Golden Roses in the Hands of Middle School Students. Junior High Volume

Author: Author Country: China
Editor-in-Chief: Zhang Wei
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-10-01
Features: Russian writer Pavlovsky once wrote a story titled "The Golden Rose." A poor cleaner, in order to craft a golden rose for a girl he admired as a blessing, persistently sifted through the dust from the golden workshop every day, collecting tiny bits of gold. Over time, he eventually crafted a golden rose. The author believes this process is similar to a writer gathering and accumulating materials before writing—writing the golden rose of a novel, the golden rose of prose, the golden rose of poetry! Writer Zhang Wei, in his tireless reading over decades, has been searching for such "golden roses." It was the works that captivated him that led him onto the literary path and which he kept in his heart. Today, he presents these radiant "golden roses" to the world. Now, let us engage in dialogue with these noble souls, let us craft our own "golden roses"!
Excerpt: I can't remember how this story about a Parisian cleaner named John Chamay came to me. Chamay earned a living by cleaning several artisan workshops in the area. Chamay lived in a thatched hut in the suburbs. One could have greatly described this suburb to distract the reader from the story's main point. However, it might be worth mentioning that even today, some ancient forts still remain in the suburbs of Paris. During the time this story took place, these forts were covered in weeds like honeysuckle and hawthorn, where wild birds built their nests. Chamay's hut was at the foot of a northern fort, neighboring the shabby houses of blacksmiths, cobblers, cigarette collectors, and beggars. If Maupassant had once taken an interest in the lives of these hut dwellers, he might have written several more outstanding short stories. Perhaps they would have added new crowns to his eternal glory. Unfortunately, no one besides detectives came to visit these places. Even the detectives only came to search for stolen goods. The neighbors called Chamay "Woodpecker," from which one can imagine him as thin, with a pointed nose and a tuft of hair always sticking out from under his hat, like a cluster of bird feathers. Chamay had once lived a better life. During the Mexican War, he served in Napoleon's "Little" army. Chamay was in luck. He contracted a severe fever in Vera Cruz and was sent back to France without ever setting foot on the battlefield. The regiment commander took this opportunity to entrust his daughter, Susanna, an eight-year-old girl, to Chamay to bring her back to France. The commander was a widower and had to take his daughter everywhere with him. But this time, he decided to part with her and sent her to his sister in Lyon. The climate of Mexico would take the life of a European child. Moreover, the chaotic guerrilla warfare posed many unpredictable dangers. On Chamay's journey back, the Atlantic evaporated the heat. The little girl remained silent all day, not even smiling when she watched fish leap out of the greasy water. Chamay took meticulous care of Susanna. Of course, he understood that she expected not just care but also tenderness. But what tenderness could he, a soldier in a colonial army, think of? What could he do to make her happy? Roll dice? Or sing some coarse tunes from the barracks? But they couldn't keep silent forever. Chamay increasingly felt the little girl looking at him with confused gazes. In the end, he decided to tell her fragments of his life, recalling every trivial detail from a fishing village on the coast of the English Channel: the shifting sands, the puddles left by the ebb tide, the small chapel with a broken bell, his mother who healed the neighbors' stomach ailments. In these memories, Chamay couldn't find anything that would bring Susanna joy. But what surprised him was that the little girl listened to these stories greedily, often urging him to repeat them and delve into new details. Chamay tried his best to recall these details, and eventually, he could hardly believe he had ever truly experienced them. This was no longer a memory but a faint shadow of a memory. These shadows, like a thin mist, soon dissipated. Indeed, Chamay had never thought he would have to relive this superfluous period of his life again. Once, he vaguely recalled a story about a golden rose. In an old fisherman's house, on a cross, there was a crudely made, dull-colored golden rose. He didn't know if he had seen this golden rose himself or if he had heard the story of this rose from others. No, perhaps he had even seen this rose with his own eyes and remembered how it shone, even though there was no sunlight outside and a fierce storm was raging over the Channel. Chamay increasingly clearly recalled the brilliance of this rose—the few bright lights under the low ceiling. The entire village was puzzled: Why hadn't the old woman sold this treasure. If she had, she would have gotten a lot of money. Only Chamay's mother was certain that selling the golden rose was a sin, because it was when she, the old woman, was still a funny...