles out Mu Dan’s translation of Lord Byron’s satiric epic Don Juan as his most successful translation, in which he used lively vernacular Chinese and maintained the original Italian ottava rima, or eight-line stanzas in iambic pentameter, throughout 16,000 lines of verse.9 None of Mu Dan’s poetry translations were legally available to the public during the Mao era. However, they were published during the Cultural Revolution as part of a set of 100 volumes of “yellow-covered books” (huangpi shu 黄皮书) of modern Western literature intended to aid Chinese officials in the task of eradicating revisionist bourgeois ideologies.10 During the Mao years, members of urban literary groups and culturally minded youths sent down to the countryside managed to get hold of these books. As a result, Mu Dan’s poetry translations became popular among young writers of “misty poetry” (menglong shi 朦胧诗),11 such as Bei Dao 北岛 (literally, “northern island”; the pseudonym of Zhao Zhenkai 赵 振开; 1949–) and Mang Ke 芒克 (the pseudonym of Jiang Shiwei 姜世 伟; 1951–), who founded the poetry journal Today (Jintian 今天) in 1978. Bei Dao recalls that the “translated style” of these poems provided a new “vehicle for expressing [the] creative impulses” of young poets, one that freed them from the rigid ideological constraints of socialist realism:

8 For a brief discussion of Mu Dan’s life and works, see Du Yunxie, “Eleven Poems by Mu Dan,” pp. 252–54. 9 Mu Dan, “Youlai yu guisu,” in Yige minzu yijing qilai, p. 8. 10 See Bei Dao’s discussion of the “yellow books” in his presidential lecture at Stan- ford, “From Founding of Today to Today: A Reminiscence,” Perry Link, tr., January 1998, accessed June 11, 2011, http://prelectur.stanford.edu/lecturers/dao/dao_on_today.html. For Mu Dan’s translated works, see his Mu Dan yiwen wenji 穆旦译文文集 (Collection of Mu Dan’s Translated Works; Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 2005). 11 “Misty” poetry refers to works produced in the wake of the Cultural Revolution in China by young dissident poets. “Menglong” means “misty,” “dim,” or “opaque,” and was used to suggest a kind of poetry that eschewed the clear-cut political didacticism of the Mao era. For a discussion of misty poetry, see Chapter Three of Xiaomei Chen, Occidental- ism: A Theory of Counter-Discourse in Post-Mao China (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), pp. 69–98. Also, see “Introduction: Chinese Poetry through the Looking Glass,” in Tani Barlow, Out of the Howling Storm: The New Chinese Poetry (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1993), pp. 1–40. 270 epilogue

For underground writers, the yellow-covered books not only opened new vistas for spiritual refuge but exemplified a literary style that was radically different from the official socialist realism. It was called, at the time, the “translation style.” Certain Chinese writers, including the best poets of the latter 1940s—Mu Dan, Yuan Kejia, Chen Jingrong, Zheng Min, and others later known as the “Nine Leaves Group”—after 1949 had given up trying to write creatively under the new political guidelines and had turned instead to work on the translation and research of foreign literature. The “transla- tion style” of Chinese that they created became, for my generation, a vehicle for expressing creative impulses and seeking new linguistic horizons.12 The Nine Leaves Group (Jiuye pai 九叶派) referred to by Bei Dao included Mu Dan, Yuan Kejia, Chen Jingrong, Zheng Min, Xin Di, Du Yunxie, Hang Yuehe, Tang Qi, and Tang Shi, all of whom wrote modernist poetry dur- ing the 1940s. Named in retrospect by poets and scholars of the post-Mao period, the wartime works of the Nine Leave Group were first made legally available in 1981 with the publication of The Collected Works of the Nine Leaves (Jiuye ji 九叶集). Mu Dan’s collected poems were first published in 1986, followed by his complete works 10 years later in 1996. These pub- lications subsequently sparked enthusiastic responses labeled the “Nine Leaves craze” (Jiuye re 九叶热) and the “Mu Dan craze” (Mu Dan re 穆旦热).13 On the one hand, younger writers of the “misty” school were inspired by Mu Dan and other Nine Leave poets’ “translated style,” characterized by modernist imagery and complex, Western-inspired grammatical struc- tures. Yet at the same time, again like Mu Dan, they employed imagis- tic language with ties to both modern vernacular and classical Chinese poetry. According to critic Li Tuo: Although the language they [the misty poets] used clearly bore the imprint of the times, it was not difficult to find in their poems intrinsic links with classical Chinese poetry, such as the importance placed on the use of

12 Bei Dao, “From Founding of Today to Today.” See also Bei Dao’s discussion of the impact of the “translated style,” in his “Translation Style: A Quite Revolution,” in Wendy Larson and Anne Wedell-Wedellsborg, eds., Inside Out: Modernism and Postmodernism in Chinese Literary Culture (Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 1993), pp. 60–64. 13 For a discussion of Zheng Min and other Republican-era modernist poets’ return to writing poetry during the post-Mao period, see “The Poetry of the ‘Returnees’” in Hong Zicheng, A History of Contemporary Chinese Literature, Michael M. Day, tr. (Brill: Leiden, 2007), pp. 319–34. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 271

imagistic language and the emphasis on the meaning implied by the words, or reading between the lines.14 A further similarity between Mu Dan and these younger poets was their treatment of poetry as a kind of satirical prose essay used to express disil- lusionment and critique social ills. In some ways reminiscent of Mu Dan, who in his poem “May” indicted an unnamed “you” in condemning “the murderers” who “sing triumphantly of the freedom of May,” Bei Dao casti- gated an imaginary audience (addressed as “world”) in his poem “Answer” (Huida 回答): “Let me tell you, world,/ I—do—not—believe! If a thou- sand challengers lie beneath your feet,/ Count me as number thousand and one” (告诉你吧, 世界/我—不—相—信!/纵使你脚下有一千名挑 战者,/那就把我算作第一千零一名).15 Apart from his influence on younger poets, Mu Dan’s poetry inspired critical interest and research. In their 1994 study A Repository of Literary Masters of the Twentieth Century, Volume on Poetry (Ershi shiji Zhongguo wenxue dashi wen ku shige juan 二十世纪中国文学大师文库诗歌卷), Zhang Tongdao and Dai Dingnan named Mu Dan as the finest poet of the twentieth century, followed by Bei Dao and Mu Dan’s teacher Feng Zhi,16 hailing Mu Dan as the “furthest explorer of modernist Chinese poetry.”17 While scholars drew attention to Mu Dan’s innovative experiments with Western modernism, they also argued that compared to earlier modernists such as Li Jinfa, his poetry was deeply rooted in the vicissitudes of modern Chinese history. In his essay, “That Dazzling Flash of Lightening in the Dusk” (Huanghun li na duomu de shandian 黄昏里那道夺目的闪电), Li Yi argued that “although he [Mu Dan] is the most modernist, the most Westernized [of writers], he inspires his readers to ponder deeply because this kind of modernism and Westernization is expressed in a very realist and Chinese way.”18 The canonization of Mu Dan’s poetry was further reflected when his nationalistic poem “Praise” was included in high school textbooks as a

14 Li Tuo, “The New Vitality of Modern Chinese,” in Wendy Larson and Anne Wedell- Wedellsborg, eds., Inside Out: Modernism and Postmodernism in Chinese Literary Culture, p. 70. 15 Bei Dao, “The Answer,” Bonnie McGougall, tr., in August Sleepwalker (New Direc- tions, 1990), p. 33. 16 Zhang Tongdao 张同道 and Dai Ding 戴定, eds., Ershi shiji Zhongguo wenxue dashi ku shige juan, 2 vols. (Haikou: Hainan, 1994), I: 3. 17 Ibid., p. 18. 18 Li Yi 李怡, “Huanghun li na duomu de shandian” 黄昏里拿道 夺目的闪电 (That Daz- zling Flash of Lightening in the Dusk), in Du Yunxie, ed., Fengfu he fengfu de tongku, p. 112. 272 epilogue paradigmatic example of modern Chinese poetry.19 High School Language and Literature, Vol. 3 (Gaozhong yuwen di sance 高中语文第三册), for example, includes four poems from the Republican era: Mu Dan’s “Praise,” Wen Yiduo’s “Dead Water” (Si shui 死水), Ai Qing’s “I Love this Earth” (Wo ai zhe tudi 我爱这土地), and Xu Zhimo’s 徐志摩 (1897–1931) “Goodbye to Kang Bridge” (Zai bie Kangqiao 再别康桥). Thus, as contem- porary poets and critics have grappled with the impact of foreign poetry, and sought to create a modern tradition rooted in Chinese history and aesthetics, they have drawn inspiration from Mu Dan’s modernist poetry from the period of the War of Resistance. The publication for the first time in 1996 of Mu Dan’s 27 poems from the end of the Cultural Revolution also helped enrich contemporary crit- ics’ understanding of his work. The six-stanza poem “Song of Wisdom” (Zhihui zhi ge 智慧之歌) from this collection begins: I have walked to illusion’s end. This is a forest of drifting, fallen leaves. Each leaf symbolizes a kind of joy; Now they are all yellow and withered, piled up in my heart. One kind of joy is youthful love— Like blazing shooting stars in a distant sky. I don’t know where they have gone, disappearing forever; Some fell to earth before my feet, icy cold and stiff. Another kind of joy is boisterous friendship; Flowers in full bloom know nothing of autumn. The social net replaces the pulsing blood, The cold wind of life casts passion into reality. 我已走到了幻想底尽头, 这是一片落叶飘零的树林, 每一片叶子标记着一种欢喜, 现在都枯黄地堆积在内心。 有一种欢喜是青春的爱情, 那时遥远天边的灿烂的流星, 有的不知去向, 永远消逝了, 有的落在脚前, 冰冷而僵硬。 另一种欢喜是喧腾的友谊, 茂盛的花不知道还有秋季,

19 See Gaozhong yuwen disance 高中语文第三册 (High School Language and Litera- ture) 6 vols. (Beijing: yuwen chubanshe, 2004), III. See online index, accessed July 5, 2011, http://www.jszxedu.com/chat/ywzyk/gzyuqc/gzywdyc3.htm. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 273

社会的格局代替了血的沸腾, 生活的冷风把热情铸为实际。 20 Despite Mu Dan’s repeated rejection of the stock imagery of “wind, flow- ers, snow, and moon,” “Song of Wisdom” nevertheless includes images of leaves, flowers, stars, and wind, used to express the interiority of the poet. An autumnal forest filled with falling leaves symbolizes the poet’s disillusionment and the cessation of his youthful passions. Reminiscent of his earlier poem “Walking in the Wilderness,” this piece incorporates the Whitmanesque image of “pulsing blood,” employed here to represent youthful love. However, “the pulsing blood” is set against the “cold wind of life,” and Mu Dan creates a series of further contrasts between reality and illusion, and the flowers of spring versus the desolate autumn scene. Unlike Mu Dan’s speaker in “Walking in the Wilderness, who discovers a connection embodied through blood with his fellow travelers and the surrounding landscape, here the poetic speaker finds himself alone and alienated as he ponders the loss of youthful love and friendships. None- theless, like the aimless flâneurs in Mu Dan’s early poems written in Tianjin and Beijing, the passionate hikers in “Walking in the Wilderness,” and the demonstrators in his poems about May Fourth celebrations, here the speaker is once again presented as walking. The energy and motion embodied in his poems are distinctly different from the quietude and stillness found in much traditional Chinese nature poetry and serve as testament to the modernity of his work. Yet, the arrival of his speaker at “illusion’s end,” many years after his treacherous march into the “heart” of the nation, mirrors the long and perilous journey of Westernized modern- ism in China.

Ye Qianyu

In 1948, Ye Qianyu and his wife Dai Ailian traveled to the United States where they toured and displayed Ye’s paintings and artwork from the war years. Following his visit, Ye produced a cartoon-sketch series about his travels to the U.S. titled Record of Paradise (Tiantang ji 天堂记; 1948). This series featured scenes of American life, including drawings of homeless people, and representations of Asian and African American people being subjected to prejudice of various kinds. During the Mao years, Ye stopped

20 Li Fang, Mu Dan shi quanji, p. 313. 274 epilogue producing cartoons and focused his energies on creating Chinese paint- ings, becoming best known for his paintings of dancing minority women and traditional opera performers. In this respect, Ye traveled the same path as other wartime cartoonists, such as Te Wei, Hu Kao, and Zhang Guangyu, who focused predominantly on Chinese paintings under the Mao regime. In 1954, Ye Qianyu was appointed head of the Chinese Paint- ing Department at the Central Academy of Fine Arts. Following China’s border disputes with India in 1962, he was criticized and came under sus- picion because of his paintings of Indian dancers. And during the Cultural Revolution, he was persecuted and imprisoned for 10 years as a result of his earlier connections with the Western cartoon.21 In 1975, Ye was released from prison; the following year, he was treated for a heart condition and returned to his hometown of Lutong where he began working on sketches and paintings of landscape scenes. In 1978, Ye resumed his position as chair of the Department of Chinese Painting at the China Academy of Art, and in 1979 he was officially rehabilitated. He was then appointed vice president of the Research Institute of Chinese Painting in 1981, and later became vice chairman of the Chinese Artists’ Association, and a member of the Standing Committee of the Chinese Federation of Literary and Art Circles. Apart from resuming his teaching and administrative duties, Ye began painting again after a decade of forced inactivity. In 1980, he completed a series of four landscape paintings featuring his home region, New Drawings of a Residence on Fuchun Mountain (Fuchun shanju xintu 富春 山居新图), based on sketches he had begun during his trip home in 1976. Also, Ye created numerous portraits of dancing minority women and other performers. Many of these were reworkings of earlier paintings, including Redrawing of Brightly Colored Swirling Butterflies from the 1960s (Chongxie liushi niadai caidie fenfei 重写六十年代彩蝶纷飞; 1979), New Draft of Peacock Dance (Kongquewu xingao 孔雀舞新稿; 1979), and New Draft of Indian Dress (Yindu zhuang xingao 印度装新稿; 1984). Ye produced as well a series of 10 paintings based on sketches of his wife he had made during the 1940s, titled Images from the 1940s of Dai Ailian on the Dance Stage (Dai Ailian Sishi niandai wutai xingxiang 戴爱莲四十年代舞台 形象; 1989).

21 For a detailed discussion of Ye’s experiences during the Cultural Revolution, see “Shinian huangtang meng” 十年荒唐梦 (Ten Years of an Absurd Dream), in his Xixu cangsang ji liunian, pp. 372–458. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 275

Following an absence of almost 40 years, Ye returned as well to cartoon- ing. In 1987, he created a sketch-cartoon series, Ten Years of an Absurd Dream (Shi nian huangtang meng 十年荒唐梦), dealing with his experi- ences during the Cultural Revolution. In 1993, he produced another series of sketch-cartoons, An Old Brush Recalls Childhood (Laobi yi tongnian 老笔 忆童年), about his childhood in Lutong. As in his earlier sketch-cartoons, in these works Ye uses Chinese ink and brush along with a traditional seal, and once again he includes autobiographical references that link his own experiences to the history of the Chinese nation. For example, in “Jiang Qing Pulls out my Tendons by Imperial Edict” (Jiang Qing yi ming chou wo jin 江青懿命抽我筋; 1987), Ye depicts Mao’s wife as a giant chicken, wearing a crown and glasses, who grabs his head in her beak (Fig. 6.1). In “The End of the Qing Dynasty: Leaving Behind Childhood” (Qingmo yitong 清末遗童; 1993), he portrays himself with a queue, standing next to a large pair of scissors (Fig. 6.2). The cutting off of his queue symbolizes both the fall of the Qing dynasty and the end of his childhood.

Fig. 6.1. Ye Qianyu, “Jiang Qing Pulls out my Tendons by Imperial Edict,” from his 1987 sketch-cartoon series Ten Years of an Absurd Dream.

Fig. 6.2. Ye Qianyu, “The End of the Qing Dynasty, Leaving Behind Childhood,” from his 1993 sketch-cartoon series An Old Brush Recalls Childhood. 276 epilogue

Ye’s return to producing sinicized cartoons was part of a larger trend dur- ing the post-Mao period, when many older artists who had been perse- cuted during the Mao years resumed cartooning. As Hongying Liu-Lengyel and Alfonz Lengyel describe in their article “Ancient Literature and Folk- lore in Modern Chinese Cartoons,” cartoonists such as Liao Bingxiong and Ding Cong once again took up traditional brush and ink in order to pillory the Gang of Four and the violent excesses of the Cultural Revolution.22 Younger artists followed suit in producing sinicized cartoons attacking those responsible for the Cultural Revolution. These political artists not only employed the traditional brush, but also appropriated stories and themes from popular literature, such as Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguo yanyi 三国演义; 14th century), Water Margin (Shuihu zhuan 水浒传; 14th century), Journey to the West (Xiyou ji 西游记; 16th century), and Dream of the Red Chamber (Honglou meng 红楼梦; 18th century).23 While Ye once again began cartooning during the 1980s, this period also witnessed a revitalization of interest in his earlier work from the Republican era. Many of his cartoons and sketches from the 1930s and 1940s were published in collective editions, including From the Thirties to the Forties: A Selection of Cartoons by Ye Qianyu (Cong sanshi niandai dao sishi niandai Ye Qianyu manhua xuan 从三十年代到四十年代 叶 浅予漫画选; 1981), Mr. Wang and Little Chen (Wang xiansheng yu Xiao Chen 王先生与小陈; 1986), and Indian Customs (Yindu fengqing 印度 风情; 1986). Similarly, Ye’s lectures and essays on cartooning, sketching, and Chinese painting were published in collections such as Drawing and Discussions on Art (Hua yu lunyi 画与论艺; 1991). Moreover, exhibitions were held featuring Ye’s sketches, cartoons, and paintings; these included A Ye Qianyu Retrospective (Ye Qianyu huazhan 叶浅予画展), which was hosted jointly by the Research Institute of Chinese Painting and the Chi- nese Artists’ Association. In 1988, Ye received the Golden Monkey Award for lifetime achievement in cartoon art.24 Although Ye’s paintings and cartoons witnessed a resurgence in pop- ularity, in his memoir he describes the difficulties he experienced in the 1980s when he sought to come to terms with his Westernized cul- tural background. As Ye recalls, his attempts to justify his choices as a

22 Hongying Liu-Lengyel, and Alfonz Lengyel, “Ancient Literature and Folklore in Mod- ern Chinese Cartoons,” Journal of Asian Pacific Communication 7.1–2 (1996): 45–53. 23 Ibid. 24 For information on Ye’s exhibitions and awards received during the 1980s and 1990s, see Zhang Tianman, Ye Qianyu, pp. 28–41. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 277

­cartoonist would take the form of imaginary conversations with his char- acter Mr. Wang. According to the artist, Mr. Wang would ask him: “Why from the beginning did you force me, this skinny old man, to imitate that old, fat American man who was afraid of his wife, and make people laugh by exposing ugliness?”25 In response, Ye would explain to Mr. Wang that Shanghai life was already very Westernized, and that being scared of one’s wife was nothing new in China.26 Ye portrays their troubled relationship in his drawing, “I am in you, You are in me, May 1983, Ye Qianyu and Mr. Wang Together” (Ni zhong you wo, Wo zhong you ni, Yi jiu ba san nian wu yue, Ye Qianyu Wang xiansheng zai yiqi 你中有我, 我中有你, 一九八三年五月, 叶浅予王 先生在一起; Fig. 6.3). Mr. Wang is shown smiling on the right of the frame, while on the left, Ye stares at the viewer with deep bags under his eyes. Four years later, in 1987, Ye made another portrait of himself and Mr. Wang, but this time added another one of his cartoon characters, Mr. Chen. Ye titled his work, “He is in Me, I am in Him” (Wo zhong you ta, Ta zhong you wo 我中有他, 他中有我; Fig. 6.4, Plate Section). While Mr. Chen and Mr. Wang emerge from Ye’s head like troubling figments of his imagination, the cartoonist’s hair and eyebrows stand on end, and his eyes are ringed with additional layers of bags. The uneasy and shift- ing deictic relationship between Ye and his cartoon figures reflect the multiple divide between Chinese and Western aesthetics, modern and

Fig. 6.3. Ye Qianyu, “I am in You, You are in Me, May 1983, Ye Qianyu, Mr. Wang Together.”

25 Ye Qianyu, Xixu cangsang ji liunian, p. 43. 26 Ibid. 278 epilogue traditional art, and the pre- and post-Mao eras that Ye repeatedly attempted to bridge during his long career.

Wang Zengqi

Following the communist victory, fiction writer Wang Zengqi was assigned to Wuhan to assist with educational administration, although he returned shortly afterwards to Beijing to work for the Beijing Fed- eration of Literary and Art Circles. In 1954, he was transferred to the Chinese Folk Art Research Association, and from 1950 to 1958 he served as editor for the literary journals Beijing Literature and Art (Beijing wenyi 北京文艺), Talking and Singing (Shuoshuo changchang 说说唱唱), and Folk Literature (Minjian wenxue 民间文学).27 During this period, he pub- lished three short stories. However, in 1958, Wang was labeled a Rightist and sent to a commune outside the Great Wall to work as a laborer for four years at an agricultural research institute as part of the Anti-Right- ist Campaign. Subsequently, he gave up writing stories for more than 20 years. In 1962, he was transferred to Beijing to work for the Peking Opera Troupe, and focused his energies on writing “model” operas (yang banxi 样板戏). Despite being subjected to criticism during the Mao years, in his essay “Opening Speech,” Wang describes his period of forced labor in a positive light as a kind of learning experience: In 1958 I was mistakenly labeled a Rightist and sent to an Agricultural Research Center outside the Great Wall to labor for almost four years. These four years were very important to me. I worked together with the agricul- tural laborers (i.e., peasants), ate the same food they did, and in the evenings slept on the same heated brick bed [kang 炕] in a large dormitory (the pil- lows were next to one another so that lice from the quilt of the person lying farthest to the east could jump freely to the quilt of the person farthest to the west). I was able to gain a realistic view of a Chinese village and Chinese peasants.28 As a result of his time living with the peasantry, Wang writes that when he returned to writing in the 1980s and 1990s, his work grew closer to the lives of common people. Like the stories in Collection of Chance

27 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao jiamen,” p. 289. 28 Ibid. See also Wang Zengqi’s discussion of his experiences during the Anti-Rightist Campaign in his essay “Suiyu er an” 随遇而安 (Finding Contentment Anywhere), in Wang Zengqi quanji, VI: 132–41. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 279

Encounters, such as “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” and “Chance Encounter,” many of Wang’s stories from the post-Mao period deal with reminiscences about ordinary people from his hometown of Gaoyou in Jiangsu. In particular, Wang wrote many stories after returning to Gaoyou several times in the 1980s, following over 30 years of separation from his native region (Fig. 6.5). These later stories include works such as “Hometown People” (Guxiang ren 故乡人; 1981) and “A Tale of Big Nur” (Da’nao ji shi 大淖记事; 1981). In addition, Wang wrote many stories about wartime Kunming, such as “Kunming Rain” (Kunming de yu 昆明 的雨; 1984), in which he treats Kunming not as a site of exile, but as his “second hometown.”29

Fig. 6.5. Wang Zengqi on a return visit to his hometown of Gaoyou during the late 1980s.

29 See Zhang Yongjie’s 张永杰 discusssion in his “Wenben jiyi de ‘guxiang’: Yi Wang Zengqi bixia de Kunming wei zhongxin” 文本记忆的故乡以汪曾祺笔下的昆明为中心 (The “Hometown” in Literary Memory: With a Special Focus on Kunming in the Writings of Wang Zengqi), Ph.D. dissertation, Beijing University, 2005. 280 epilogue

While Wang’s post-Mao stories deal with memories of the pre-Mao past, Wang also revisited his former career by rewriting several of his stories from the 1940s, such as “Special Gift” (1948; 1981) and “Occupation” (Zhiye 职业; 1947; 1983). As he commented in an interview in 1989 with Zhang Xingjin about his writing career during the 1980s: “I recovered the creative pathway that I once sought during the 1940s. That is to say, the work I did in the 1980s was an extension of my work from the 1940s.”30 In total, Wang produced over 100 stories and 200 essays; these latter writings became very popular and are frequently reprinted in collections of his works.31 As Wang sought ways to return to his “creative pathway,” he contin- ued his earlier project of searching for a native style of writing rooted in traditional aesthetics and regional language. Like his earlier works, his post-Mao stories combine a colloquial vernacular with classical Chinese. However, at the same time, these later works embody a style that is dis- tinct from his earlier stories. Most noticeably, the stream-of-consciousness passages and talkative, highly self-conscious narrators of Wang’s early sto- ries are largely absent from the post-Mao stories.32 Moreover, his later pieces eschew the more Westernized language used in many of his ear- lier stories, which were characterized by the heavy use of pronouns. For example, whereas Li Tuo counts 15 pronouns (many in the first-person) in the first paragraph of Wang’s story “Revenge,”33 his post-Mao story “Bud- dhist Initiation” (Shou jie 受戒; 1980) contains no pronouns at all. None- theless, these later stories are still characterized by a modernist aesthetic and employ shifting temporal and narrative frames and elements of meta- fiction. With respect to the deceptively simple nature of his smooth and essay-like prose, Wang remarked:

30 Zhang Xingjin 张兴劲 , “Fang Wang Zengqi” 访汪曾祺 (An Interview with Wang Zengqi), Beijing wenxue 1 (1989): 69. 31 See Huang Yao 黄尧, Feng Yongqi 冯永祺, and Tang Shijie 汤世杰, eds., Yunyan miaomiao: Wang Zengqi yu Yunnan 云烟渺渺汪曾祺与云南 (Misty Clouds—Wang Zengqi and Yunnan; Kunming: Yunnan jiaoyu, 2000); Wang Zengqi, Wu wei: Wang Zengqi tanchi sanwen 32 pian 五味汪曾祺谈吃散文32篇 (The Five Flavors: Wang Zengqi’s 32 Essays on Eating; Jinan: Shandong huabao, 2005); Deng Jiuping 邓九平, ed., Wang Zengqi rensheng manbi 汪曾祺人生漫笔 (Wang Zengqi’s Writings about Life; Beijing: Tongxin, 2005). 32 For an analysis of the shifts in style between Wang’s pre- and post-Mao stories, see Wang Feng 王枫, “ ‘Yibing’ ‘Zhiye’ liangzhong wenti de duidu”异秉职业两种文体的 对读 (“Special Talent” and “Occupation”: A Comparison of Two Kinds of Literary Forms), in Qian Liqun, ed., Duihua yu manyou, pp. 424–48. 33 Li Tuo, “Wang Zengqi yu xiandai Hanyu xiezuo—Jiantan Maowenti,” p. 7. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 281

I definitely do not reject modernism. Whenever someone slanders a younger writer whose works show modernist tendencies, I often defend him. I occa- sionally still write works that cannot be strictly called realistic, such as my “Epiphyllum Flower, Crane, and Foxfire” [Tanhua, he, he guihuo 昙花鹤和 鬼火]. Even stories that appear at first to be objective narratives sometimes contain stream-of-consciousness passages, but critics don’t easily notice them. Works of mine that appear on the surface to be very ordinary are in fact not all that straightforward.34 Like Mu Dan, Wang’s modernist yet lyrical and essay-like style served as a source of inspiration for younger writers. In particular, his stories about his native region influenced “roots-seeking” (xungen 寻根) authors like Han Shaogong 韩少功 (1953–), Wang Anyi 王安忆 (1954–), and Mo Yan 莫言 (1955–), winner of the 2012 Novel Prize in Literature. Wang wrote numerous prefaces and introductions for their works and frequently praised their writings.35 In addition, many of these writers looked up to Wang as a teacher and originator of the “Wang style” (Wang qi 汪气).36 Having spent time in the countryside during the Cultural Revolution, the roots-seeking writers focused on non-urban images and themes and consciously wrote within the tradition of native-soil fiction. Yet, like Wang, they reinvented the native-soil genre through their modernist experi- mentation with temporal and narrative frameworks and the conscious

34 Wang Zengqi, “Zibao Jiamen,” p. 290. 35 Nine of these prefaces are collected in Wang Zengqi quanji; see, for example, “Tui- jian Qiutian de zhong” 推荐秋天的钟 (Recommendation for Autumn Bell; 1993), in Wang Zengqi quanji, VI: 11–12; “Tuijian Huaifu he niu” 推荐孕妇和牛 (Recommendation for Preg- nant Women and Cows; 1993), in Wang Zengqi quanji, VI: 9–10. For Wang Zengqi’s praise of Mo Yan’s writing, see “Wang Zengqi ping Mo Yan zuopin Fengru feitun” 汪曾祺评莫 言作品丰乳肥臀：中国当代文学的突破 (Wang Zengqi Comments on Mo Yan’s work Big Breasts and Wide Hips), accessed December 10, 2012, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/ dfpd/dfwhyl/2012-10-12/content_7220976.html. As Wang Zengqi commented with respect to Mo Yan’s novel Big Breasts and Wide Hips (Fengru feitun 丰乳肥臀; 1996), “This is a seri- ous, sincere work that is full of symbolic meaning,” adding that the novel represented not only “a breakthrough for Mo Yan’s novels, but also for contemporary Chinese literature.” 36 Many roots-seeking authors wrote essays on Wang’s writing style, e.g., Wang Anyi’s 王安忆, “Wang Lao jiang gushi” 汪老讲故事 (Old Wang Tells Stories), in her Wo du wo kan 我读我看 (I Read, I See; Shanghai: Shanghai renmin, 2001), pp. 115–23. More gener- ally, roots-seeking writers wrote essays about Wang Zengqi and his views on writing. Mo Yan, for example, claimed that he agreed with Wang Zengqi about the negative impact of Hollywood on modern Chinese literature. See “Mo Yan zancheng Wang Zengqi dui wenxue de kanfa” 莫言赞成汪曾祺对文学的看法 (Mo Yan Endorses Wang Zengqi’s Views on Lit- erature), accessed December 10, 2012, http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_5b1077250102e75q .html. 282 epilogue intermixing of regional language, classical Chinese, and the ­vernacular.37 Indeed, some scholars, such as Yi-tsi Feuerwerker, have argued that the stylistic and structural looseness favored by these authors has ties to postmodernism.38 As Wang Zengqi comments in his introduction to A Selection of Short Stories by Roots-Seeking Authors, “They [roots-seekers] are attempting to assimilate the best features of both regional vernacular (tuyu 土语) and ancient Chinese in order to produce a new, elegant lan- guage that is distinctively their own.”39 Scholars like David Wang and Jef- frey Kinkley have stressed the influence of Wang’s teacher Shen Congwen on these younger writers.40 Yet, Wang Zengqi’s emphasis on language as a culture-bearing medium, in particular his experimentation with regional vernacular and an essay-like style drawn from classical prose, had a deep impact as well on the roots-seekers.41 In many of his post-Mao essays, including “A Casual Discussion on the Creation of Short Stories” (Xiaoshuo chuangzao suitan 小说创造随谈; 1983), “The Problem of Language in Chinese Literature” (Zhongguo wenxue de yuyan wenti 中国文学的语言问题; 1987), and “The Essayization of Fiction” (Xiaoshuo de sanwenhua 小说的散文化; 1986), Wang Zengqi theorized about the interconnections in his own work between Western modernism and traditional aesthetics. In similar vein, Li Tuo argues that “Wang Zengqi’s language forms an internal connection between Ming and Qing classical Chinese and modern language.”42 As a result, Li claims that Wang’s style provides an alternative to the Westernized vernacular found in much modern and contemporary Chinese fiction and scholarly writing,

37 See Li Tuo’s discussion of the link between roots-seeking writers and post-Mao mod- ernism in his Zhongguo dangdai wenxue de ‘xianfeng’ yu ‘xungen’” 中国当代文学的先 锋与寻根 (The “Avant-garde” and “Roots-seeking” in contemporary Chinese literature), in Liu Shaoming 刘绍铭, and Ma Hanmao 马汉茂 (Helmut Martin), eds., Shijie Zhongwen xiaoshuo xuan 诗界中文小说选 (A Selection of International Chinese Fiction; Taibei: Shibao, 1987), pp. 259–62. 38 See “The Post-Modern ‘Search for Roots’ in Han Shaogong, Mo Yan, and Wang Anyi,” in Yi-tsi Feuerwerker, Ideology, Power, Text, pp. 188–238. 39 Wang Zengqi, “Xu” 序 (Preface), in Li Tuo 李陀, ed., Zhongguo xungen xiaoshuo xuan 中国寻根小说选 (A Selection of Short Stories by Roots-Seeking Authors; Hong Kong: Sanlian shudian, 1993), p. 5. 40 See David Wang, “Imaginary Nostalgia: Shen Congwen, Song Zelai, Mo Yan, and Li Yongping,” pp. 247–89. Also, see Jeffrey Kinkley, “Shen Congwen’s Legacy in Chinese Lit- erature of the 1980s,” pp. 71–106. 41 For a discussion on Wang Zengqi’s post-Mao fiction and his impact on the roots- seeking writers, see Carolyn FitzGerald, “Imaginary Sites of Memory: Wang Zengqi and Post-Mao Reconstructions of the Native Land,” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture 20.1 (Spring 2008): 72–128. 42 Li Tuo, “Wang Zengqi yu xiandai Hanyu xiezuo—Jiantan Maowenti,” p. 19. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 283 and offers the reader a “feeling of liberation—the vernacular can be written this way!”43

Fei Mu

In the wake of the post-Mao “discovery” of Spring in a Small Town, Fei Mu’s film was hailed as both an exemplar of Eastern cinema and a mod- ernist classic on a par with other masterworks of international cinema. As film critic Liu Chenghen wrote, “Spring in a Small Town is not only a classic treasure chest of Chinese aesthetics, but even more it is one of the great works of international film.”44 As a result of growing interest in Fei Mu’s work, several dedicated studies were published during the 1990s, including Huang Ailing’s The Poet Director—Fei Mu (Shiren daoyan—Fei Mu 诗人导演—费穆; 1998) and Wu Zhongli’s The Film Aesthetics of Spring in a Small Town—A Tribute to Fei Mu (Xiaocheng zhi chun de diany- ing meixue—Xiang Fei Mu zhi jing 小城之春的电影美学—向费穆致敬; 1996). Similarly, many contemporary filmmakers were deeply impressed by Fei Mu’s film. In his memoir of the Beijing Film Academy, Ni Zhen observes that films from the 1930s and 1940s, especially Wu Yonggang’s The Goddess and Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town, led “the class of 1982 [of the Beijing Film Academy] to respect and ponder Chinese film his- tory,” even though they were “indifferent toward the films of the fifties.”45 In an interview with Ni Zhen, Zhang Yimou recalls the deep impression Spring in a Small Town left on him when he studied at the academy. In particular, he contrasts the realism of Fei Mu’s film to “phony” works of Mao-era film: Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town was tremendously important. To have achieved that level in 1948 makes it a magnificent film. And it makes him a magnificent director. It’s still very important today. Its doubts about the human condition run very deep. Its language is simple yet it had deep and lasting appeal. Back then, we really didn’t like modern Chinese film because

43 Ibid. 44 See Liu Chenghan 刘承汉, Xiaocheng zhi chun: Fu, bi, xing de dianfan 小城之春 赋比兴的典范 (Spring in a Small Town: An Model of Exposition, Metaphor, and Implied Comparison), in Liu Chenghan, ed., Dianying fu, bi, xing ji 电影赋比兴集 (A Collection of Filmic Exposition, Metaphor, and Implied Comparison; Hong Kong: Tiandi tushu, 1992), p. 68. 45 Ni Zhen, Memoirs from the Beijing Film Academy, p. 97. 284 epilogue

so many films lacked realism and were phony. But a film like Spring in a Small Town has not been surpassed by many urban films to this day. It’s a rare masterpiece in Chinese film history.46 Of the contemporary directors who expressed admiration for the film, Tian Zhuangzhuang most directly paid tribute to Fei Mu in his 2002 remake Springtime in a Small Town. In the opening credits, Tian dedicates the film to “the founders of Chinese national cinema.”47 Shelly Kraicer argues that by paying homage to Fei Mu, Springtime in a Small Town “engages at a thematic and symbolical level to try and heal a violent rupture in Chinese culture: the chasm that Liberation (1949) and the Cultural Revolution (1966–76) opened between contemporary Chinese culture and its tradi- tional past.” Kraicer proposes that in so doing, “Tian seems to be turning a radical commentary on China’s breakdown into a nostalgic celebration of a lost perfect past.”48 In an interview at the 2003 Melbourne International Film Festival, Tian explained that he became interested in the project because he wanted to help “bridge the divisions” between people in the new millennium: I remember that, before the time of the millennium, everybody was so busy, celebrating, looking forward to the future. But afterwards, everybody seemed very distant from each other. People seemed to all be worried about themselves. There was no connection between them. It was a great letdown after such a big build-up and it left a pervasive feeling of loneliness. So the film is about characters attempting to bridge the divisions between them, to find love and some kind of warmth.49 Indeed, whereas Fei Mu’s original film is told largely through lacunae, Tian’s remake seeks to close the gaps between past and present, as well as between the characters in the film, who are engaged in the search for “love and some kind of warmth.” As well as removing Yuwen’s voice-over, which emphasizes the gaps, inconsistencies, and repetitiveness of Yuwen’s memory, Tian also excises such disorienting, modernist features as the flash-forward, flashback, and mid-scene dissolves. Similarly, in place of

46 Ibid., p. 103. 47 For Tian’s dedication, see Ah Cheng 阿城, Xiaocheng zhi chun 小城之春 (Spring- time in a Small Town; Taibei: Shibao wenhua, 2002), p. iv. See also see the cover of the DVD of Tian’s remake, produced by Guangdong yinxiang 广东音像, and the opening credits to Tian’s film. 48 See Shelly Kraicer’s review of Springtime in a Small Town, China Now, accessed June 11, 2011, http://www.chinanowmag.com/filmreview/filmreview.htm. 49 See “A Spring Flowering, a Decade on,” The Age, September 21, 2003, accessed June 11, 2011, http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/09/19/1063625198182.html. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 285 the many pregnant pauses in Fei Mu’s minimalist script, Tian intersperses soft, classical music throughout the film. Moreover, he adds more dialogue. In contrast to Fei Mu’s script of about 40 pages, the screenplay for Tian’s remake, written by Ah Cheng 阿城 (1949–), is around 90 pages.50 Tian thus transforms Fei Mu’s portrayal of postwar desolation into a beautifully packaged tribute to a classic of modern Chinese cinema. Yet, as Jie Li observes, Tian’s remake is only one take on the film, and Fei Mu has “cast his influence in more subtle and anxiety-free ways on con- temporary Chinese filmmakers.”51 In her essay “Home and Nation Amid the Rubble: Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town and Jia Zhangke’s Still Life,” Li draws comparisons between the cinematography of ruins and rubble in Spring in a Small Town and Jia Zhangke’s 贾樟柯 (1970–) Still Life (Sanxia haoren 三峡好人; 2006), a film about population displacement resulting from the Three Gorges Dam Project. Li argues that, in both cases, ruins mirror the emotional and physical injury suffered by their inhabitants: As in Spring in a Small Town, both physical architecture and human bodies undergo injury, displacement, and scattering [in Jia’s Still Life]. The violence done to old dwellings—turning them into piles of stone, brick, and cement blocks—parallels the violence done to the inhabitants when they refuse to budge from their homes designated for demolition.52 In addition, Li shows how both directors treat the long take as a kind of landscape painting that evokes lyric poetry, following the traditional prac- tice of inscribed calligraphy. Specifically, she draws comparisons between Fei Mu’s evocation of Du Fu and Jia’s use of Li Bai’s 李白 (701–62) poem “Leaving Baidi Town in the Early Morning” (Zao fa Baidi cheng 早发白 帝城). The poem, about Li Bai’s journey down the Yangtze through the Three Gorges following his release from exile in Guizhou in the wake of the An Lushan Rebellion, is here recited over a loudspeaker on a ferry as tourists set off down the Yangtze River on a tour of the Three Gorges Dam. According to Li, Jia draws inspiration from Fei Mu’s use of long-take cin- ematography and his “fusion of emotion and scenery” to depict modern themes of displacement and loss of home. As Li notes, Jia does not cite Fei Mu as a direct influence on Still Life. However, according to Jia, his 19-minute film Cry Me a River (Heshang de aiqing 河上的爱情; 2008), about the reunion of four college friends and

50 For the script of the remake, see Ah Cheng, Xiaocheng zhi chun, pp. 1–163. 51 Jie Li, “Home and Nation Amid the Rubble,” p. 86. 52 ibid., p. 103. 286 epilogue lovers 10 years after the “Tiananmen Square Incident” (1989), was inspired by Spring in a Small Town. In an interview with Andrew Chan of Film Com- ment, Jia discussed the links between his film and Fei Mu’s work: I worship the achievements of Chinese cinema in the Thirties. There are two directors of that period who I love: Fei Mu and Yuan Muzhi. Yuan has a movie called Street Angel that I love. Cry Me a River is about intellectuals, and it’s easy for me to make a connection to Spring in a Small Town because Fei Mu’s film is about the feelings of intellectuals at a time when so many countries were affected by the Second World War. For me, Cry Me a River reenters the world of China in 1989. It shows how, 10 years on, everyone’s entered the real world, and some people have married, but deep inside they share a great sense of devastation. On the one hand, I wanted to connect the film to Spring in a Small Town with the setting on the river. In Chinese culture, rivers symbolize the passage of time; as Confucius said, “Time is going on like this river, flowing away endlessly day and night.” On the other hand, I wanted to use the two lead actors from Summer Palace [which was banned in China for its depiction of the Tiananmen Incident] to make the audience faintly aware that the characters come from that era.53 While in Still Life Jia draws from Fei Mu’s long-take filming of ruins, in Cry Me a River he employs a similar plot to Spring in a Small Town about the reunion of former lovers. Moreover, as in Fei Mu’s film, he “focuses on love scenes, walks on the river, and on boats.”54 Yet, despite its por- trayal of the reunion of friends and former lovers, Cry Me a River is about the inseparable distance between present and past, as well as between friends, and between reality and lost ideals in the wake of Tiananmen. Jia thus appropriates Fei Mu’s “aesthetics of desolation” to depict traumatic memory in the wake of government-sponsored violence and to convey the sense of loss resulting from the inexorable passage of time. As in the case of Jia Zhangke, Tian Zhuangzhuang, and Zhang Yimou, many other directors, including Wang Xiaoshuai 王小帅 (1966–)55 and Stanley Kwan 关锦鹏 (1957–),56 have been influenced by Fei Mu. His

53 See Andrew Chan, “An Interview with Jia Zhangke,” Hot Spice, A Blog about Cinema, accessed June 11, 2011, http://nwfilmforum.wordpress.com/2009/03/08/an-interview-with- jia-zhangke/. 54 See “Cry Me a River Makes Splash in Venice,” CCTV.com, accessed June 11, 2011, http://www.cctv.com/english/20080831/101387.shtml. 55 See “Wang Xiaoshuai Wang Yi Liaotian jilu” 王小帅网易聊天记录 (Record of a Conversation between Wang Xiaoshuai and Wang Yi), accessed July 5, 2011, http://ent.163 .com/edit/010308/010308_73336.html. 56 See Stephen Teo’s discussion of the impact of Spring in a Small Town on Stanley Kwan’s Rouge (Yanzhi kou 胭脂扣; 1987), accessed July 5, 2011, http://www.filmreference searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 287 impact on contemporary film has become more nuanced since the redis- covery of Spring in a Small Town during the 1980s. Not only do directors now look to Fei Mu’s work as an emblem of national film—they draw inspiration from his artistry as they search for a filmic language to portray alienation, violence, and desolation in contemporary life.

Fei Ming

Among the scholars and works discussed in this study, Fei Ming remains the least known and most poorly researched in China. As Haiming Liu observed in his 2001 dissertation with respect to the status of scholarly research on the novelist, “The overall scholarship on Fei Ming remains rudimentary. Some of the most basic premises and assumptions must themselves be examined.”57 In similar vein, in his preface to Fei Ming’s Collected Short Stories (Fei Ming duanpian xiaoshuo ji 废名短篇小说集), published in 1996, Wang Zengqi lamented: “Almost no one knows the name Fei Ming. Studies of modern Chinese literary history published in China almost never mention him.”58 In part, this lack of scholarly interest is a result of readers’ difficulty in understanding his work, in particular After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane. In his preface, Wang Zengqi writes that while Fei Ming’s earlier lyric fiction is “beautifully written,” in contrast The Biography of Mr. Neverwas leaves him “unable to make head or tail” of the author’s ostensible subject, and he has “no idea what Fei Ming is say- ing” in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane.59 Given these difficulties, Wang predicted that it would be another 20 years before Fei Ming’s important position in modern Chinese literary history would be recognized.60 Nonetheless, as Chen Jianjun and Zhang Jibing document in their recent study Notes on Fei Ming Research (Fei Ming yanjiu zhaji 废名研究 札记; 2009), the 1980s witnessed an upsurge of interest in the author’s works compared to previous decades. According to their count, fewer than

.com/Films-Wi-Z/Yanzhi-Kou.html. Kwan paid a further tribute to Fei Mu in his 1992 film Ruan Lingyu 阮玲玉 (a.k.a. Centre Stage). 57 Haiming Liu, “Transformation of Childhood Experience: Rainer Maria Rilke and Fei Ming,” p. 137. 58 Wang Zengqi, “Dai xu” 代序 (In Lieu of a Preface), in Feng Sichun 冯思纯, ed., Fei Ming duanpian xiaoshuo ji (Changsha: Hunan, 1997), p. 1. 59 Ibid., p. 2. 60 Ibid., p. 5. 288 epilogue

15 articles about him appeared in the period 1950–78.61 However, from 1978 to 2001, approximately 270 scholarly essays and studies were pub- lished on Fei Ming.62 And since the 1980s, many collective editions have been published, such as Fei Ming’s Collected Short Stories (Fei Ming duan- pian xiaoshuo ji; 1997). Research on Fei Ming has largely focused on the distinctiveness of his literary style and his experimentation with different genres and narrative perspectives. As we have seen, in his essay “About Style,” Wang Zengqi names Fei Ming as one of three modern authors who have most influ- enced his own work. Many other critics, including Wu Xiaodong and Zhu Yaning, have drawn attention to the unique lyrical quality of Fei Ming’s writing.63 Critics have also discussed Fei Ming’s combining of traditional poetic forms, such as Tang dynasty quatrains, with modernist aesthetics.64 His unique approach to native-soil fiction is another topic of scholarly enquiry.65 Indeed, the linguistic experimentation characteristic of roots- seeking fiction can be traced back to Fei Ming. As discussed, Wang Zengqi has commented that his own efforts to combine the genres of poetry, essay and the short story, and combine colloquial and classical Chinese, were in many ways inspired by Fei Ming. More recently, in the wake of the publication of After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane in 1997 and 2003, scholars have taken an interest in Fei Ming’s wartime writings, although the reception of his later works has on the whole been lukewarm. As we have seen, Qian Liqun criticizes Fei Ming’s aesthetic shift during the war period as “too fast,” and claims that his new wartime focus on realism leaves the reader feeling as if his work

61 Chen Jianjun 陈建军 and Zhang Jibing 张吉兵, Fei Ming yanjiu zhaji (Taibei: Xiuwei zixun keji gufen youxiao gongsi, 2009), p. 203. 62 tian Guang 田广, Fei Ming xiaoshuo yanjiu 废名小说研究 (Research on the Fiction of Fei Ming; Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue, 2009), p. 189. 63 Zhu Yaning 朱亚宁, “Lun Fei Ming xiaoshuo de wenti tezheng” 论废名小说的文 体特征 (On the Unique Formal Qualities of Fei Ming’s Fiction), Sichuan shifan daxue bao 4 (1992): 36–44; Wu Xiaodong 吴晓东, Jinghua shuiyue de shijie: Fei Ming Qiao de shixue yandu 镜花水月的世界废名桥的诗学硏读 (A World of Flowers in the Mirror and the Moon in the Water: Research on the Poetics of Fei Ming’s Bridge; Nanning: Guangxi jiaoyu, 2003). 64 Zhu Xuejian 祝学剑, “Fei Ming xiaoshuo yu Tangren jueju” 废名小说与唐人绝句 (The Fiction of Fei Ming and Tang Dynasty Quatrains), Fujian luntan 10 (2007): 29–34. 65 Du Xiuhua 杜秀华, “Shibi chanqu xie tianyuan: Fei Ming ji qi dui xiandai xiaoshuo de yingxiang” 诗笔禅趣写田园废名及其对现代抒情小说的影响 (Writing about Field and Garden with a Zen Poetic Brush: Fei Ming and His Influence on Modern Lyric Fiction), Beijing wenxue pinglun 1 (1995): 152–59. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 289

“has lost something.”66 In contrast, Wu Xiaodong is more receptive to the author’s changing style and argues that the heterogeneous form of the later novel is unique in “the entire history of Chinese literature.”67 Nonetheless, although Wu devotes one section of his four-part article to discussing Fei Ming’s experimentation with form, his study focuses more on the novel as a source of wartime history and intellectual history than of stylistic innovation. Wu begins his discussion by explaining his inter- est in After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane in terms of the shift in thinking undergone by intellectuals in response to the war period: I am extremely interested in the topic of how war changed authors’ lives and their views and way of thinking. We can begin by examining the work of Shen Congwen, Eileen Chang, Qian Zhongshu, Zhou Zuoren, Bian Zhi- lin, Feng Zhi, Shi Tuo, Fei Ming, and so on, and explore how war delivered them a new creative style and new ways of expressing consciousness. In my view, Fei Ming is hard to match. Only he genuinely returned to the lowest stratum of society and lived among village people for the entire duration of the war, and only he had first-hand experience of elementary and middle school education.68 Apart from these responses, Zhang Jibing has published several articles on After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, including “Fei Ming’s Experience as a Wartime Refugee and his Family Life” (Fei Ming de binan jingli yu qi jiazu shenghuo 废名的避难经历与其家族生活; 2005),69 which were recently collected into a monograph, A Study of Fei Ming during the War of Resistance (Kangzhan shiqi Fei Ming lun 抗战时期废名论; 2008).70 In this study, Zhang provides very little formal analysis of Fei Ming’s writ- ing; like Wu, he sees the novel primarily as a source of historical infor- mation. Academic approaches to Fei Ming’s complex formal modernist experimentation in this work, and to his shifts in style during the war period, thus remain at a rudimentary level. Nonetheless, research on Fei Ming continues to expand. In 2007 alone, over 35 scholarly articles were published on his work. Recent scholarship on Fei Ming, including a steady flow of research on After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, suggests that the study of his wartime works will continue to expand in the future as the

66 Qian Liqun, ed., Duihua yu manyou, p. 314. 67 Wu Xiaodong, “Zhanluan niandai de linglei shuxie.” 68 Ibid. 69 Zhang Jibing, “Fei Ming de binan jingli yu qi jiazu shenghuo,” Huanggang shifan xueyuan xuebao 4 (2005). 70 Zhang Jibing, Kangzhan shiqi Fei Ming lun (Wuhan: Huazhong shifan daxue, 2008). 290 epilogue result of a growing interest in the author, and in wartime cultural and intellectual history generally.

Chinese Modernism and Global Postmodernity

Despite the large divide between the post-Mao era and the time of the War of Resistance and civil war, contemporary intellectuals have repeat- edly returned to this earlier period in search of artistic inspiration and reconnection to national traditions. In some ways, the looseness of the wartime aesthetics of dissolution has proved well-suited to portraying rapid social change and upheaval in contemporary Chinese society. In particular, marketization and the economic reforms of the 1980s facili- tated the breaking apart of a once unified society rigidly controlled by the state, a process that has accelerated since the 1990s. In his study Post­ socialist Modernity: Chinese Cinema, Literature, and Criticism in the Market Age, Jason McGrath analyzes the way in which the market economy has pluralized China’s cultural field: The basic processes characterizing Chinese culture and society since the early 1990s—marketization, differentiation, individualization, pluralization—are consistent with the transformation from a unified social system, in which the political, the economic, and the cultural are all intimately intertwined, to a market society in which the economic differentiates itself and in turn drives the differentiation and pluralization of many other aspects of society and culture.71 To a certain extent, the fragmentation of contemporary life has parallels in the decentralization of culture that occurred during the war period. The rapid breaking away of the present from the past has created a sense of alienation and disorientation similar to that expressed by the wartime aesthetics of dissolution. Also, in ways reminiscent of wartime modernists such as Fei Ming, who attempted to reconcile Marxism, Con- fucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism in his wartime novel, contemporary intellectuals have sought to make sense of a cacophony of divergent world views and isms. Moreover, although it is many years since China was embroiled in full-scale war with Japan or subjected to semi-colonial occupation, contemporary society still grapples with the threat of Western

71 Jason McGrath, Postsocialist Modernity: Chinese Cinema, Literature, and Criticism in the Market Age (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2010), p. 9. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 291 political, military, and cultural hegemony, even as its economy surges. Wartime modernists’ experimentation with highly destabilized narrative and temporal perspectives, along with their melding of high and low cul- tural forms, and their portrayal of the ruins of modernity have thus all resonated with contemporary artists and writers seeking to depict simi- larly “scattered” and chaotic realities. Some scholars, including Xiaobin Yang, Arif Dirlik, and Xudong Zhang, interpret the fragmentation of postsocialist culture as evidence of the emergence of postmodernism, although they argue that Chinese post- modernism must be understood on its own terms in the context of mod- ern Chinese history and its Maoist legacy.72 However, McGrath argues that “The central cultural logic of China at the turn of the twenty-first century is not essentially postmodern, but rather is largely consistent with the fundamental dynamics of capitalist modernity itself.”73 Whereas postmodernity has been defined as “the condition after the end of tele- ology,” McGrath observes that political and economic power structures in post-Mao China have continued to rely on “the master narrative of progress.”74 In similar vein, Shu-mei Shih draws attention to the incom- plete and lengthy process of modernization in the Chinese, and more gen- erally, Third World context: The project of modernity in the Third World context is incomplete not due to an unfulfilled promise, as Jurgen Habermas lamented in the West- ern context, but instead due to its being a particularly arduous, violent, repetitive, and long process. Longer than any modernist writer could have anticipated.75 The divergence of opinions about how to define postsocialist culture sheds light on the contradictions resulting from China’s status as a rapidly modernizing nation, which is at the same time also influenced by global postmodernity. In Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture, Marita Sturken and Lisa Cartwright analyze how the complexities of Chinese postmodernism are reflected in Jia Zhangke’s 2004 film The World

72 See Arif Dirlik and Xudong Zhang, eds., Postmodernism and China (Durham: Duke University Press, 2000); Xiaobin Yang, The Chinese Postmodern: Trauma and Irony in ­Chinese Avant-Garde Fiction; see also Sheldon Lu, China, Transnational Visuality, Global Postmodernity (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002). 73 Jason McGrath, Postsocialist Modernity, p. 7. 74 Ibid., p. 204. 75 Shu-mei Shih, Lure of the Modern, p. 385. 292 epilogue

(Shijie 世界).76 The film is set in the World Park, a theme park outside Beijing which contains replicas of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, the Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal, the Pyramids, the Tower of London, and even Tiananmen Square. Visitors are invited to “See the world without ever leaving Beijing!” and enjoy a “global voyage” by foot, speedboat, or battery- operated car. On the one hand, the World Park illustrates the fact that in the wake of globalization, Chinese people, like everyone else, are now liv- ing in a postmodern world of “simulacra” which has lost sight of the real. According to Baudrillard, “The simulator’s model offers us ‘all the signs of the real’ without its ‘vicissitudes.’ ”77 In keeping with this postmodern aes- thetic, Jia Zhangke includes animated cartoon sequences in which char- acters in the film imagine themself flying outside the park when they text each other on their cell phones. Yet, in contrast to such playful postmodern stylistic flourishes, in an interview with Valerie Jaffee for Senses of Cinema, Jia commented that he views the park as a “sorrowful place,” which nonetheless carries great cultural significance: Those artificial landscapes are very significant. The landscape in the World Park includes famous sights from all over the world. They reflect the very strong curiosity of people in this country, and the interest they have in becoming a part of international culture. At the same time, this is a very strange way to fulfill those demands. To me, it makes for a very sorrowful place.78 The World Park serves as a symbol of the yearning of ordinary Chinese to become more international and modernized. Yet, at the same time, Jia’s film reveals the poverty in which many of the park’s visitors and work- ers live and the high price they pay in order to pursue their dreams of a better life. The ending of the film is particularly bleak in its depiction of the death of Cheng Taisheng 成太生, a migrant worker from Shaanxi, and his girlfriend Zhao Xiaotao 赵小桃, resulting from asphyxiation due to a gas leak in the shabby apartment in a poor industrialized neighbor- hood where Zhao is house-sitting for a friend. The World thus not only

76 See Marita Sturken and Lisa Cartwright’s analysis of Jia’s The World in their Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), pp. 307–309. 77 Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, Sheila Faria Glaser, tr. (Ann Arbor: Uni- versity of Michigan Press, 1981), p. 2; cited in Sturken and Cartwright, Practices of Looking, p. 307. 78 Valerie Jaffee, “An Interview with Jia Zhangke,” Senses of Cinema, accessed July 2, 2012, http://sensesofcinema.com/2004/feature-articles/jia_zhangke/. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 293 embodies a postmodern aesthetic, but also critiques the social problems resulting from China’s rush towards globalization. In doing so, it expresses a modernist angst over the disintegration of the master narrative of prog- ress and the state’s promises of a better life in the wake of its economic reforms. Similarly, Jia Zhangke’s appropriation of Li Bai’s poem and Fei Mu’s film in Still Life has links with both postmodernism and modernism. In her analysis of the film, Jie Li describes Jia’s postmodern treatment of Li Bai’s poem: When Shen Hong takes a tourist ferry downstream from Fengjie to Yichang, the same route Li Bai traveled before he wrote “Leaving Baidi Town in Early Morning,” the poem is recited by a disembodied voice through a loudspeaker on the ferry and is framed by a tourist introduction to the Three Gorges Dam. A television monitor shows us that the sound must be a recording put on loop so that the spontaneous inspiration of genius is made to serve the clichéd repetition of state propaganda, and a record of firsthand feeling is turned into a highly mediated, passive, and vicarious experience.79 Jia treats the media recording of Li Bai’s poem as another kind of simula- crum, which here is endlessly repeated for the purpose of attracting tour- ists to the Three Gorges Dam in order to make a profit. In addition, the closed-circuit television repeatedly broadcasts a show about the history of the dam project, which Li argues “glorifies the taming and domination of nature as a sign of China’s emergence as a modern nation,” thereby over- shadowing the “transcendent vision of Li Bai’s poem.”80 As in the case of The World, Jia once again employs a postmodern aesthetic to critique the harms resulting from China’s modernization and marketization projects. In addition to his postmodern reworking of Li Bai, Jia Zhangke also reinvents Fei Mu’s modernist film noir approach to filming the bombed- out ruins from the War of Resistance. In some ways, Jia Zhangke resembles Fei Mu in his employment of a “handscroll aesthetic.” As Shelly Kraicer observes, Jia’s “long, slow, 180-degree pans . . . turn vast fields of rubble, waste, and half-decayed, soon-to-be demolished buildings into epic tableaux. In style, these images seem partially derived from traditional Chinese scroll painting, but have nothing to do with them in content.”81 Although Jia’s style may be borrowed from scroll painting, he uses a high- definition digital color camera to create his “epic tableux.” Whereas Fei

79 Jie Li, “Home and Nation Amid the Rubble,” p. 102. 80 ibid. 81 Shelly Kraicer, “Chinese Wasteland: Jia Zhangke’s Still Life,” Cinema Scope 29 (2006). 294 epilogue

Mu undercuts the sense of an unfurling handscroll through the use of dis- solves and fade-outs, thereby creating a disorienting modernist aesthetic, Jia’s digital cinematography creates a smoother and more seamless effect. Accompanied by composer Lim Giong’s 林強 (1964–) haunting electronic music and the disembodied and repeated voice of Li Bai via the televi- sion link, Jia’s cinematography could be interpreted as a simulacrum of a handscroll. Viewed in this light, his filming of ruins not only serves as a testament to the destructive effects of modernization, but also embodies a self-referential critique about its status as postmodern commodity.82 Like Jia, other contemporary writers and artists have expressed anxiety over the emergence of postmodernity. Xiaobing Tang, for example, argues that Wang Anyi’s novella Our Uncle’s Story (Shushu de gushi 叔叔的故事; 1990) can be interpreted as a critique of transnational postmodernism. Analyzing the recurrent themes of melancholy in the novel, Tang argues that they stem from a fragmented sense of being cut off from “coherent ideals or worldviews”83 in the postmodern era: We may even conclude that her melancholy, in which the longing for a modern longing causes the deepest sorrow and ambivalence, gathers its historical content and relevance only in an age that deems itself “post” and beyond all ideologies and the modern. In other words, Wang Anyi’s post- modern melancholy may be read as a critique of a transnational postmod- ernism that, in the words of Ross Chambers, is nonmelancholic, “a kind of modernism without its pathos of lack.”84 Although Wang Anyi yearns for a modernist longing, her melancholic mood is in some ways closer in spirit to modernism than to the play- fulness and critical distance found in much postmodern art. Indeed, the coexistence of a globalizing postmodern culture and rapidly accelerating modernization in contemporary China has produced a kind of cultural tension—one which leads intellectuals to express modernist yearnings for historical truth and for the rapidly fading past despite their deep awareness of living in a postmodern digital age. Yet, at the same time, the

82 In his analysis of Still Life, Shelly Kraicer discusses the film’s use of onscreen titles to draw attention to four symbols of consumption: cigarettes, wine, tea, and candy. Through the use of this technique, Kraicer argues that “the film contains an ambivalent interior critique of the concomitant pleasures and dangers of turning cinema itself into a series of tantalizingly consumable items.” See ibid. 83 Xiaobing Tang, “Melancholy against the Grain: Approaching Postmodernity in Wang Anyi’s Tales of Sorrow,” in Arif Dirlik and Xudong Zhang, eds., Postmodernism and China, p. 365. 84 Ibid., p. 376. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 295 dominant ethos of modernization has brought postsocialist culture into a closer relationship with Republican-era modernism. Rather than conceiv- ing of earlier forms of modernism as predominantly a source of artifacts to be reproduced or reinvented through pastiche and parody, contemporary writers and artists conceive of themselves as building modern cultural tra- ditions with ties to both the Republican-era and pre-modern traditions. In this respect, Jia Zhangke resembles Tian Zhuangzhuang, even though his approach to reinventing Fei Mu is more postmodern. Similarly, despite their postmodern aesthetic, characterized by the breaking down of nar- rative and generic boundaries, elements of metafiction, and the mixing of high and low culture, contemporary roots-seeking authors situate their work in a tradition of native-soil literature by Republican-era writers such as Lu Xun, Shen Congwen, Wang Zengqi, and Fei Ming. Arguably, the weight of China’s 5,000 years of history has helped to fuel this powerful desire to construct a modern literary aesthetic with strong links to China’s pre-modern cultural traditions. In some ways, postmod- ern melancholy resembles the “aesthetics of the shard.” Viewed in the context of pre-modern literature, postmodern reworkings of China’s mod- ernist cultural traditions could be viewed as yet another manifestation of China’s “literature of memory.” However, at the same time, the sense of anxiety and desolation expressed by Jia Zhangke and other artists is closely tied to the problems resulting from China’s rapid modernization. In addition, the efforts of writers and artists to modernize Chinese cul- ture parallel the state’s discourse of modernization. Indeed, as Gao Minglu observes, many contemporary intellectuals view postmodernity as simply “a new version of modernity proper, instead of as an essential critique of or a break with it.”85 Like writers and artists, contemporary critics also envision Chinese culture as involved in a process of interrupted modernism. Li Tuo, for example, argues that the Chinese vernacular has undergone a process of modernization that began during the Republican era and resumed dur- ing the post-Mao period.86 According to Li, early modernists such as Lu Xun, Shen Congwen, Zhou Zuoren, Shi Zhecun, Lao She, and Xiao Hong

85 Gao Minglu, “Post-Utopian Avant-Garde Art in China,” in Ales Erjavec, ed., Post­ modernism and the Postsocialist Condition: Politicized Art under Late Socialism (University of California Press, 2003), p. 248. 86 See Li Tuo, “The New Vitality of Modern Chinese,” and his “Wang Zengqi and Modern Chinese Writing—Also a Discussion of Maoist Discourse.” 296 epilogue

“explored the beauty and grace of the Chinese language.”87 Li singles out the fiction of Lu Xun and observes that although he wrote in the vernacu- lar, “his style was so refined and elegant, so dignified and infused with the formal beauty of literary Chinese” as to make his readers “easily fall under the illusion that one was reading classical Chinese instead.”88 How- ever, Li claims that during the Mao era, these experiments were silenced, and a more Westernized prose style became the dominant trend. Li views this style as exemplified by Mao Dun’s realist fiction, which eschews the influence of traditional aesthetics and instead employs the heavy use of pronouns and long adjectival modifiers. In fact, many writers, such as Zhao Shuli, continued to experiment with traditional forms during the Mao years. Nonetheless, Li’s analysis of literature from this period is emblematic of the views of many contemporary scholars, who perceive of literature and art produced during the Mao years as constituting a break from China’s long process of cultural modernization during the twentieth century. In contrast, after the end of the Cultural Revolution, Li argues that writers once again began experimenting formally in an attempt to modernize the Chinese vernacular. While Li sees the misty poets as pio- neers in this regard, he writes that they were followed by roots-seeking authors like Ah Cheng, as well as by avant-garde writers such as Yu Hua 余华 (1960–)89 and Ge Fei 格非 (1964–). Although the style of these various writers was influenced by Western modernism and postmodern- ism, Li views their experiments as part of a broader attempt to create a national language with connections to both traditional aesthetics and the modern vernacular: Without rejecting the premise that Western languages may yet influence the future development of Chinese, it can safely be said that problems such as how to resist excessive Westernization of the Chinese language, of how to sustain its unique qualities and to maintain a link between modern and clas- sical Chinese, have not only received widespread attention but have already led to tangible results in practice: a modern Chinese language with nation- ally distinctive characteristics is steadily taking shape. I believe this event is fraught with significance not merely for China but also for the world. One has

87 Li Tuo, “The New Vitality of Modern Chinese,” p. 69. 88 Ibid., p. 68. 89 For an analysis of Yu Hua’s postmodern reconfiguration of heroic representations of the War of Resistance in his short story “Death of a Landlord,” (Dizhu de si 一个地主的死; 1995), see Steven Riep, “A War of Wounds,” pp. 163–64. Yu Hua’s postmodern reworking of wartime heroics attempts to undermine heroic master narratives, but also embodies a social critique of heroic depictions of the war in the mass media. searching for roots: modernist echoes in the post-mao era 297

only to consider how the rapid development of mass media in the twentieth century has reduced the world to a “global village,” so that national borders as well as linguistic boundaries are becoming more and more meaningless, to appreciate that the question of how to maintain the distinctiveness of every national language (especially those of the Third World countries) is one that is inextricably bound up with the future of the human race.90 The efforts by contemporary intellectuals to resist overt Westernization through constructing national culture and language arguably have some parallels to the wartime preoccupation with the question of national forms. In both cases, the desire to recover cultural traditions embedded in the collective memory was elicited in reaction to national trauma and the “tearing” of collective memory. However, whereas wartime writers and artists sought to produce national culture in an attempt to ward off the threat of Japanese colonial expansion, their contemporary equivalents have viewed their formal experiments as part of an effort to keep the ubiq- uitous influence of globalization at bay. Seeking to produce new cultural forms with links to both traditional aesthetics and Republican-era art and literature, contemporary writers and artists have thus found inspiration in Fei Ming and Wang Zengqi’s combining of classical language and the modern vernacular; Fei Mu’s employment of landscape painting aesthet- ics; Mu Dan’s imagistic verse; and wartime artists’ experiments with the sinicized cartoon. As China continues to develop at an ever faster pace, it has yet to be seen how wartime modernism will be reinterpreted and appropriated in the construction of ever newer (post)modernisms.

90 Li Tuo, “The New Vitality of Modern Chinese,” p. 72.

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Index

Page numbers in italic-face refer to illustrations. Page numbers in bold-face indicate poetry presented in Mandarin that is translated into English. A forward slash “/” (as in 117/ 119–122) indicates a continuing discussion interrupted by non-associated illustrations.

A Long (1907–67), 256n137 Beijing School (jing pai) neo- Nanjing Blood Sacrifice (Nanjing xueji), traditionalists, 18, 128 23–24 and blank space, 98, 100, 101 aesthetics: and collective identity, 21–23 and jiuping xinjiu (“new wine into old and “expressing the meaning” (xieyi), bottles”), 11–14 95, 184 of liminality, 8, 10, 29, 174–175, and Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town, 200–205, 208–211, 209f4.10, 211–212 173, 205–208, 286 of mutual implication/mediation and harmony (he), 121, 122, 164 (Fei Ming), 128, 219–220, 242–243, Mu Dan’s use of, 48 248–250 Ah Cheng (1949–), 285, 296 and transcendence, 121–122, 132–134, Ai Qing (1910–96), 272 139 essay aesthetic promoted by, 33–34 of traumatized visuality, 202, 203–204 and popular poetry admired by of unrestrained roaming (you), 205–206 intellectuals at Lianda, 16, 36, 44 See also essay or prose aesthetic and Whitman, 44 (sanwen mei); modern aesthetics; Ai Wu (1904–92): national forms; Western modernism Native Land (Guxiang), 261 aesthetics of desolation (huangliang), All-China Resistance Association of 286–287, 295 Writers and Artists (Zhonghua quanguo and contemporary artists, 295 wenyijie kangdixiehui), 5, 13–14 and equivocal contrasts (cenci duizhao), American romanticism: 29, 169, 174–175, 210–216 disillusionment with, 20, 31 and Jia Zhangke, Cry me a River and Mu Dan, 48–49 (Heshang de aiqing), 286 Walt Whitman (1819–1982), 43–45, and liminality, 2–4, 10, 29, 169, 211 47–49, 65, 273 See also Chang, Eileen (1920–95) See also poetry aesthetics of dissolution: An Lushan Rebellion (An Shi zhi luan), and aesthetic looseness, 8, 26, 30, 207–208, 230, 230–231n52, 285 139–140, 220 Anderson, Marston, 24, 25, 247–248 “aesthetics of the shard”, 147, 212, 295 artistic production: and displacement, 81 self-referentially presented by Ye and Fei Ming’s focus on “reality” Qianyu, 122 (xianshi), 246–251 Auden, W.H. (1907–73), 45–47, 48, 56 and Fei Mu’s cinematography, 174, 185, autobiography: 200–205, 200–201f4.6–4.8, 205f4.9, and distanced self-narration, 252, 256 208–211, 209f4.10, 214–215 and Fei Ming, 23, 217–264passim iconoclastic aesthetics (Virginia Woolf), Feng Zhi: 165–166 “Recollections of Kunming”, 230–231 and postmodernism, 268 Wu Zixu, 131n20, 230–231, 235 and postsocialism, 290 and the “fusion of scene and emotion”, See also fragmentation 103 aesthetics (traditional): and voiceover narration, 197 314 index

Ye Qianyu: The Book of Songs (Shijing), 108, 122, 197, A Detailed Account of Life’s 248 Transformations: A Record of the boudoir poetry (gui yuan shi), 196–199 Passing Years (Xixu cangsang ji Buddhism: liunian), 79, 93 “Comprehensive Scene within Four self-referential cartoon-sketches, 21, Meters” (Ye Qianyu), 117/119–122, 93, 97, 101–106, 109–111, 117–118, 120f2.29 120f2.29, 275–278, 275ff6.1–6.2, and emptiness, 133–134, 243 277f6.3 and Fei Ming’s eclectic combination “In a Miao Village in Guizhou” of diverse ideologies, 18, 29, 219, (Zai Guizhou Miaoxiang), 81, 92, 226–227, 236, 243, 290 109–111, 110f2.18, 116, 122 and the “Fifth Patriarch Temple” (Fei See also historicization of subjectivity; Ming), 259–261 historiography; interiority; memory; Huangmei Buddhist sites, 260 self Indian Buddhist ritual dance, 113–116, 319–321ff2.22–2.25 Ba Jin (1904–2005): and national consciousness, 227, 253 Cold Nights (Han ye), 171 peace and harmony, 120–122, 140 Family (Jia), 177–178 and spiritual cultivation (jiang xiuxing), and the maturation of Chinese fiction, 236 234 Wang Zengqi’s displacement to a on wartime propaganda writing monastery, 127, 139, 280 frustrations, 228 and William Empson, 46n44 Bakhtin, Mikhail (1895–1975), 233 and Ye Qianyu’s hybrid-style, 28, Baudelaire, Charles (1821–67): 112–113, 123 ambivalence of intellectuals toward, and Zhang Daqian, 121 55, 56 See also Dunhuang murals (Mogao and Fei Ming, 241, 242, 243 Caves) on the flâneur, 52 and He Qifang’s “Clouds” (Yun), 54–55 Cai Chusheng (1906–68): and Mu Dan, 146 death of, 216 See also poetry New Woman (Xin nüxing), 191, 192 Baudrillard, Jean, 292 Song of the Fisherman (Yuguang qu), Bazin, Andre, 204 181 Bei Dao (Zhao Zhenkai, 1949–), 269–270, Spring River Flows East (Yi jiang 271 chunshui xiang dong liu), 170, Beijing Film Academy, 283 187–190, 191, 192, 203, 214 Beijing Literature and Art (Beijing wenyi), Camel Grass (Luotuo cao), 239 278 Cartoon Propaganda Corps. See National Beijing School (jingpai): Salvation Cartoon Propaganda Corps and neo-traditionalism, 18, 128, 243, ( Jiuwang manhua xuanchuan dui) 244, 245 cartoons and cartooning: Shanghai modernists (haipai) manmu (cartoons and woodblock), 5, contrasted with, 18 79, 80, 84, 85f2.4, 86, 315f2.5 See also Fei Ming; neo-traditionalism; National Salvation Cartoon Propaganda Wang Zengqi; Zhou Zuoren Corps ( Jiuwang manhua xuanchuan Bian Zhilin (1910–): dui), 80f2.1–2.2, 82–84, 83f2.3, 91, mentioned, 128, 254, 289 244 and Rilke, 130–131 “sketch-cartoons”, 92–106, 109–111, blank space (kongbai): 116–122 and imagination in traditional Western cartoons and cartooning, 80, aesthetics, 98, 100, 101, 104, 246 84, 86–87, 89–90, 123, 274 and the imagination/mystery of death, See also sinicized cartoons 241 (Zhongguohua manhua); Ye Qianyu index 315

(1907–96); Ye Qianyu (1907–96), art progressive ideas in films during latter works and illustrations years of, 188, 191 censorship: and uncertainty about the future, 142, during the Japanese occupation, 169 142, 165 of films by the Nationalist government, and “victory as defeat”, 171, 186–192 188 wartime propaganda films, 191 and marketization, 187 Chinese Communist Party (CCP): of Nanjing University history Anti-Rightist campaign of, 268, 278 department publications, 6 Fei Mu denounced by, 173 of research on wartime culture outside film history and progressive postwar of Yan’an, 6 films, 188 of Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu), harsh treatment of wartime film 172–173 directors, 216 “yellow-covered books” (huangpi shu) of “liberated region” (jiefang qu) modern Western literature, 269 controlled by, 5 Chakravarty, Amiya, 93n34 and Mao Dun, 232, 233 Chan, Andrew, “Interview with Jia Shi Dongshan denounced by, 216 Zhangke”, 286 Ye Qianyu’s imprisonment during the Chang, Eileen (1920–95), 234, 265, 289 Cultural Revolution, 274 “aesthetics of liminality” of, 29, 174–175, See also Mao Zedong (1893–1976) 211 Chinese modernism: critique of H.G. Wells’s Outline of and (post)modernity, 265–268, 290–297 History, 2, 20, 262 prewar and wartime periods compared, cross-generic formal experimentation 4, 17–26 of, 1–2 and the semi-colonial cities of Shanghai and distanced self-narration, 256 and Beijing, 3–4 and plot structure, 125, 128 and “translingual” modernity, 3–4 on tragedy and realism, 169 See also Fei Ming; Mu Dan; wartime See also aesthetics of desolation modernism; Western modernism (huangliang) Chinese universities. See universities Changsha: Chongqing: and the Cartoon Propaganda Corps, 91 as a cultural city, 7, 91 National Changsha Temporary as a wartime capital, 5 University Hunan, 38f1.3 and “After Exhaustive Bombing” (Pilao Chekhov, Anton, 127, 128 hongzha zhi hou, Ye Qianyu), 97–99, Chen Duxiu (1879–1942), 38 97f2.11 Chen Jianjun, 287–288 Nationalist film studios relocated to, Chen Liting (1910–), Distant Love (Yaoyuan 169 de ai), 171, 188 Poetry Recitation Team (Shige langsong Cheng Jihua (Marxist critic), 173, 215 dui), 32 Chengdu: Wartime Chongqing (Zhanshi and Feng Zhi’s focus on Du Fu’s Chongqing, Ye Qianyu), 93–94, “Chengdu Fu”, 230–231n52 94f2.9, 95–97, 96f2.10, 97–99, 97f2.11, Ye Qianyu’s stay in, 81, 113, 117 99–100, 100f2.12 Cheung, Dominic, 63n88, 64 See also Nationalist government; China Poetry Forum (Zhongguo shitan), Nationalist interior 32–33 cities: China Poetry Society (Zhongguo shige city walls: hui), 53–54 and exile/separation, 213, 214 Chinese Civil War (1945–49): in ruins, 172f4.1, 174, 204–205, and essay-like novels, 228 207–209, 212, 214–215 and the evolution of Chinese and corrupt Westernized modernity, 181 modernism, 27, 29–30, 191, 263 as fishnets, places of entrapment, 21, and hope in the future with the coming 40n30, 42–43, 48, 66, 105 revolution, 188, 257 See also displacement; rural return 316 index

Cohn, Dorrit, 220, 252 and wartime fiction, 1–4 commodification and consumption. See and wartime modernism, 1–2, 4–5, 11–12 marketization with Western psychoanalysis and communication: Eastern thought, 138–140, 167 poetic communication between soul and Ye Qianyu’s cartooning, 15, 89–91, mates (zhiji), 197–198 93–94, 94–95, 97, 110 promotion of the war effort, 33–34, 84, See also fragmentation; intertextuality; 89, 91–92 Western cultural forms See also national forms Crow, Carl (1884–1945), 182–183 Confucian thought: Cultural Revolution: and cyclical concepts of history, 248 114n60, 216, 264–265, 269, 272, and Fei Ming’s eclectic combination 274–276, 275f6.1, 281, 284, 296 of diverse ideologies, 18, 29, 219, 225–227, 290 Dai Wangshu (1905–50): and Fei Mu’s films, 181–183 “The Nightwalker” (Ye xingzhe), 51 Confucius (Kong fuzi), 181–182, 186, Daoism: 323f4.4 and Fei Ming’s eclectic combination and Feng Zhi, Wu Zizu, 230 of diverse ideologies, 18, 29, 219, and the “modern sage” (modeng 226–227, 243, 290 shengren), 180, 215 idea of fish swimming in open water and Neo-Confucianism, 183 without being caught in the “net” of and postwar film, 187–188 the world, 43 and truth and reason (daoli), 236 Immortal Li, 71n101, 75 and Wang Zengqi, 149, 149n88 “non-action” wuwei as a counter to contemporary avant-garde writers, and Western militarism, 20, 137, 226 (post)modernity, 295–297 and Wang Zengqi, 20, 129, 133, 137–140, Covarrubias, Miguel (1904–57, Mexican 142, 167, 226 painter and caricaturist), 89 Zhuangzi, 128, 132–133, 243 creative process: Daruvala, Susan, 196, 239 Orphic myth as metaphor for, 62–63 Day, Steven, 8, 15, 229, 230, 255 See also metafiction desolation. See aesthetics of desolation Crescent Moon Society (xinyue she), 244, Ding Cong (1916–2009), 15, 91, 276 245 Ding Ling (1904–86), 25, 234, 235 Crespi, John, 44, 56, 87 The Sun Shines on the Sanggan River cross-generic formal experimentation: (Taiyang zhao zai Sangganhe shang), and contemporary roots-seeking 235 authors, 295 See also May Fourth writers and Fei Ming’s novels, 219, 220–221, disembodiment: 228–229, 263 and the floating indeterminacy of and Fei Mu’s cinematography, 174–175, traveling, 160, 162 198–199, 205–206, 209–211, 214–215 and the recitation of Li Bai’s poem in Mu Dan’s regulated verse and free Sill Life, 293–294 verse, 97, 228 and weary, aimlessly walking and “national painting”, 109 individuals, 51 and popularization of the war effort, displacement, 30, 78, 95, 125, 169 13–17 as a heroic journey, 131, 134, 137–140 and postwar films, 189, 210 and fragmentation of cultural centers, and Rilke, 130 5–6, 8, 10, 15 and Wang Zengqi’s blending: of intellectuals: of classical and colloquial Chinese, Fei Ming, 27, 218, 261–262 140–147, 149–150, 152, 280 Feng Zhi, 131n20, 230–231, 235 of Western psychoanalysis and Mu Dan, 36–42, 56, 78 Eastern thought, 128, 129, 136–140, Wang Zhangqi, 127, 139, 158 167, 228 Ye Qianyu, 80–81, 95 index 317

and the interplay between collectivism either/or binarism of nationalist discourse, and individualism, 25–26, 47–49, 6–10 65–66, 102, 139, 211–212 broken down by Ye’s artwork, 123 relocation of Lianda to Kunming, 5, Eliot, T.S. (1819–90), 66 37–39ff1.2–1.3, 37–49passim Empson, William (1906–84), 46, 66 and ruralization, 21–22, 42–49, 54–56, entrapment: 261–262 in air-raid shelters: separation of wives and husbands: Mu Dan’s “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Spring River Flows East (Cai Chusheng Shelter”, 58–61, 64–67 and Zheng Junli), 187–190 cities as fishnets, 21, 40n30, 42–43, 48, Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu), 178, 66, 105 179f4.3, 193 by colonialism, 297 and shifting narrative perspectives, conveyed by Fei Mu’s camera angle, 137–138 199–200, 200–201ff4.6–4.8 and the struggles of the common hope for the future in the face of, people, 158 67–68, 76–78 and the Three Gorges Dam project, 285 Escher, Maurits Cornelius (1898–1972), See also exile literature; ruralization “Drawing Hands”, 117, 119f2.28 distanced self-narration, 146–147, 251–257 essay or prose aesthetic (sanwen mei), Dream of the Red Chamber (Honglou 33 meng), 163, 203, 276 and disillusionment with wartime dreams and dreaming: heroics, 228 and boudoir poetry (gui yuan shi), essayization (sanwenhua) of poetry, 196–197, 198 12–13, 32 and Fei Ming, 157, 237, 241–242, 243 and Fei Ming’s cross-generic style, 219, and the long take, 202 220–221, 228–229, 263, 263 Ye Qianyu, Ten Years of an Absurd of fiction, 126, 128, 135–136, 229–231, Dream, 275, 275f6.1 280–281, 282 Zhuangzi’s “Dream of the Butterfly”, Ming dynasty essay, 148–149 132–133, 133n34 prosification (sanwenhua), 12–13, 32 Du Fu (712–70): satirical essays (zawen, “miscellaneous “Birds are still whiter against river’s essay”), 73 sapphire” (jiang bi niao yu bai), and Su Shi, 135–136 143–144 See also narrative structure and Fei Ming, 264 evidential studies (kaozhengxue): and Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town, and Fei Ming, 222, 239, 243, 259 207–208, 212, 214, 285 and Hu Shi (1891–1962), 259 and Feng Zhi, 230 See also historiography “Spring Prospect” (Chun wang), exile literature: 207–208, 212, 214 associated with Hunan, 156 and Wang Zengqi, 128, 143–144, 150 and Feng Zhi, Wu Zixu, 131n20, Duanmu Hongliang (1912–96), 128, 234, 230–231, 235 254, 261 Li Bai, “Leaving Baidi Town in the Early Dunhuang murals (Mogao Caves): Morning” (Zao fa Baidi cheng), 285, Ye Qianyu’s appropriation of elements 293–294 of, 16–17, 18, 28, 81, 111–116 Su Shi, “A Spring Scene” (Chun jing), Zhang Daqian’s copies (linmo) of, 16, 81, 212–213 111–112, 114–115, 316–317ff2.19–20 Yue Fei: “River Runs Red” (Man jiang hong), Eight Thousand Miles of Clouds and Moon 189–190 (Baqian lilu yun he yue, Shi Dongshan See also displacement; native-soil [1904–67]), 170, 171, 187, 188, 189, 190, (xiangtu) literature; walkers and 203 wanderers 318 index

Fei Ming (Feng Wenbing, 1901–67): and evidential studies and aesthetics of mutual implication, (kaozhengxue), 222, 239, 243 128, 219–220, 242–243, 248–250 lack of formal ending, 217, 236 autobiography: Biography of Mr. Neverwas (Moxuyou and “Essay” (Sanwen), 217, 237–238, xiansheng zhuan): 250 as autobiographical fiction, and “Fifth Patriarch Temple” 217–218, 238, 252, 261 (Wuzu si), 258–260 Bridge (Qiao), 218, 219, 241, 242, 243, contemporary critical response to 261 writing by, 246–247, 287–290 short story collections: eclectic combination of diverse Date (Zao), 218 ideologies (Buddhism, Confucianism, Peach Garden (Taoyuan), 155, 218 Daoism, and Marxism), 18, 29, 219, Tales of a Bamboo Grove (Zhulin de 226–227, 236, 243, 290 gushi), 155, 155, 157, 218, 237, 241, and the emergence of Chinese 261 postmodernism, 18, 267, 287–290, Fei Mu (1906–51) 295, 297 and the aesthetic of unrestrained and the “Fifth Patriarch Temple”, roaming (you), 205–206 259–261 Dragon Horse Films (Longma dianying) and Huangmei: co-founded by, 215 as a fictional setting, 217–218, and Du Fu, 207–208, 212, 214 223, 238, 243–244, 247, 248, and “Eastern Cinema”, 173, 283 258–259 and equivocal contrasts (cenci duizhao), elementary school teaching in, 218, 29, 169, 174–175, 210–216 238 and film noir, 174, 185, 200–205, and “literature as the embodiment of 200–201f4.6–4.8, 205f4.9, 209, 211, moral instruction” (wen yi zai dao), 214–215 224–227 impact on other directors, 173, 173, and “literature, history, and philosophy 283–287 are not to be separated” (wen shi zhe and Li Tianji’s filmscript, 21, 29, bufen jia), 226 178–179, 212, 214 and Lu Xun, 222 and long-take cinematography, 29, 174, and native-soil fiction, 288, 295 185, 200, 202–207, 205f4.9, 209, 210, radicalization of, 23, 29, 219, 227, 246, 262 257, 290 and Lu Xun, 176–178 and “random jottings” (biji), 219, 250 and national cinema, 175, 184, 283, 284, and realism, 21, 23, 218–219, 221, 221, 287 225, 248–249, 288–289 and national painting, 174, 184, 207–208 “talks on poetry” (shihua), 29 and native-soil fiction, 212, 295 and Wang Zengqi, 148, 149 and Su Shi, 29, 212, 213, 214 See also Beijing School (jingpai); and traditional drama, 183–184, 210 Hegel, G.W.F. (Hegelian philosophy); use of voiceover narration, 174, 193, historicization of subjectivity; 195–199, 200, 211 historiography See also aesthetics of desolation essays: (huangliang) Discussions with Youth on Lu Xun dramas directed by: (Gen qingnian tan Lu Xun), 264 Dream of Plum Blossoms (Meihua “Essay” (Sanwen), 217, 237–238, 250 meng), 183 “Fifth Patriarch Temple” (Wuzu si), The Fragrant Concubine (Xiang fei), 183 258–260 Six Chapters from a Floating life novels: (Fusheng liuji), 183 After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane essays: (Moxuyou xiansheng zuo feiji “A Small Problem in Sea of Fragrant yihou): Snow-The Use of ‘Flashback’ and index 319

‘Suspense’” (Xiangxuehai zhong and jiuping xinjiu (“new wine into old de yige xiao wenti-“Daoxufa” yu bottles”), 11–14 “xuanxiang” de zuoyong), 185 and the massification of art, 14–15 “Confucius’s Life and Times” (Kongzi and Ye Qianyu’s “national painting”, 81, ji qi shidai), 183 92, 108–113, 110f2.18, 115, 122, 316f2.17, “Director, Scriptwriter-Written for 318f2.21, 318f2.21 Yang Ji” (Daoyan juzuozhe-Xie gei See also massification of art; national Yang Ji), 174n19 forms (minzu xingshi); native-soil “The Challenge of Turning Traditional (xiangtu) literature Opera into Film” (Zhongguo jiuju Fong, Grace S., 196 de dianyinghua wenti), 184 fragmentation: films directed by: and aesthetic forms, 32 Blood on Wolf Mountain (Langshan “aesthetics of the shard”, 147, 212, 295 diexue ji), 9, 182 and artistic coherence amid the Confucius (Kong fuzi), 182, 323f4.4 “incomprehensible cacophony” of Filial Piety (Tianlun), 180–182 reality, 22, 66, 290 Life (Rensheng), 181 and broken city walls, 172, 172f4.1, Majestic Mountains and Rivers (Jinxiu 204–205, 205f4.9, 207–209 jiangshan), 215 and chasm between tradition and Murder in the Oratory (Zhanjing modernity, 212, 284 tang), 184 and Collection of Chance Encounters Night in the City (Chengshi zhi ye), 181 (Wang Zengqi), 126–127 Regret that Surpasses Life and Death of contemporary life, 290–295 (Shengsi hen), 184, 324f4.5 of cultural centers during the war Sea of Fragrant Snow (Xiangxuehai period, 5–6, 8, 10, 15 zhong), 185 “divided self ” (under colonialism), Spring in a Small Town (Xiaocheng 110–111, 193, 220f2.18, 254, 277–278, zhi chun), 4, 20, 21, 171–179, 172f4.1, 277f6.3, 325f6.4 179f4.2, 179f4.3, 185–186, 187, and isolation, 175–176, 322f4.2 192–199, 201f4.6–4.8, 202–203, and Mu Dan’s poetry, 32, 64, 67, 77 205f4.9, 209f4.10, 210–215, 261, separation of wives and husbands: 283–287, 322f4.2 Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu), See also Spring in a Small Town 177–178, 179f4.3, 187 (Xiaocheng zhi chun, Fei Mu) and short forms of writing, 234–235 Feng Ruolan, 119–121 See also aesthetics of dissolution; Feng Zhi (1905–93), 234 cross-generic formal Collection of Sonnets (Shisi hang ji), 62 experimentation; displacement; mentioned, 265, 289 historical discontinuity “On the Lessons of History” (Lun lishi Freud, Sigmund (1856–1953) and de jiaoxun), 233 Freudian analysis, 128, 129, 138–140, and Rilke, 62–64, 66, 131n20 167, 195 “We Came Outside the City” (Women Fu, Poshek, 7–8 lai dao jiao wai), 58 fusion of scene and emotion (qingjing Wu Zixu, 62n87, 131n20, 230–231, 235 jiaorong), 47, 103 See also Lianda (Xinan Lianda, Southwest Associated University, Gao, Minglu, 295 Kunming) Gaoyo: Feng Zikai (1898–1975), 90, 98–99, 99, 102 See also Nationalist interior Feuerwerker, Yi-tsi Mei, 235, 255, 282 Gaoyou: the flâneur, 52–53, 55 and Wang Zengqi, 21, 126–127, 151, The Flower Drum (Da huagu), 158 152–153, 155–157, 165–166, 279f6.5 folk forms: generic hybridity. See cross-generic formal Chinese Folk Art Research Association, experimentation 278 Gide, André, 127, 128 320 index

The Goddess (Shennü): women as cultural fighters (wenhua by Wu Yonggang, 191–192, 203, 283 zhanshi), 190–191 Gu Jiegang (1893–1980)., 13–14 See also patriotic resistance Gu Kaizhi (345–406), 98 heroic narratives: Guang Yongji (1916–), 11–12 disillusionment with, 9, 10–12, 20, 27, Gui Youguang (1506–71): 132, 167, 228 and Wang Zengqi, 148–149 historical discontinuity: Guilin, 7, 15, 91, 101 and ideological tensions, 232–233 See also Nationalist interior imaged by broken city walls, 172, Guizhou, 107 172f4.1, 174, 204–205, 207–209 Gunn, Edward, 8, 17, 20, 183–184, 240–241 and sites of memory (lieux de mémoire), Guo Moruo (1892–1978), 38, 53, 53, 79 260–262 and traumatic memory, 198 Halbwachs, Maurice, 20 See also memory Han Shaogong (1953–), 281 historicization of subjectivity, 227, Han Yu (768–824): 275ff6.1–6.2, 275 “Ancient Meaning” (Gu yi), 120–121, 122 and longer fiction, 234 essays of, 248 and Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane harmony (he): (Fei Ming), 221, 227 artistic coherence amid the and Ye Qianyu, 275ff6.1–6.2, 275 “incomprehensible cacophony” of See also autobiography; Fei Ming reality, 22, 66, 290 historiography: as a homophone for lotus (he), 119–122, and Confucian philosophy, 225, 248 120f2.29 and Fei Ming: and peace, 121, 122 Biography of Mr. Neverwas as See also music and musicality “history” (lishi), 218 He Qifang (1912–77), 16, 36, 54–55, 56, 245 and Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane “Clouds” (Yun), 54–55 (Fei Ming), 221, 227 Hegel, G.W.F. (Hegelian philosophy): and Feng Zhi’s Wu Zixu, 131n20, and Fei Ming’s After Mr. Neverwas Rides 230–231, 235 a Plane, 220, 224, 253–254 and fiction writing, 128, 135–136, and May Fourth writers, 154–155 229–236, 229–232, 280–281 See also Fei Ming Hegelian philosophy, 154–155, 220, 224, heroes and heroism: 253–254 and Confucian heroes in Fei Mu’s films regional history in Fei Ming’s fiction, 248 (Zilu, Confucius, Sun Liting), 180–181, See also autobiography; evidential 182, 182, 186, 323f4.4 studies (kaozhengxue); Fei Ming and fictional forms, 11–13 (Feng Wenbing, 1901–67) knight-errantry/swashbuckling tales, Hitchcock, Alfred (1899–1980), 205 17–18, 21 Hollis, C. Carroll, 44 knight on a psychological quest Hong Kong Film Association, 173 (“Revenge”, Wang Zengqi), 129–140 Hsia, C.T., 6 and the “modern sage” (modeng Hu Feng (1902–85), 8n20, 84 shengren), 180, 215 Hu Kao (1912–94), 79, 100–101, 274 the ordinary man in Spring in a Small Hu Shi (1891–1962): Town (Fei Mu), 178, 186 An Outline of Chinese Philosophy and “realistic heroes” (xianshi de (Zhongguo zhexue dagang), 183 yingxiong), 82, 83f2.3, 84, 85f2.4, 89, and evidential study (kaozhengxue), 259 90f2.8, 93–94, 94f2.9 and new vernacular poetry (xin shi), 53 victimization contrasted with, 6–7n15, Huang Ailing (Hong Kong film critic), 176, 86, 176–178, 191, 244, 315f2.5 283 “Wertherian” hero in May Fourth Huang Mao (1917–), 90–91 fiction, 53 Huang, Martin, 197n88 index 321

Huang, Nicole, 211, 256 anti-Japanese photographs, 91–92 Huangmei: anti-Japanese student movements, 238 as a setting of Fei Ming’s fiction, 149, invasion of Hong Kong, 101, 103 157, 217–218, 223, 238, 243–244, 247, and its effect on male confidence/ 248, 258–259 masculinity, 186–187 destruction of Buddhist sites in, 260 Japanese bombing, 56, 57, 63, 218, 222, Fifth Patriarch Temple in, 257, 259, 223, 257 260–261 Japanese censors, 169 humor. See satire/humor Japanese control of film facilities, 169 Hung, Chang-tai, 17n48, 22 and reclamation by the Nationalist husbands. See wives and husbands government, 170 Huters, Theodore, 148 Japanese-occupied region (lunxian qu), 5 interiority: Nanjing attacked by, 24 and communication between soul rape committed by Japanese troops, mates (zhiji), 197–198 223 and “conveying the spirit” (chuan shen) representation: of painted subjects, 98–99 of Japanese aggression, 85 and Freudian psychology, 129, 138–139, of Japanese soldiers, 103 195 Shinobazu Pond in Ueno Park, 121 and jingjie (poetic scene): See also War of Resistance against Japan portrayed by Fei Mu, 209 (1945–49) portrayed by Mu Dan, 49, 64–65, Jia Zhangke (1970–): 273 and Fei Mu, 173, 286 portrayed by Wang Wei, 99 and Li Bai’s poem “Leaving Baidi Town portrayed by Ye Qianyu, 97f2.11, in the Early Morning” (Zao fa Baidi 98–101, 100f2.12, 102–103, 103f2.13 cheng), 285, 293–294 and voiceover narration, 174, 193, Still Life (Sanxia haoren), 285–286, 295 195–199, 200, 211 The World (Shijie), 291–293 and Woolf’s stream-of-consciousness jingjie (poetic scene), 49, 64–65, 209 narration, 163–164 jiuping xinjiu (“new wine into old bottles”), See also autobiography; self; spirit; 11–14 stream-of-consciousness narration Jones, Andrew, 193, 194, 234–235 (yishi liu) Journey to the West (Xiyou ji), 276 intertextuality: Journey to the West (Xiyou manji, Zhang and Fei Ming, 222 Guangyu), 91 and Fei Mu: Joyce, James, 128, 135, 135 Spring in a Small Town, 207–208, July School, 8n20, 23 212 and Mu Shiying’s fiction, 24 Kinkley, Jeffrey, 132n27, 138n55, 149n88, and Ye Qianyu’s “Comprehensive Scene 282 within Four Meters,” 119–122, Kraicer, Shelly, 284, 293, 294n82 120f2.29 Kunming: See also cross-generic formal in Wang Zengqi’s fiction, 129, 279 experimentation See also Lianda; Nationalist interior Israel, John, 132, 244 landscape painting: Jaffee, Valerie, 292 and Fei Mu’s cinematography, 185, Japan: 285–286 anti-Japanese cartoons, 79 and Jia Zhangke’s cinematography, 285 anti-Japanese films: and Ye Qianyu, 274 Blood on Wolf Mountain (Langshan See also nature diexue ji, Fei Mu), 9, 182 language: Mulan Joins the Army (Mulan congjun emphasizing the presentness of the by Bu Wancang), 191 past, 134, 153, 194 322 index

heavy use of pronouns, 65, 135, 139–140, Liu Xie (465–520): 280, 296 The Literary Mind and the Carving of and Wang Zengqi, 134, 143–146, 153 Dragons (Wenxin diaolong), 47–48 See also narrative voice; ou hua Lu Ling (1923–94), 128, 148, 231, 234, 235 (Westernization); vernacular Children of the Rich (Caizhu di modernization ernümen), 228, 231–232, 236 Lao She (1899–1966), 9, 11, 13, 234, 234, and fictionalized history, 233 295 Tolstoyean narration, 225, 228, 231–232, Laughlin, Charles, 102, 105–106 233, 254, 255 Lee, Leo, 53, 73, 76 Lu Xun (1881–1936): Leung Ping-kwan, 16, 74 and Fei Ming, 222 Li Bai (701–62): Discussions with Youth on Lu Xun “Leaving Baidi Town in the Early (Gen qingnian tan Lu Xun), 264 Morning” (Zao fa Baidi cheng), 285, and Fei Mu, 176–178, 192 293–294 “loner versus the crowd” narrative Li, Cheuk-to, 199, 210 paradigm of, 25, 76–77, 151, 190–191 Li Guangtian (1906–68), 12–13, 32 “Madman’s Diary” (Kuangren riji), Li, Jie, 207–208, 208n112, 285, 293 20n58, 73 Li Jinfa (1900–76): and Mu Dan, 28, 70, 73, 77 “Sagesse”, 51, 271 “My Native Land” (Guxiang), 155–156 Li Shangyin (812–58), 197, 207n108 “New Year’s Sacrifice” (Zhufu), 155–156 Li Tianji (1921–95), 21, 29, 175–179, “Preface to Call to Arms” (Nahan 212–214 xuyan), 76, 176 Li Tuo, 30, 135, 265, 265–266n2, 280, satirical essays (zawen, “miscellaneous 282–283, 295–297 essay”), 73 Li Yu (937–78, Southern Tang dynasty shorter fictional forms preferred by, emperor), 189–190 234–235 Li Yu (1611–80, exemplary essayist), 247 “The True Story of Ah Q” (Ah Q Lianda (Xinan Lianda, Southwest zhengzhuan), 52, 87, 147, 222 Associated University, Kunming): and vernacular modernization, formation of, 5 295–296 intellectual atmosphere of, 48 and Wang Zengqi, 129, 141, 147–148, Literary Gathering (Wenju, Lianda 155 student literary journal), 32 See also May Fourth Movement radicalization of, 132, 244–245 (1915–21) relocation to Kunming of, 5, Lu Xun Arts Institute (Yan’an), 16 37–39ff1.2–1.3, 37–49passim Lu Zhixiang (1910–93), 79 and Yan’an, 16 lyricism: See also Feng Zhi; Kunming; Mu Dan; Fei Mu as the “poet director”, 29, 197, Wang Zengqi 207–208, 212–214 Liang Qichao (1873–1929), 19, 224 fusion of scene and emotion (qingjing Liao Bingxiong (1915–2006), 15, 91 jiaorong), 47, 103 liminality, 8, 10, 174–175, 211–212 “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter” Lin Niantong, 205–207 (Mu Dan), 58–67 Ling Shuhua (1900–90): “lyrical fragrance”, 31, 35 and the emergence of Chinese new lyricism (xin de shuqing) and Mu postmodernism, 18 Dan, 34, 35 Literary Gathering (Wenju, Lianda student old lyricism (jiu de shuqing), 34 literary journal), 32 Song dynasty lyrics (ci), 34, 128 “literature of memory”, 147, 295 “third route for lyricism” (di san tiao Little Toys (Xiao wanyi), 203 shuqing de lu), 34 Liu Chenghen, 283 and Wang qi (lyrical and essay-like Liu Jiegang (1893–1980), 13 style of Wang Zengqi), 128, 135–136, Liu, Kang, 228 280–281 index 323

“We Came Outside the City” (Feng Zhi), masculinity: 58 colonial subjectivity and “hyper- See also poetry masculinity”, 138–139 weak male characters in postwar film, MacKay, Marina, 10 171, 186–188, 190–191 Mao Dun (Shen Yanbing, 1896–1981), See also wives and husbands 232–233, 234, 235–236, 254 massification of art: Eclipse (Shi), 232 and jiuping xinjiu (“new wine into old “Literature and Art for the Masses bottles”), 11–15 and the Use of Traditional Forms” and national forms of cartoon (Dazhonghua yu liyong jiu xingshi), (Zhongguohua manhua), 9, 15, 80–81, 14 84, 90–91 Maple Leaves (Shuangye hong si eryue and Resistance Cartoons (Kangzhan hua), 235–236 manhua), 82–86, 85f2.4, 91, 315f2.5 Midnight (Ziye), 232 See also folk forms; national forms Rainbow (Hong), 232 May Fourth Movement (1915–21): Westernized prose style of, 296 and contemporary Chinese culture, See also May Fourth writers 265–266 Mao wenti (Maoist discourse), 30, 135, 265, focus on science and modernization by, 265–266n2, 295–296 17n49, 251 Mao Zedong (1893–1976): idealism of, 192 and the Cultural Revolution: and Mu Dan’s poetry, 37, 67–73 114n60, 216, 264–265, 269, 272, and postwar film, 191–192 274–276, 275f6.1, 281, 284, 296 and Shi Dongshan, 190–191 Jiang Qing (wife) as a giant chicken, May Fourth writers: 275, 275f6.1 and contemporary Chinese culture, Mao-Era films: 266 and phoniness/lack of realism, modernist rejection of leading 283–284 imperatives of, 24–26, 74, 154, 224, and Mao wenti (Maoist discourse), 30, 237, 249, 251 265, 265–266n2 See also Ding Ling; Lu Xun; Mao Dun; “The Role of the Chinese Communist Shen Congwen Party in the National War” McDougall, Bonnie, 245–246 (Zhongguo gongchandang zai McGrath, Jason, 290, 291 minzu zhanzheng de diwei), 13 McManus, George (1884–1954), Bringing See also Chinese Communist Party up Father, 86–87, 87f2.6 (CCP); Marx, Karl memory: marketization: childhood memories, 229 of the film industry, 180, 187, 294n82 and Fei Ming, 50, 221–222, 258–259, and modernization, 293–294, 294n82 261 Marx, Karl (1818–83) and Marxism: and Fei Mu, 172 and After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane and native-soil fiction, 155–157, 261 (Fei Ming), 243–244 and Wang Zengqi, 21, 126–127, 151, as a Confucian thought for modern 151–157, 152–153, 155–157, 165–166 times, 225–227 and Ye Qianyu, 275F6.2, 275 and Fei Ming’s eclectic combination of collective memory, 20–21, 170, 266–267, diverse ideologies, 29, 219, 226–227, 297–298 290 and Fei Ming, 220, 260–262 and Lord William Empson, 46 and Ye Qianyu, 97–98, 97f2.11, 101, The Communist Manifesto as an 122–123 English-learning text, 245 and flash-forward and flashback filming, See also Mao Zedong; radicalization of 185, 194, 196–197, 205, 284 wartime writers “literature of memory”, 147, 295 324 index

and the presentness of the past, 134, Mu Dan (1918–77): 153, 194 and Auden, W.H., 45–47, 48, 56 and ruins, 178, 186, 194, 198, 201–202 biographical overview, 268–269 and schizophrenia, 257 censorship of his poetry translations, sites of memory (lieux de mémoire), 269 260–262 and the emergence of Chinese traumatic memory: postmodernism, 267, 268–273, 281, and Fei Mu, 20–21, 174, 174, 194–195, 297 198–199, 202, 205, 215, 286, 297–298 Exploration Team (Tanxian dui), 28, 58 See also autobiography; historical literary translations of, 268–270 discontinuity and Lu Xun, 28, 70, 73, 77 metafiction: “Lyric Poem in an Air-Raid Shelter” and contemporary roots-seeking (Fangkongdong li de shuqingshi), authors, 295 58–61, 62–67, 98 and Fei Ming: “May” (Wuyue), 70–72, 103 After Mr. Neverwas Rides a Plane, “1939 Torchlit Procession in Kunming” 243, 250 (Yijiu sanjiu nian huoju hanglie zai Bridge, 242 Kunming), 68–69 The Biography of Mr. Neverwas, oratorical style of, 67, 146 239–241 “Praise” (Zanmei), 32n5, 39, 47, 271–272 and Fei Mu’s voiceover techniques, 174, recitation poetry, 39–40 193, 195–196, 199 and reflexive poetry (chensi shi), 62 and Mu Dan, “Lyric Poem in an Air-raid and Rilke, 62–63, 66 Shelter”, 64 “Song of Wisdom” (Zhihui zhi ge), and Shanghai modernists, 24 272–273 and Wang Zengqi: “The Wanderer” (Liulangren), 49–50 “Chance Encounter”, 164–165 travels to Burma, 39 “Old Lu”, 145–147 “Walking in the Wilderness” (Yuanye “Revenge” (Wang Zengqi), 137, 280 shang zoulu): Ye Qianyu’s self-reflections, 88–89, 95, “fusion of scene and emotion”, 103 99, 109–111, 110f2.18, 122 and nostalgia, 261 See also autobiography; creative oratorical style of, 44–45, 67, 146 process; self and traditional culture, 48–49 Mi, Jiayan, 51 “Walking in the Wilderness”, Part II, militarism: 39, 40–42 Confucian thought as counter to, and Walt Whitman, 43–45, 47–49, 65, 224–227 273 Miller, Tyrus, 10 xiandai shenghuohua (closer to modern misty poetry (menglong shi), 269–271, 296 life), 24 Mo Yan (1955–), 281 Mu Shiying (1912–40), 23–24 modern aesthetics: Mulan Joins the Army (Mulan congjun by and postsocialist culture in China, 30, Bu Wancang), 191 291–295 music and musicality: modernism. See Chinese modernism; and the busker duo in “Chance wartime modernism; Western Encounter” (Wang Zengqi), 163 modernism “Graduation Song” (Biye ge), 192 modernity: harmonizing effect of, 162–163 modernist aspects of boudoir poetry, Lim Giong (1964, composer), 294 198–199 Mu Dan’s aural poetry, 68 and Nationalist discourse, 6–10, 123 painting and music in Wang Zengqi’s modernization: fiction, 136–137 and marketization, 293, 294, 294n82 “rhythmic nature” of Fei Mu’s Mogao Cave murals. See Dunhuang cinematography, 208n112 murals and Shen Congwen, 12, 126 index 325

soundtrack of Love Parade, 66 Fei Ming’s fluid identification with, and the story of Yu Boya and Zhong 259 Ziqi, 198 and vacillating pronouns, 257 and the tune “Butterfly Longs for the “loner versus the crowd” paradigm of Lu Flower” (Die lian hua), 212n123 Xun, 25, 76–77, 151, 190–191 and the tune “Lady Yu” (Yu meiren), and nihilistic self-doubt, 236 190 split narrator/protagonist/writer of Fei See also harmony (he); poetry; regional/ Ming, 253–256 traditional opera storyteller narrator used by Shi Tuo, 254, 255 Nandy, Ashis, 138–139 Tolstoyean narration of Lu Ling, 225, narrative structure: 228, 231–232, 233, 254, 255 and chaotic wartime realities, 1–2, 11–13, voiceover narration, 174, 192–199, 200, 235 211 circular structure of Spring in a Small See also self; stream-of-consciousness Town (Fei Mu), 178 narration (yishi liu) essay-like style: national cinema: and Fei Mu’s long takes, 262 golden age of, 170 essay-like style (san style), 12–13, 128, and national salvation, 175 148, 149, 157, 218, 227–231, 233, 263, reclamation of Japanese film facilities 280–282 after the end of the War of flash-forward and flashback, 185, 194, Resistance, 170 196–197, 205, 284 and Tian Zhuangzhuang’s remake of incomplete/“unfinished” plots, 232–233, Springtime in a Small Town, 284 235–236 national forms: floating and indeterminacy of Wang See also massification of art Zengqi’s “Chance Encounter”, national forms (minzu xingshi): 160–162, 165–167 and collective identity, 21, 24 longer fiction and the “historicization” and national defence/salvation, 4, 8, of subjectivity, 234 11–17, 24 and “random jottings” (biji), 219, 250 vernacular modernization by rejection of heroic themes, 9, 10–12, 20, contemporary intellectuals 27, 132, 167 compared with, 296–297 rejection of well-defined plots, 1–2, 20, See also aesthetics; aesthetics 125, 235–236 (traditional); folk forms; national “scene by scene” development of stories, cinema; national painting under Ye 134, 177 Qianyu (1907–96), art works and short forms associated with illustrations; national salvation; fragmentation and political crisis, sinicized cartoons (Zhongguohua 234–235 manhua) See also essay or prose aesthetic national painting. See under Ye Qianyu (sanwen mei) (1907–96): art works and illustrations narrative voice: national salvation: clapper talker/narrator of Zhao Shuli, and collective identity, 9 255 forsaken love used as political allegory, and “double-voiced discourse” 213–214 (Bakhtin), 233 and globalization, 30, 291–293, 297 fluidity and unstability of, 25–26, 65, and hope for the future, 67–68, 76–78, 137–140, 251–257 93–94, 188, 235, 257 I-narrator: as an intellectual concern, 8–9, 11, 24 on a “balcony at dusk” (Eileen and Lianda university students, Chang), 211 37–38ff1.2–1.3, 37–40 in Collection of Chance Encounters and “literature as the embodiment of (Wang Zengqi), 126–127, 141, 151, moral instruction” (wen yi zai dao), 159, 160, 162, 163, 164 224–227 326 index

and national consciousness, 224–227, Ye Qianyu’s landscape paintings, 274 253–254 and the “lyrical fragrance” of the and national resistance poetry, 54 countryside, 31, 35 and “rescuing grandfather” in family and mental landscapes/poetic vision, dramas, 181 47–49, 99–100, 158 National Salvation Cartoon Propaganda rivers: Corps ( Jiuwang manhua xuanchuan in Mu Dan’s poetry, 42, 71, 74–76 dui), 79, 80f2.1–2.2, 82–84, 83f2.3, 91, on-rushing rivers symbolizing the 244 progressing revolution, 177–178 Nationalist government: in Wang Zengqi’s stories, 157, censors, 188 159–160, 163, 165–166 China Film No. 2 Studio, 188 wind: China Today (Jinri Zhongguo), 92 and the interiority of the poet, 64, Chongqing as the wartime capital of, 5 273 film studios relocated to Chongqing, 169 and Mu Dan’s poetry, 34–35, 58–59, funding of morally engaged films, 188 68–69, 75, 272–273 “great hinterland” (da houfang): the passage of time and lonely Ye Qianyu’s sketches of, 91–98, 169 wanderings, 213–214 and the National Salvation Cartoon and “Revenge” (Mu Dan), 133 Propaganda Corps ( Jiuwang manhua and Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu), xuanchuan dui), 79, 80f2.1–2.2, 214 82–84, 83f2.3, 91, 244 See also landscape painting relocation of wartime universities to neo-traditionalism: the interior, 5, 37–39ff1.2–1.3, and the Creation Society (xinyue she), 37–49passim 14 See also Chongqing as an effort to extend the scope of Nationalist interior: modernity, 17–22, 26 “great hinterland” (da houfang), 5, 169 and evolutionary theory, 19–20, 224 scholarship on the wartime interior, 5–8 and Fei Mu, 183–184, 196–198 See also Chongqing; Gaoyou; Guilin; and Neo-Confucianism, 183 Kunming; Wuhan See also Beijing School (jingpai); rural native-soil (xiangtu) literature: return and Fei Ming, 155, 261 New Woman (Xin nüxing by Cai and Lu Xun, 295 Chusheng), 191, 192 “Record of Peach Blossom Spring” Ni Zhen, 283, 283–284 (Taohua yuanji, Tao Yuanming), 156 Nora, Pierre, 21, 261 and rural return, 21–22, 26 The Songs of Chu (Chuci), 108, 156 ou hua (Westernization): and Wang Zengqi, 21, 126–127, 151, during the Mao years, 296–297 155–157, 165–166, 212 during the post-Mao years, 30, 291–293, See also exile literature; folk forms; rural 297 return resisted by contemporary intellectuals, nature: 296–297 and embodiment, 42–45, 273 and Wang Zengqi’s writing, 135 fusion of scene and emotion (qingjing See also language; Western modernism jiaorong), 47, 103 Ouyang Yuqian (1889–1962), 15–16 landscape: Owen, Stephen, 147 and Fei Ming, 259 and Fei Mu’s cinematography, 185, palace poetry (gongti shi), 197–198 206–208, 214, 285 Pan Liudai (1920–2001), 256 and Jia Zhangke’s cinematography, patriotic resistance: 285 and the shared interests of intellectuals and Mu Dan, 47–48 and popularists, 7–11, 16–17, 21 and Mu Dan, “Walking in the See also heroes and heroism; national Wilderness”, 273 salvation index 327

Pickowicz, Paul, 170, 171n9, 186–187, 189, prostitution, 54, 132, 191–192 191 Proust, Marcel, 127, 136 plot structure. See narrative structure Plunder of Peach and Plum (Taoli jie by Qian Liqun, 7, 234, 246, 268n7, 288–289 Yuan Muzhi), 191–192, 202 Qian Zhongshu (1910–98): poetic ideals: mentioned, 234, 265, 289 and the plight of the common people: Qiu Dongping (1919–82), 256 Auden as exemplary, 46 scholar-officials, 53 radicalization of wartime writers, 23, poetry: 29–30, 132n27, 244–246 boudoir poetry (gui yuan shi), 196–199 and the China Poetry Society (Zhongguo German mysticism, 62 shige hui), 53–54 inscribed poetry and calligraphy, 207, and Fei Ming, 29, 189, 218–219, 285 237–238, 243–244, 254 misty poetry (menglong shi), 269–271, and hope for the future, 177, 188, 296 214–215, 235, 257 national resistance poetry, 54–56 jinbu (“progressive”) left-wing classics, new poetry (xin shi), 13, 53 188 Orphic poetry, 62–64 See also Marx, Karl (1818–83) and palace poetry (gongti shi), 197–198 Marxism “recitation poetry” (langsong shi), realism (xianshizhuyi): 32–33, 39, 44–45, 54–56 and artistic license/imagination, 150, “reflexive poetry” (chensi shi), 62 247–248 sonnet forms, 35, 57–63 and Fei Ming, 246–251 See also American romanticism; and Fei Mu, 179, 204–205, 205f4.9 Baudelaire, Charles (1821–67); and the I-narrator of realist fiction, 25, lyricism; music and musicality 76–77, 190–191 popular culture: naturalness and spontaneity in Spring popular literature (tongsu wenyi), 14 in a Small Town (Fei Mu), 179, regional opera, 15, 158–159 204–205, 204f4.9 popular films: and postmodern “simulacra”, 292 morally engaged films as an antidote realist heroes (xianshi de yingxiong), to, 188 84, 89 popularization of the war: and satire/humor, 92–97, 101 and cross-generic formal expression, and Wang Zengqi, 9, 129, 142, 145, 147, 13–17 150, 153–154 Post-Mao era: and wartime modernism, 22–26 and Mao wenti (Maoist discourse), 30, and Ye Qianyu, 92–93, 96, 98–99, 106 265, 265–266n2 regional/traditional opera, 15, 158–159 and Republican-era modernism, 29–30, and Fei Mu’s long-take cinematography, 265–268, 295–296 210 postmodernity: “model” operas (yang banxi), 278 and modernist longing, 291–295 The Lute (Pipa ji), 190 as a process of interrupted in Wang Zengqi’s fiction, 158–159 modernism, 17–18, 24–26, 268, See also music and musicality 295–297 Ren Jun (1909–2003), 54 propaganda: Resistance Cartoons, 82–86, 85f2.4, 91, Resistance Cartoons, 82–86, 85f2.4, 91, 315f2.5 315f2.5 revolutionary experience: prose aesthetic: and future hopes, 93–94, 188, 235, 257 (sanwen mei), 33 future uncertainty, 178, 191–192, 215, See also essay or prose aesthetic 236 (sanwen mei) See also national salvation; patriotic prosification (sanwenhua), 12–13, 32 resistance 328 index

Rilke, Rainer Maria (1875–1926), 62–63, self: 127, 130–131 bu yao wei ji, yao wei ren, 238 Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguo and colonized subjects, 138–140 yanyi), 276 distanced self-narration, 146–147, roots-seeking: 251–257 and “national painting”, 4, 21, 81, 111–113, and interiority: 115, 123 as a focus of modernist style, 146 and traditional painting models, 117, “loner versus the crowd” narrative 122–123 paradigm of Lu Xun, 25, 76–77, 151, “roots-seeking” (xungen) authors: 190–191 Ah Cheng (1949–), 285, 296 as Other, 110–111, 193, 220f2.18, 254, Mo Yan (1955–), 281 277–278, 277f6.3, 325f6.4 and native-soil literature, 295 and isolation, 175–176, 322f4.2 Wang Anyi, 281, 294 and the Other: and “Wang style” (Wang qi), 281 and the nation/common people and Wang Zengqi, 281–283 (redefinition of the author/ See also Jia Zhangke (1970–) audience relationship), 26, 123, Rouzer, Paul, 197 150–151, 159, 255–256 rural return: and psychological struggle, 137–140 and collective identity, 21–23, 21, and the remembered past, 152 122–123 and spiritual self-cultivation, 47–48, and “My Native Land” (Lu Xun), 236 155–156 See also interiority; metafiction; and “native-soil” (xiangtu) literature, narrative voice; I-narrator 21–22, 26 Sha Ding (1904–92), 234, 261 and Tao Yuanming (365–427), 21, Shakespeare, William, 128, 183, 243 42–43, 128, 156, 248 Shanghai: and Walt Whitman, 43–45, 47–49, 65, cartoonists in, 87–89 273 Shanghai printing presses relocated to and Wang Zengqi, 21, 126–127, 151, Wuhan, 82, 84 152–153, 155–157, 165–166 Shanghai modernists (haipai): and Ye Qianyu, 274–275 Beijing School (jingpai) contrasted See also native-soil (xiangtu) literature; with, 18 neo-traditionalism; walkers and and cartoonists’ cultural activities, 79 wanderers and cultural studies in the Western ruralization: academy, 6 and popular culture, 22 fantastic aspects of modernity See also displacement emphasized by, 23–24 and Westernization, 18 sanwenhua. See essay or prose aesthetic Shanghai women writers, 256 (sanwen mei) See also Chinese modernism satire/humor: Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 43, 269 black humor in Fei Mu’s Spring in a Shen Congwen (1902–88): Small Town, 198 and the essayization (sanwenhua) of and Mao Dun’s poetry, 73 poetry, 32, 33, 282 and optimism, 92–97, 101 hierarchy of art forms, 12 satirical essays (zawen, “miscellaneous impact on Wang Zengqi, 127, 138, 142, essay”), 28, 73 144, 147, 148 and “The True Story of Ah Q” (Ah Q Long River (Chang he), 236, 261 zhengzhuan, Lu Xun), 222 mentioned, 128, 254, 265, 289, 295 and Ye Qianyu’s cartoons, 86–87, 93 post-Mao era and impact on The Scholars (Rulin waishi), 12 roots-seeking writers, 265, 282 index 329

Shen Fu (1905–94): cinematography, 177, 199–209, Myriad of Lights (Wanjia denghuo), 188, 201f4.6–4.8, 202–203, 205f4.9 188 cross-generic boundaries, 209–210 Sherry, Vincent, 10–11 minimalist aesthetic of, 175–176 Shi Dongshan (1902–55): as national allegory, 214 Eight Thousand Miles of Clouds and rediscovery of, 283–287 Moon (Baqian lilu yun he yue), 170, See also Fei Mu 171, 187, 188, 189, 190, 192, 203 Spring River Flows East (Yi jiang chunshui and Lu Xun, 190–191 xiang dong liu, by Cai Chusheng and suicide in 1955, 216 Zheng Junli), 170, 171, 187–190, 191, 192, Shi Tuo (1910–88), 8, 128, 231–232, 234, 203, 214 254, 289 Stanley Kwan (1957–), 173, 173, 286 “A Kiss” (Yi wen), 148 stream-of-consciousness narration (yishi Master of Wuwang Village (Wuwangcun liu): de guanzhu), 255 and The Biography of Mr. Neverwas Shi Zhecun (1905–2003), 23, 24n68, 265, 295 (Fei Ming), 243 mentioned, 265 and “The Love Song of J. Alfred Shih, Shu-mei, 2, 18, 24, 25, 154–155 Pruforck” (Eliot), 66 on Fei Ming, 128, 242–243, 249 and Virginia Woolf, 135, 163–164 translation of Wang Zengqi, 134 Wang Zengqi’s use of, 23, 129, 135–136, on Wang Zengqi, 139–140, 154–155 143, 153–154, 157, 159, 163–164, 280, 281 Shu, Yunzhong, 8n20, 23, 148, 228, See also interiority; narrative voice; 254–255 Western cultural forms; Western Silverman, Kaja, 171 modernism Sima Qian (145–86), 128, 155, 248 Su Qing (1917–82), 256 sinicized cartoons (Zhongguohua manhua): Su Shi (1037–1101): and massification of art, 81 “A Spring Scene” (Chung jing), 212–215 and new forms of modernism, 81, 89–91, and Wang Zengqi, 128, 135, 139, 166 101, 150, 297 suicide: traditional forms used by Ye Qianyu, depicted in films, 171, 176, 187, 192 94–95, 94f2.9, 102, 103f2.13, 116, of Shi Dongshan, 216 117f2.26 Sutcliffe, Bret, 189, 190, 191 and Ye’s ambivalent relationship to the national collective, 123 Tagore, Rabindranath (1861–1941), 113, 115, Ye’s post-Mao period return to, 276 136 See also national forms; Ye Qianyu Tang, Xiaobing, 294 (1907–96); Ye Qianyu (1907–96), art Tao Yuanming (365–427), 21, 42–43, 128, works and illustrations 156, 248 The Songs of Chu (Chuci, Qu Yuan Te Wei (1915–2010), 79, 274 (340–278)), 108, 156 Tian Han (1898–1968), 15 Southwest Associated University (Xinan Tian Jian (1916–85), 16 Lianda). See Lianda Tian Zhuangzhuang (1952–): spirit: Jia Zhangke compared with, 295 anima (shen) expressed through the remake of Springtime in a Small Town eyes, 98, 99 by, 173, 284–285 of the common people, 13 Turgenev, Ivan (1818–1883), 127, 128 spiritual self-cultivation (jiang xiuxing), 47–48, 236 Udden, James, 195–196, 202–203 See also interiority universities: Spring in a Small Town (Xiaocheng zhi relocation to interior, 5, 37–39ff1.2–1.3, chun, Fei Mu), 171–179, 172f4.1, 179f4.2, 37–49passim 185–186, 187, 192–199, 209f4.10, 261, See also Lianda (Xinan Lianda, 322f4.2 Southwest Associated University, and aesthetics of dissolution, 210–215 Kunming) 330 index vernacular modernization: and Fei Ming, 128, 148, 149, 157, and classical and colloquial Chinese 287–288 melding: and Fei Mu’s neo-traditionalism, 183 by Shen Congwen, 149–150, 152 forced labor described by, 278 by Wang Zengqi, 140–147, 149–150, and foreign writers, 127, 131 152, 280 and Gaoyou, 21, 279, 279f6.5 and Westernized literary style, 282–283, and Lu Xun, 129, 147–148 295–297 and national salvation, 8 and xin shi (new vernacular poetry), and native-soil fiction, 21, 128, 155–159, 53 165–166, 212, 212 “victory as defeat”, 171, 186–192 post-Mao essays, 282–283 pronoun use: walkers and wanderers: I-narration, 141, 148 and the aesthetics of unrestrained and Western modernist style, 135, roaming, 205–206 139–140, 280 in “Clouds” (Yun, He Qifang), 54–55 rejection of wartime heroics, 9, 20, drifting ( fuyou) in the countryside, 131–140 47–48 return to short story writing by, and Escape from Hong Kong (Ye 278–280 Qianyu), 102–106, 103f2.13, 105f2.15, and the traditional Ming essay, 148–149 106f2.16 and Virginia Woolf, 126, 129, 160–162, and Fei Mu, Spring in a Small Town, 172, 165–167 172f4.1, 174, 178, 204–205, 205f4.9, 207 Wang qi (lyrical and essay-like style of), circular narrative struture of, 178 128, 135–136, 280–281 knight on a psychological quest and Zhou Zuoren, 149 (“Revenge”, Wang Zengqi), 129–140 See also Lianda (Xinan Lianda, and Lianda’s relocation to Kunming: Southwest Associated University, 37–38ff1.2–1.3, 37–49passim Kunming) and Mu Dan’s “Song of Wisdom” essays (Zhihui zhi ge), 272–273 “About Style” (Tan fengge), 148, 149, and the “road trope”, 105–106 288 the Western flâneur, 52–53, 55 “Casual Discussion on the Creation of wind, the passage of time and lonely Short Stories” (Xiaoshuo chuang- wanderings, 213–214 zao suitan), 282 and Zhou Yuwen (fictional character) in “Guanyin Temple” (Guanyin si), Spring in a Small Town, 172, 172f4.1, 132n29 178, 194, 204, 205f4.9 “Preface to Fei Ming’s Collected zou xiang shi jie (“walk towards the Short Stories” (Fei Ming duanpian world”), 266 xiaoshuo ji xuyan),” 287, 288 See also exile literature; rural return “Self-Introduction” (Zibao jiamen), “The Wanderer” (Liulangren, Mu Dan), 49 158 Wang Anyi (1954–): “The Essence of the Short Story” Our Uncle’s Story (Shushu de gushi), 294 (Duanpian xiaoshuo de benzhi), 1, and “Wang style” (Wang qi), 281 28, 126, 129, 131, 136–137, 150, 158, Wang, Ban, 202 160–162 Wang, David, 9, 155–156, 232, 236, 266, “The Rambling Narration of an 282 Amphibian” (Liangqi zashu), Wang, Jing, 266 137n47, 140, 149n87 Wang Pingling (1898–1964), 14 stories: Wang Tingyun (812–70), 197 “A Tale of Big Nur” (Da Nao ji Shi), Wang Wei (699–759), 99 279 Wang Xiaoshuai (1966–), 286 “Buddhist Initiation” (Shou jie), 280 Wang Zengqi (1920–97): “Epiphyllum Flower, Crane, and Fox- displacement to a monastery, 127, 139, 280 fire” (Tanhua, he, he guihuo), 280 and the emergence of Chinese “Hometown People” (Guxiang ren), postmodernism, 267, 281–283, 297 279 index 331

“Occupation” (Zhiye), 280 Water Margin (Shuihu zhuan), 276 “Special Gift” (Yibing), 142, 280 Wells, H.G., 2, 20, 262 Collection of Chance Encounters (Xie hou ji): Wells, Orson, 204 about, 28, 126–127, 129, 142, 167 Wen Rumin, 234 “Artists” (Yishujia), 126, 142 Wen Yiduo (1899–1946), 16, 32–33, 33f1.1, “Carpenter Dai” (Dai chejiang), 126, 39, 53, 171, 244–245, 272 142 Western cultural forms: “Chance Encounter” (Xie hou), 126, appropriated by wartime dramatists, 129, 142, 159–167 15 “Convicts” (Quifan), 126, 142 and cross-generic formal “Down and Out” (Luopo), 126 experimentation, 15, 125–126 “Men Famous for Chicken and Duck” and the sense of crisis felt by modern (Jiya mingjia), 129, 142, 151–159, 165, poets, 53 261, 279 Western cartoons and cartooning, 84, “Old Lu” (Lao Lu), 126, 129, 141–151 86–87, 89–90, 123, 274 “Revenge” (Fuchou), 9, 20, 126, 129–140 Western film techniques: Wang Zuoliang (1916–95), 34, 43, 48, 269 film noir, 174, 185, 200–205, War of Resistance against Japan (1945–49): 200–201f4.6–4.8, 205f4.9, 209, about, 3 211, 214–215, 293 decentralization of culture during, 30 and zou xiang shi jie (“walk towards the defection of Japanese soldiers world”), 266 encouraged, 83 See also cross-generic formal and the evolution of Chinese experimentation; stream-of- modernism, 10–11, 27, 30 consciousness narration (yishi liu); and Feng Zhi’s Wu Zixu, 131n20, Western modernism 230–231, 235 Western militarism: traumatic memory of, 142, 199 Daoist pacifist themes as counters to, and World War II, 19–20n57 20 War of Resistance Art and Literature evolutionary theory as the source of, Association (Kangzhan wenyi), 9 19–20, 224 wartime culture: Western modernism: and collective memory, 20–21, 170, 174, and the Beijing School (jingpai), 18, 128 266–267, 297–298 British modernism and war opposition, and the division of China into three 10–11 distinct areas, 5 and Freudian psychology, 128, 129, and the fragmentation of cultural 138–140, 167, 195 centers, 5–6, 5–6, 8, 10, 15 and traditional aesthetics, 282 and the Nationalist interior, 6–7 and wartime modernism, 24–26, wartime modernism: 290–297 and the blurring of cultural boundaries/ Westernized literary style: hybridity, 2–3, 11–17 and Chinese vernacular cross-generic formal expression, 2–4, modernization, 282–283, 295–297 13–17, 30, 81, 210–213, 268, 290–291, heavy use of pronouns, 65, 135, 295–297 139–140, 280, 296 and larger historical realities, 10–11, See also Chinese modernism; 22–26 cross-generic formal prewar and wartime periods compared, experimentation; ou hua 4, 17–26 (Westernization); stream-of- and Western modernism, 24–26, 24–26, consciousness narration (yishi liu); 290–297 Western cultural forms; Western and zou xiang shi jie (“walk towards the science and technology world”), 266 Western science and technology: See also aesthetics of desolation; as detrimental to Chinese aesthetics of dissolution; modernization, 20, 251 displacement and evolutionary theory, 19–20, 224 332 index

and Fei Ming, 223–224, 251 and Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town, and the May Fourth Movement, 17n49, 285, 286 251 long takes in post-World War II and mechanized modernity, 77–78, European cinema, 203–204 223–224, 251 and the War of Resistance, 19–20n57 and theories of evolutionism, 19, 20 Wu Fuhui, 234 Western doctor portrayed in Spring in Wu Wenying (1200–60), 196 a Small Town (Fei Mu), 20, 172, 176, Wu Xiaodong, 224–225, 248, 250, 263, 194, 198, 211 288, 289 and Western militarism, 20 Wuhan, 32, 91, 278 Whitman, Walt (1819–1982), 43–45, 47–49, and the Cartoon Propaganda Corps, 82 65, 273 and Nationalist discourse, 7 wives and husbands: Shanghai printing presses relocated to, A Good Husband and Wife (Hao fuqi), 82–84 176 See also Nationalist interior Eight Thousand Miles of Cloud and More (Shi Dongshan), 188, 192 xiangtu literature. See native-soil (xiangtu) and the flâneur, 52n59 literature and George McManus (1884–1954), Xiao Hong (1911–42): Bringing up Father, 86–87, 87f2.6 Mabole, 234 Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu), mentioned, 8, 128, 234 171–172, 172f4.1, 178–179, 179f4.3, 187, Tales of the Hulan River, 229, 234, 261 193 Xiao Jun (1907–88), 12 Spring River Flows East (Cai Chusheng Xiao Qian (1910–99): and Zheng Junli), 187–190 and the emergence of Chinese Wang Zengqi’s depictions of, 158 postmodernism, 18 Ye Qianyu: Xie Zhiliu (1910–1997), 116, 119 and Dai Ailian, 101–104, 103f2.13, Xinan Lianda (Southwest Associated 104f2.1, 104f2.14, 112, 273, 274, 277, University). See Lianda 318f2.21 Xu Chi (1914–96), 31, 44 Jiang Qing (Mao’s wife) depicted by Xu Zhimu (1897–1931), 272 Ye Qianyu, 275, 275f6.1 Mr. Wang, 87, 88f2.7 Yan’an: women: Lu Xun Arts Institute, 16 gender role reversal portrayal in Mao’s Yan’an Forum of Art and wartime film, 190–191 Literature (1942): and prostitution, 132, 191–192 mentioned, 22n63, 245 and rape committed by Japanese as a wartime intellectual center, 16, 36, troops, 223 56 Shanghai women writers, 256 Ye Qianyu (1907–96): See also wives and husbands and Dai Ailian (wife), 101–104, 103f2.13, Woolf, Virginia, “Mr. Bennett and 104f2.1, 104f2.14, 273, 274, 277 Mrs. Brown”, 127, 129, 160–165, 166, performing regional dances, 112, 274, 167 318f2.21 See also stream-of-consciousness- and foreign audiences, 83 narration (yishi liu) imprisonment by the CCP, 274 World War I: and the national collective, 115, 117, and British modernism, 10–11, 165, 166 122–123 Chinese intellectual reaction to and national forms of cartoon (manhua devastation of, 19, 66, 224 de minzu xiangshi), 9, 15, 84 World War II: photograph of, 82, 83f2.3 and British modernism, 10–11 “poetic vision”/ interiority portrayed and the evolution of Chinese by, 97f2.11, 98–101, 100f2.12, 102–103, modernism, 27, 30, 46 103f2.13 index 333

and the process artistic creation, 88–89, Escape from Hong Kong (Taochu 95, 99, 109–111, 110f2.18, 122 Xianggang), 102–106 and Shanghai cartoonists, 87–89 “Frontline at Shatian” (Shatian on the shifting role of wartime cartoons, qianxian), 102–103, 103f2.13 79 “Inspection” (Jiancha), 103, and Western-style cartooning, 84, 104f2.14 86–87, 88f2.7, 89–90, 90f2.8, 123, 274 “Leaving Kowloon” (Chu See also cartoons and cartooning; Jiulong), 104, 105f2.15 sinicized cartoons (Zhongguohua “The Road to Free China” manhua) (Ziyou Zhongguo zhi lu), 105, art works and illustrations: 106f2.16 “cartoons” (manhua): “In a Miao Village in Guizhou” “Abandon the Civilian Life, Join (Zai Guizhou Miaoxiang), 81, 92, the Army” (Qiwen jiuwu), 89, 109–111, 110f2.18, 116, 122 90f2.8, 122 Record of Paradise (Tiantang ji), 273 “He is in Me, I am in Him” (Wo Six Portraits of Zhang Daqian: zhong you ta, Ta zhong you wo), “Comprehensive Scene in Four 277, 325f6.4 Meters” (Zhang’er tongjing), “I am in you, You are in me/May 116, 117/119–122, 120f2.29 1983/Ye Qianyu and Mr. Wang “Large Painting Table” (Da Together” (Ni zhongyou wo, hua’an), 116–117, 117f2.26 Wo zhong you ni, Yi jiu ba “Painting a Beard with a Beard” san nian wu yue, Ye Qianyu (Huzi hua huzi), 116–117, Wang xiansheng zai yiqi), 118f2.27 276–277, 277f6.3 Ten Years of an Absurd Dream Mr. Wang: (Shi nian huangtang meng): “Quitting Alcohol” (Jie jiu), 87, “Jiang Qing Pulls out my 88f2.7 Tendons by Imperial Edict” Mr Wang and Little Chen (Wang (Jiang Qing yi ming chou wo xiansheng yu Xiao Chen), 276–277 jin), 275, 275f6.1 Resistance Cartoons (Kangzhan Wartime Chongqing (Zhanshi manhua): Chongqing)”After Exhaustive illustrated cover (January 1938), Bombing” (Pilao hongzha zhi 84, 85f2.4 hou), 97–99, 97f2.11; “New “Living for Hatred” (Wei chouhen Appreciation for Antiques” er sheng), 85, 315f2.5 (Guwu xin chong), 99–100, “national paintings” (guo hua), 100f2.12; “Stage Set” (Wutai 81, 92, 108–113, 110f2.18, 116, 122, mian), 93–95, 94f2.9; “The 316f2.17, 318f2.21 Artery of Transportation in Cockfight (Dou ji), 108–109, 110, the Hinterland” (Zai houfang 316f2.17 de jiaotongdongmai), 95–97, “Daqian-style Indian dancers”: 96f2.10 Dance of the Offering of “sketches”: Flowers (Xianhua wu), “Drum of the Yao People”, 112, 114–116, 320f2.24 318f2.21 Indian Dance Pose (Yindu wuzi), publications and essays: 113–114, 320f2.23 A Detailed Account of Life’s Indian Dance (Yindu wu), 113, Transformations: A Record of the 319f2.22 Passing Years (Xixu cangsang ji “sketch-cartoons” (manhua suxie): liunian), 79, 93, 93n34 An Old Brush Recalls Childhood A True Record of Japanese Atrocities (Laobi yi tongnian): (Rikou baoxingshilu), 83, 92, 93n34 “The End of the Qing dynasty, My Life in Cartoons (Wode Leaving behind Childhood”, manhua shenghuo), 111n54, 275f6.2, 275 88–89nn18–19, 95n35, 99 334 index

“Cartoons and Sketching” (Manhua Zhang Yimou (1951–), 173, 283, 286 he suxie), 93 Zhang, Yingjin, 181, 189 “The Problem of the Massification Zhang Zhongliang (fictional of Art under Wartime Conditions: “Confucian-style family man”), 187–188 Part I—The Content and Form of Zhao Shuli (1906–70), 234, 255–256, 296 Picture-Story Drawings” (Zhanshi “The Rhymes of Li Youcai” (Li Youcai huihua de dazhonghua wenti di banhua), 255 yi, lianhuan tuhua de neirong he Zheng Boqi (1895–1979), 14 xingshi), 82–83, 84 Zheng Junli (1911–69): Yeh, Michelle, 53 Crows and Sparrows (Wuya yu maque), Yip, Wai-lim, 77–78 188, 191 yishi liu. See stream-of-consciousness death of, 216 narration Spring River Flows East (Yi jiang Yuan Muzhi (1909–78): chunshui xiang dong liu), 170, 171, Plunder of Peach and Plum (Taoli jie), 187–190, 191, 192, 203, 214 191–192, 202 Zheng Zhengqiu (1889–1935): Street Angel (Malu tianshi), 286 Orphan Rescues Grandfather (Gu’er jiu Yue Fei (1103–42), 189, 217–218n3 zu ji), 181 Zhongzheng Culture Prize, 188 Zhang Daqian (1889–1993): Zhou Zuoren (1885–1967), 289 copies (linmo) of Dunhuang Mogao Camel Grass (luotuo cao) journal edited Cave murals, 81, 111–112, 114–115, by, 239 316–317ff2.19–20 and eclectic school (zapai) aesthetics, Dance of the Offering of Flowers 18 (Xianhua wu), 114–115, 321f2.25 and the emergence of Chinese and Ye Qianyu, 16–17, 81, 111–116, postmodernism, 18, 295–296 321f2.25 and essayization, 125–126 Ye Qianyu’s Six Portraits of Zhang and Fei Ming, 149, 218, 237 Daqian (Zhang Daqian liu xiang), and Wang Zengqi, 149 116–118, 117f2.26, 120f2.29 See also Beijing School (jingpai) Zhang Guangyu (1900–65), 15, 91, 274 Zhu Yaning, 288, 289 Zhang Hongmei (1927–, actress), 178–179 Zhu Ziqing (1894–1948), 13, 32, 33 Zhang Jibing, 248, 287–288, 289 Zhuangzi (4th cent. B.C.): Zhang Leping (1910–92), 79, 80f2.1 and Fei Ming, 243 Zhang Shichuan (1890–1954): and Wang Zengqi, 128, 132–133 Orphan Rescues Grandfather (Gu’er jiu zou xiang shi jie (“walk towards the zu ji), 181 world”), 266 Zhang Tianyi (1906–85), 12

plate section

[Chapter Two] Plate 3

Fig. 2.5. Ye Qianyu, “Living for Hatred,” illustrated cover of Resistance Cartoons, March 15, 1938. Plate 4 [Chapter Two]

Fig. 2.17. Ye Qianyu, Cockfight, 1942 painting produced using watercolor painting and Taijiang leather paper.

Fig. 2.19. Zhang Daqian, 1942 copy of wall painting of Buddha image in the Mogao Caves. [Chapter Two] Plate 5

Fig. 2.20. Zhang Daqian, 1942 copy of Dunhuang wall painting of saint image of West Wei in the Mogao Caves. Plate 6 [Chapter Two]

Fig. 2.21. Ye Qianyu, “Drum of the Yao People,” 1944 sketch of Dai Ailian performing a regional minority dance. [Chapter Two] Plate 7

Fig. 2.22. Ye Qianyu, Indian Dance, 1945 oil painting based on his sketches of Indian women performing the Buddhist “Dance of the Offering of Flowers.” Plate 8 [Chapter Two]

Fig. 2.23. Ye Qianyu, Indian Dance Pose, 1948 oil painting. [Chapter Two] Plate 9

Fig. 2.24. Ye Qianyu, Dance of the Offering of Flowers, 1949 oil painting. Plate 10 [Chapter Two]

Fig. 2.25. Zhang Daqian, Dance of the Offering of Flowers, 1949 oil painting based on Ye Qianyu’s sketches of Indian dancers. Plate 11 [Chapter[ FourChapter] Two] Plate 11

Fig. 4.2. 1948 advertisement for Spring in a Small Town. Plate 12 [Chapter[ ChapterTwo] Four] Plate 12

Fig. 4.4. Advertisement for Fei Mu’s 1940 film Confucius. Plate 13 [Chapter[ FourChapter] Two] Plate 13

Fig. 4.5. Advertisement for China’s first color production, Fei Mu’s 1948 film Regret that Surpasses Life and Death (translated here as A Wedding in the Dream). Plate 14 [Chapter [TChapterwo] Six] Plate 14

Fig. 6.4. Ye Qianyu, “He is in Me, I am in Him,” 1987.