Night makeup

Author: Zhao Ning
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-05-01
Features: Night Makeup is my 11th novel. My novels always begin and end at midnight. When others are going to bed or doing something in bed, I am still writing. Mr. Lu Xun once said he used the time others spent drinking coffee for writing. I, on the other hand, use the time others spend having sex to write novels. The result is the same. It’s all good, all sweet. The last word I wrote for this novel, the clock struck midnight just then. I don’t know if this was a coincidence or if there’s a deeper meaning behind it. Anyway, after countless sleepless nights, I finally completed this novel, feeling extremely comfortable in my heart, and my body felt as if it had been caressed, soft and relaxed. I used the art of the novel to record my inner feelings, recording the very special year of 2003 that had just passed. The book uses the "unordered arrangement method" to document the major events of that year, including the "SARS" (white plague) that left a deep impression on Beijing people, Jay Chou’s music, and the farthest place I visited in the summer—Genghis Khan Town. Here, Genghis Khan Town is just a fictional name and differs from the real Genghis Khan Town. It’s worth mentioning. Borges’s explanation of time influenced me. There’s a passage in the novel: "Applause is destined to exist in some place in the future. The arrangement of this world is not as people imagine—what happens first and what happens later is not arranged in order. Events are like a chaotic deck of cards, and the order in which they occur is full of chance." I used the novel to explain my feeling about life. "A sudden plague made sex carry the scent of death." When people are pushed to the extreme, they have nothing left but their bodies. Joe and her mother—both women who had struggled in "desperate situations"—danced at the edge of a cliff. Love is as beautiful as death.