Shen Congwen's Collected Works

Author: Shen Congwen
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2002-06-01
Features: Autobiography of Shen Congwen recounts Shen Congwen's life before the age of twenty. A mischievous primary school student, a true nobody, who later managed to enter the literary scene of 20th-century China and become a shining name in literary history—this is truly a mystery. By carefully reading this brilliantly written autobiography, one can glean some clues to unravel this mystery. As for Shen's life after the age of twenty, we have selected three of his speeches from nearly four decades, along with several other writings, to give readers a glimpse of his life's challenging journey. Presented before the readers are both the purity and simplicity of village women and the emptiness and intricacy of city women. Their destinies differ due to their environments—former ones often follow nature, while the latter are often filled with twists and turns. They seem vulgar yet elegant, and elegant yet vulgar. When compared, one can see the author's slightly biased yet benevolent "preference" in judging beauty and ugliness. Life's questions are dazzlingly colorful, leaving one spellbound. They are ancient yet ever-new, and the pursuit of enlightenment is indeed not easy. Shen Congwen's Seven-Color "Yan" and fragments of Torchlight draw directly from nature and contemporary life, extracting philosophy with a devoted heart and a tranquil pen, approaching the style of Zhuangzi. The essays and a collection of classical poems belong to the height of "life's solemnity," expressing historical reflections on different aspects of the present world through various genres.