Zhou Tao's Prose (Illustrated Treasure Edition)

Author: Zhou Tao
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-01
Features: Zhou Tao, once famous for writing frontier poems, has now become a true prose master, with his prose achievements even surpassing his poetry. Byron believed that a poet writing prose was a form of decline. However, Zhou Tao, who has achieved success as a prose writer, did not succumb to this decline. Writing prose allowed him to find a field that better expressed his talent and a convenient form to convey his life insights. His unique creation has had an extremely profound impact on contemporary prose. Looking back, since Zhou Tao was originally a poet before turning to prose, the poet's temperament inevitably influenced his prose, or to say, his prose writing made him a singer of the western wilderness, and the limitations of his prose themes were thus inevitably linked to poetry. On this issue, this paper delves into the poetic phenomenon in Zhou Tao's prose.
1. His prose is highly poetic in its leaps and bounds
If the "poetic" articles of scholars since the Tang and Song dynasties were entirely due to their inability to surpass the peak of Tang poetry, then Zhou Tao's "writing prose with the spirit of poetry" stemmed from his poet's unique way of thinking and his innovative consciousness that transcended existing prose norms. In most of his prose, we can see a clear tendency toward "poeticization":,,，，. For example, in the prose "The Creeping Roof" (), where the author travels to the Karakoram Mountains, Zhou Tao does not, like many works of this genre, record the hardships of the journey along the axis of shifting time and space, the enthusiasm of soldiers at the frontier posts, or the noble sentiments of border guards in the snow-capped Kunlun Mountains. Instead, he writes a spiritual journey—recording his insights into the "thief of time" () hidden in nature along the way. The article presents to the reader the description of highland natural landscapes, broad associations, and the author's multi-angle reflections on society and life. There is no single narrative thread running through the entire piece; the content flows naturally with the author's thoughts and emotions, highly poetic in its leaps and bounds. From this representative prose, we can see that although Zhou Tao writes prose, his way of perceiving the world is poetic—that is, he replaces the examination of life's chronological progression with intuition, which is fundamentally consistent with poetry.
2. His prose embodies the spirit of poetry: freedom, lyricism, and imagination
Zhou Tao's pursuit of "poeticization" in his prose differs from the "poeticized writing" of the prose master Yang Shuo, who discovered beauty and sublimity in the subtle details of nature and society and completed his works through the fusion of scenery and emotion. Overall, Yang Shuo's "poeticized prose" is a concrete practice of classical Chinese aesthetic tastes in contemporary prose. However, in terms of content and technique, his prose still remains at the level of poetic imagery and the fusion of scenery with reality. This determines that his prose is still stuck at a shallow level. In contrast, Zhou Tao's "writing prose with the spirit of poetry" is deep and profound. This is not only because Zhou Tao's way of perceiving the world is poetic but also because his prose embodies the spirit of poetry: freedom, lyricism, and imagination. Zhou Tao once said, "The 'scattered' () in prose means freedom; prose is free writing, and freedom is the lifeblood of prose." In his writing, Zhou Tao well practiced this concept. His prose is like the "crazy grass" () in calligraphy, with free and unrestrained expression. Reading his prose is like embarking on a spiritual journey with the author, soaring freely. For example, in the collection "Nomadic Great Wall" (), the author sometimes takes you through a tunnel of time to verify history, comment on facts and legends, and sometimes discusses the cultural depth of the ancient Great Wall. The main body of each piece consists of the author's rich associations and omnipresent discussions on history and reality. There is rarely a continuous narrative; the content and thinking leap in astonishing ways. In Zhou Tao's hands, prose becomes a way for the writer to express his thoughts freely. Out of artistic interest, Zhou Tao has little interest in realistic writing, such as narrating life experiences or objectively describing landscapes, and prefers to express imaginative content. Thus, he is fond of touching the "wall of time" ("The Wall of Time" - Part Two of "Notes on Time"), capturing the "time thief" ("The Time Thief" - Part One of "Notes on Time"), and depicting the impression of the eagle in his heart ("Migratory Bird"). Even when describing concrete things, he blends a considerable amount of magnificent and expansive imagination. For instance, in "Jimsar Chronicle #8226; Wheat," there is the following description:
Our wheat is poured into this suspiciously old workshop, slowly and heavily ground, chewed, and powdered on this life's mill. I imagine the wheat grains being flattened, crushed, and ground into dust, gradually becoming numb and enduring its torment. A sense of groaning and unbearable suffering rises from my chest, spreading to my limbs. I truly feel that I am like them, like this wheat, slowly and painstakingly ground on a similar life's mill.
This is a highly imaginative description. In this passage, the author completely follows the logic of poetic imagination, unifying humans and objects to express his profound life experiences. Precisely because Zhou Tao's prose is filled with poetic subtlety and passion, as well as magnificent and expansive imagination, the poet Zhang Deyi regarded it as "a broader form of poetry in a different sense, a poetry with greater vigor and elegance." In the contemporary era, Zhou Tao is a rare writer who applies the logic of poetic imagination and the emotional structure of poetry to his prose writing, that is, "writing prose with the spirit of poetry."