First time in Xi'an
I can't remember what I did when I first came to Xi'an, and I can't even remember the time exactly. I only remember that I went to Qianling. . Carrying a small bag and dressed in rags, a scholar, alone, went to the train station and got on a tourist bus heading to Qianling. A trip I took in my early years has often been rummaged through in my memory over the years.
Coming down from the Northern Shaanxi Plateau, I have been grazing and grazing cattle on the high loess slopes since I was a child. When I went out, I saw mountains like waves. When I stood at the foot of the Qianling Plateau, I suddenly felt another kind of atmosphere - —The vastness and vastness of the earth. The mist rising from the majestic and majestic mountain ridges casts a mysterious veil over the Qianling Mausoleum; from Sima Shinto to halfway up the slope, one can feel the feeling of soaring clouds, the mist in front of him, and the mist of history. Huabiao, winged horses, ostriches, war horses and horse-leaders, General Zhige, wordless stele, Shusheng monument, sixty-one ministers statues and stone lions are all solemn and solemn. Following the expressions of this thousand years ago, we arrived in an instant into the depths of history.
The Qianling Mausoleum was built during the prosperous Tang Dynasty. Construction started in 684 AD. All construction projects were completed in the early years of Wu Zetian, Zhongzong and Ruizong, which lasted for 57 years. The ground buildings of the cemetery are built after the pattern of Chang'an City in the Tang Dynasty, and are divided into palace city, imperial city and outer city. More than 1,400 years of wind and rain have worn away many palaces and pavilions, but a woman's name continues to be polished in the history books.
Is being cruel and vicious really her true intention? Knowing people well and promoting them to recommend themselves, the Tang Dynasty moved forward, and the "Kaiyuan Age" followed. From a palace maid to a queen, she controlled the ministers, ruled the world, did so many earth-shattering things, and dominated the country for forty-six years, but she was left with a blank slate in terms of self-evaluation.
After her death, she rested under the soil of Liangshan Mountain. A woman appeared on Liangshan Mountain. The height of the north peak resembled a woman’s head, and the lower peak of the south peak resembled her breasts. Breasts; head resting on Liangshan Mountain, feet stepping on Weishui River, a woman lies quietly between heaven and earth. On the plateau of Liangshan, is there a tyrant? Mingzhu? The romantic queen? All the mystery, all the suspense, all the smoke and clouds, including time, are all gathered in that wordless monument.
Traveling in and out of the Northern Shaanxi Plateau
Jia Pingwa once gave me a quote: "Ma Yu was born and grew up in Northern Shaanxi. He writes the true flavor and spirit of Northern Shaanxi and writes a biography of Northern Shaanxi." . ”
My roots have been deeply rooted in northern Shaanxi throughout my life.
Going in and out of the plateau is my lifelong journey.
Many people go to Xi'an by plane. Especially the bosses, I have heard that a young coal boss from Shenmu got off the plane in Xianyang and was carried in a sedan chair to a Lincoln that had been waiting outside, and drove directly to the hotel. There is also a coal boss who went to Xi'an to meet his lover on the weekend. When there was a traffic jam on the highway, he left Da Ben behind and found another way to leave.
The air ticket costs several hundred yuan, and as a scholar, I take the train every time I go to Xi'an. This is the avenue for people in northern Shaanxi, and it is also a historical avenue.
Time and again, my eyes wander through the thousands of mountains and ridges of the Northern Shaanxi Plateau, looking for the ruins of palaces, city sites, military stations, passes, and beacons; sometimes my thoughts also travel through time and space, arriving at history. In the depths of the road, wandering on the straight road of Qin, I picked up the hoof prints of cattle and horses scattered on the road, as well as the footprints of men, women and children. Many roads are routed along river valleys. The Duqin Straight Road runs through ridges and highlands and is known as the ancestor of highways in the world. After leaving the Golden Suo Pass, the Qin and Han dynasty armies often suddenly appeared in front of the Huns cavalry - but the dragon city flying generals were there and did not teach the Hu horses to cross the Yin Mountains.
I often look out the window silently, and see that hillside, or a tree, or it could be an abandoned earthen kiln, a river, a patch of vegetables on the edge of someone’s yard, or the row of wild geese flying over the mountains. , or a person walking on the ridge, I can't say anything. Staring at this vicissitudes of life in northern Shaanxi, I feel that my words are still very shallow. I only know that their blood flows in my veins. My life and stories are their continuation. The words I wrote with tears, laughter and running are the song of my life and part of the epic of northern Shaanxi.
Standing on the plateau of northern Shaanxi, a scholar often looks at Xi'an. If the sky is clearer, he can look across the Qinling Mountains.
Going to school in Xi'an
When I was a child, my biggest dream was to go to junior high school in our county like my peers. During the summer vacation after finishing my first year of junior high school, I was herding sheep on the stone slope beside the Temple River. A man walking across the big stone ditch shouted to me, asking us to send a message to Ma Qilang's family, saying that his trip to Shenmu City for school could not be completed. . The person I wanted to give the message to was Ma Qilang. At this point, I completely gave up my dream of going to school in the city.
When my children’s generation comes, they will go to Xi’an to go to school.
I don’t know how big Xi’an is. I only remember the place on Taiyi Road. I took my children to complete the registration procedures at West Railway No. 1 Middle School and went out to eat on the street. We found a small restaurant under a row of green and tall plane trees. When leaving Yulin, a female colleague said that once I leave, my daughter will spend very little time with you in this life, and she will no longer belong to your family. My daughter was only fifteen years old at the time.
When the food was served, I suddenly started crying. Not just tears, but sobbing and choking, completely ignoring the other guests sitting around. This lasted for twenty or thirty minutes before I stopped. A woman's words made me cry so violently in the ancient city of Xi'an. The small restaurant on the street shaded by paulownia trees left an eternal mystery to the other guests who ate in that small restaurant. .
In the afternoon, my daughter went to the classroom for class.
I went to buy her a bookshelf. Walking to the halfway slope of the Furniture City in the west of the South Second Ring Road, I found a simple bookshelf that was made of angle iron and fixed with screws in a small shop. I packed two bundles of not too thick angle iron bars, one in each hand. . After all, it is an iron bar, and it is also a bookshelf after all. I am not a heavy-backed person. After almost walking dozens of steps, I have to put it on the ground to rest. The road is not very far, and I can't see the tricycle coming along the way, so I just walk back. My nose was dripping with snot, and I had no hands to wipe it. My wrists were numb from the fall. I held my breath and hurried forward. After walking for a while, my belt came loose. I had to stand down, lift my pants, and tighten them again. Take off your belt.
I walked to my daughter’s dormitory, spread the materials on the floor, and started assembling. For a whole afternoon, there was no one around to help me, and sometimes the assembly was backwards. I put the screws and caps on the half-food bag. When they are used up, the bookshelf is put up. I think this scholar and the bookshelf have a good connection.
On the high loess slopes, under the scorching sun, my father pulled a cart and went to the small town middle school to deliver rations to me. When climbing uphill, the empty frame cart was enough to pull up the mountain ridge. It contained a few bags of food. My father, who was less than forty years old, grabbed the shaft of the cart with his wrists and kicked the soles of his feet into the loess. He was still being dragged by the frame cart and was slipping. There was a rope around his shoulders, and in order to make the rope more powerful, his head was almost bent to the slope above... Many years later, I walked the streets of Xi'an again the same way my father walked on the mountain road in my hometown.
On the train platform, under the bus stop sign, in front of the traffic light cross, carrying large and small bags, bending and walking quickly, I think I am not the only one. I have pitiful parents in the world. How many parents are running like this for their children? Stay!
Then a person arrived at the Big Wild Goose Pagoda. I did not leave the mountains of my hometown before I graduated from junior high school at the age of sixteen. When I was a teenager, I spent a lot of time cutting grass and herding cattle. Apart from elementary school textbooks, I could rarely read other books. There was only one "Journey to the West" written by a villager. The old man left it behind. During the Spring Festival, every family went to his house to write Spring Festival couplets. We, the children, helped him press paper and grind ink, so that we could borrow "Journey to the West". I can't remember how many times I read it. Xuanzang traveled to the West to learn Buddhist scriptures, suffered nine deaths, and went through many hardships. This is exactly the spirit and realm our family, especially my daughter, needs in the future. The setting sun has sunk beneath the buildings in the west. In the dusk, a scholar looks up to the Big Wild Goose Pagoda in silence.
Reading Jia Pingwa’s Prose
It was also when I was teaching in Sanbian that I went through all the troubles to get a cave dwelling from the school, which became my entire home. I placed a bookshelf against the floor of the window and separated it from the window and wall into a relatively closed space, which became my study and writing room. It was in such a study room that could only accommodate a simple wooden chair for one person to sit down, accompanied by the blue lamp and the moonlight from the window, that I read my book. One of the books I read repeatedly is "Selected Collection of Jia Pingwa's Prose".
There is this passage in the book "A Writer": Writing every day and every month, people become "like hungry ghosts." But the manuscripts were sent out one after another, and the manuscripts were returned one after another. When the editor doesn't reply, there is always a printed rejection note, sometimes with a name, sometimes without a name...
How many times have I sat on the garden wall in front of the old locust tree? Reading on the column, not only is the prose good, but a young man has found strength and direction in it! Teacher Jia said in the article "My Steps and Me on the Steps": Since summer, I have been sick frequently, the cold almost never stops, and my nose is always uncomfortable in the morning, morning and night. I warned myself: the pen cannot stop. When the hemorrhoids were inflamed, I knelt on a chair and wrote on the bed; when my wife was in confinement, I sat by the diaper drying stove and wrote...
One day my wife and I had a quarrel. She always felt that she was wronged. When I came back from a walk, she tore my copy of "Jia Pingwa's Selected Prose Collection" into pieces one by one. There were so many books on the shelf, and she chose this one. Not long after that, I went to Yulin on a business trip. I suddenly saw this book in a small bookstore called "Modern People's Bookstore" on the old street of Yulin. I was so happy that I quickly bought a copy. Carrying a bag on my back, I walked out of the store, but stopped for a while because I wanted to buy another book. But the wages at that time were so low that I didn’t have a penny of income, sometimes only 50 yuan, and I had to borrow it from others. I am such an emotional person, so I turned back to the bookstore and bought another copy of "Jia Pingwa's Selected Prose Collection".
A primary school teacher in the county had absolutely no chance to meet Jia Pingwa at that time. At that time, while reading Teacher Jia’s article, I silently imagined his figure walking on the northern Shaanxi Plateau. A few years ago, he actually visited the three sides where I live! He wrote in the article "Walking Three Sides" in this self-selected collection: Traveling in northern Shaanxi, three thousand miles, the clouds rise and fall, the moon waxes and wanes, the journey is hard.
In the dusk, a person walks alone on the ridge of the ravine, and the wind blows from east to west like a saw; when the moon is in the sky, I lie alone under the bed in the shop and listen to the crickets outside the firewood door. I need to read that book of ancient poems about frontier fortresses...
I have made writing my whole life, what is it that has destined me to have such a life and destiny? Maybe it’s those books I read in adolescence: "Leaves of Grass", "Life", "The Ordinary World", "Green Tree"... They are the ones that infect the emotions of my life and influence my choice of path and direction. thinking. One of the most important books is "Selected Collection of Jia Pingwa's Prose".
Later I went to Xi'an and visited Master Jia Pingwa several times to listen to the master's teachings. Several times, he was kept in the unit building of his institute for lunch. Before eating, Wang Lizhi brought a stack of Teacher Jia's books with notes on them, saying that they all required Teacher Jia's signature. After Teacher Jia finished signing those books, I gave my portfolio to Teacher Jia and held it in both hands. At this time, Teacher Jia said, please sign it for me. My first reaction made me say one sentence: I can’t write. . Teacher Jia said, leave it as a souvenir! As he said that, he handed me the pen he had just signed. There was no way out. I took the pen and my hands were shaking violently. I wrote on the title page of my book: Teacher Jia Pingwa, please correct me... This is how fascinating a literary young man is. An “event” to be proud of! But I have never dared to mention it in front of others, as that would make people laugh out loud. The first time I wrote this here, I wanted to tell the world about the master's mind.
Chen Zhongshi’s calligraphy
I have two calligraphy works by teacher Chen Zhongshi.
In the name of writing an inscription for a newspaper supplement, I went to Xi'an to find Teacher Chen Zhongshi. In the spring of 1998, I was recruited to work at the newspaper. Just after I started working for a while, the newspaper was still recruiting people, and those of us who came first were required to take the unified entrance examination. In that exam, I failed. The reason why I came in first was because some of my small articles at that time had attracted attention. Minister Wang Shixiong, who was in charge of the Propaganda Department at that time, had dinner with the editor-in-chief of the newspaper. Minister Wang said that the horse-language article was well written! Outsiders can see clearly and think that newspapers should hire people who can write good articles. The Independent Press does not think so. First of all, in a place like a newspaper, it is always difficult to figure out whose articles are good. Secondly, newspapers do not need to hire people based on their articles. This has probably always been the case. When the two people were arguing, Minister Wang specifically cited an article I had previously published in a newspaper supplement, "White Flowers Pay Tribute to Heroic Spirits," which I wrote about Lu Yao. It snowed heavily on November 17th that year in northern Shaanxi, which happened to be the anniversary of Lu Yao's death. I wrote this plot in the article and gave it a title. The editor-in-chief said that this was a coincidence, and it would not snow at this time of the solar calendar in northern Shaanxi. Minister Wang retorted, there is also the story of June Feixue in literary works. Later, it was not uncommon to see snow in May and heavy snow in August in northern Shaanxi. That time I didn't come as usual, so I just stayed at the newspaper office. Later, a supplement was edited. It was precisely in this way that I had the opportunity to contact Teacher Chen Zhongshi.
I contacted him through a friend and told him that Chairman Chen Zhongshi had gone to Beijing and would not be able to return to Xi'an until the afternoon of the next day. He agreed that I should call him the next day.
The next day is a Saturday and it rains again. Should I make this call or not? Walking alone on the streets of Xi'an, the world is stained with water. The sycamore leaves on both sides of the street are falling rustlingly in the autumn rain. After walking a few steps, I have to wipe the cold rain off my hair and face with my hands... I want to go back in a hurry. In northern Shaanxi, it was very difficult to buy tickets by train at that time. I plucked up the courage to call Chairman Chen, and the call got through. Mr. Chen said that he was in the car and couldn't hear clearly, and asked me to call him later. It was getting late, so after a while I braved the call and called Mr. Chen again. This time Mr. Chen asked me to leave him my mobile phone number. After he wrote it, he notified me to pick it up.
In the afternoon, it was getting dark. When I had made all preparations to return to northern Shaanxi and had no hope, Mr. Chen called me and asked me to go back to Shaanxi at 8 to 9 p.m. , go to his office to pick up the words.
Standing on Jianguo Road where No. 83 is located, looking in from the blue brick arched gate of the Writers Association, the courtyard of the Shaanxi Writers Association is quiet and dark. Standing at a corner of the balcony, lighting a cigarette, I was waiting for Mr. Chen. There was no moonlight, and the cigarette butt flickered on and off. Suddenly, I heard someone walking on the dark road ahead. And coughing and spitting loudly. Didn't the old man at the concierge just tell me that Chairman Chen has a cold today and won't be coming? From the sound of movement, it must be an old man coming over. Sure enough, it was Mr. Chen who came over. I hurriedly stepped forward to shake hands with Mr. Chen and thank him. When he arrived at the office, he put on his desk the banner "Xintianyou" on the masthead of the literary supplement of "Yulin Daily" and "Northern Shaanxi Folk Singers" on another column of the cultural section that I wanted, which he had written in advance at his home, and asked me to read it. Ok.
After lighting a cigar, Mr. Chen had a warm conversation with me, asking in detail about the situation of our newspaper and the creation of the team of Yulin literary writers. When I took out the book "In Memory of Lu Yao" published by the People's Literature Publishing House and edited by the literary critic Mr. Li Jianjun, it contained my essay "White Flowers Pay Tribute to the Heroic Spirits". It is a book that I cherish very much. I would like to invite you to When Mr. Chen wrote a few words of encouragement to me on the title page of this book, he happily picked up the pen and wrote this sentence as I asked: "A locust tree, the cold wind blew off its leaves, and the ice and snow frostbitten its leaves. heart, and then gave it spring.
"That's a big tree I met when I was teaching in Sanbian in my twenties. It's an old locust tree next to the west wall of the campus. The curved trunk is as thick as an arm, and the tall and rich crown is as big as half a basketball court. Big. From the young buds among the withered black branches in early spring, to the countless small white flowers in the depth of spring, to the dark green tree crowns under the scorching sun, to the falling yellow leaves when the autumn wind blows every year, morning and evening, day and night, Through wind, frost, rain and snow, many times in the past five or six years, I stood alone on the concrete platform in front of the teaching building and on the garden wall, reading my book and the old locust tree. In 1997, I went to the People's Literature Magazine for training. Everyone invited me. The editor teacher wrote an inscription as a souvenir, and Teacher Li Jingze asked me what to write. Looking up at the distant three-sided plateau, and the old locust tree with thousands of flowers blooming in the primary school, I asked Teacher Li to write what was written above in my notebook. That sentence of my own poem.
Later when I came to Xi’an, Mr. Chen wrote a poem for me: “The Yellow River falls from the sky and flows through the East China Sea, and thousands of miles are written in my mind.
"It is still hanging on the wall behind my office. When visitors enter the room, they first look at the words. In the small dark office in the corridor, the light of the words shines brightly, illuminating the entire humble room...