Notebook

Author: Wang Shuo
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-01-01
Features: Wang Shuo is solitary in our era. It is he who has persistently upheld the tradition of realism in Chinese literature and the spirit of facing life. Most people are deceived by his superficial playfulness and delinquent tone, failing to see that he is, at his core, a true enlightenmentist. They overlook the profound humanistic spirit that permeates his novels, his compassion for the common people, his longing for love, and his desperate pursuit of the value of individual existence. These books were written ten years ago or earlier. At that time, I was very self-assured, believed in many things, distrusted many others, and had strong desires, thinking that what I knew was all there was. The people, scenes, and conversations in these books are from my past experiences, unremarkable in life. I only found them interesting because I didn’t know more, and I wrote them down with pretense. Those scenes are gone, those people have scattered, the living have aged prematurely, and I no longer speak or view myself in the same way. Sometimes, I feel I have lost the ability to continue writing. Culture is terrifying, like food—it is either eaten or one dies, but once eaten, one is shaped by it. I doubt its core has been encoded into our genes, no longer needing to be acquired through education. I feel like I’m swimming in the sea, endless waves overwhelming me. When will I reach the other shore, with a clear, innocent mind like an early human who had just descended from the trees? As for these books, I personally believe they are a testament to a dark age. To live, to live in self-invented and self-satisfied illusions—this may be the fate of a writer. Understanding it is useless.