MCLC: Laughlin on Mo Yan (1)

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: martin winter (dujuan99 at gmail.com)
Subject: Laughlin on Mo Yan (1)
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Thank you, Charles, for this eloquent and far-reaching defense of
literature. A defense, at least a deeper discussion of art and literature,
is what has been missing from the debate. We've had apologies of Mo Yan, or
the Nobel prize. From himself, in his storied speech. From commentators,
including me. I said debate in China is the best thing, perhaps the only
thing, that comes from this prize. But what kind of debate? And why?
Shouldn't we be glad about the attention for Chinese literature, and for
literature in China? Isn't it enough to read more, and read more carefully?

Nick Kaldis has observed that Anna Sun's article was the first attempt to
debate Mo Yan and the current situation of Chinese literature in literary
terms. Charles has pointed out the crucial flaws. The concept of Mao-speak
or Mao-ti came up in the 1980s in the context of a renaissance of culture,
writing, philosophy, debate- everything that had been missing in the
Mao-aftermath. Charles has emphasized that new literature in the 1980s,
Like the fiction of Yu Luojin, Dai Houying, Zhang Wei, Zheng Yi, Wang
Anyi, Liu Sola, Zhang Xianliang, Han Shaogong, Jia Pingwa, Can Xue, Ma
Yuan, Yu Hua, Ge Fei and many others, along with the critical writing,
philosophy etc. around it, was supposed to overcome the effects of
Mao-speak. Charles has also shown how Anna Sun's view deliberately blocked
out major portions of Chinese literature in many centuries, including the
last 100 years.

But let us go back to the 1980s. In hindsight, it was very naive to believe
that art and literature could renew the nation. What nation? What kind of
nation, stemming from which revolution? It's very easy and futile now to
say all the hope of renewal was naive. The hope ended in 1989, and has been
ending ever since, in the selling off of land, air, culture, heritage,
water, people- with steadily worsening consequences. On the other hand, art
and literature are still involved in an ongoing renewal, with very
interesting results.

The only flaw in Charles' essay, from my point of view, is what I've said
before, too many times perhaps. I believe that ideology isn't harmless.
Questions involving ideology and philosophy aren't harmless. At least they
were thought of as relevant in the 1980s. Copying Mao's seminal 1942 speech
on literature and art in 2012 is just a ritual, yes. But what do Mao
Zedong, the "Yan'an Talks", the involved concepts and the furious critique
of ritual obeisance signify in the first place?

Are they all more important than reading more art? Maybe not. Still, how
about a little theory? What is ideology? Lacan's answer, according to
Zizek, comes down to emptiness. No, this is not about Buddhism. Ideology
is what people hold on to in their hearts and minds, in order to belong.
To belong to a group. To have an answer, the hope of an answer, a meaning.
Do you need to know what your ideology is all about, where it came from,
what it involves? Not really. It's there. Like the belief that everyone is
entitled to buy automatic weapons. Every citizen.

In the 1980s, such questions, or more intelligent ones than I can elaborate
here, there and anywhere, were asked a lot. A very, very big hope was
involved. That's where Liu Xiaobo comes from. That's where Wang Shuo comes
from. That's where Yu Hua comes from. With some writer's, it's not always
obvious where they come from. Liu Zhenyun and Feng Xiaogang, who are known
for lively comedies, with sometimes well-hidden serious issues, have just
released "1942", a film about famine. Man-made famine, mostly. And
campaigns. Campaigns to unite the nation, to beat intruding foreigners.

It is rather obvious where Gao Xingjian comes from, when you hear him
speak. Some Weibo users did that last weekend, for a comparison in Nobel
Literature speeches. Gao's Nobel speech was available, copied on Chinese
servers, which had not been policed very severely in this case,
apparently. Gao Xingjian's Mandarin has a southern accent. He is not hard
to understand, but it's not the kind of Mandarin Mo Yan commands, rather
effortlessly, it seems. Mo Yan is the Writer's Association's vice
chairman. The chairwoman is Tie Ning. I like her stories, they are very
much about memory. But I haven't heard her speak in public. Don't know if
a shining, booming Mandarin like Mo Yan's is the standard at official
cultural associations these days.

Is it obvious where Mo Yan comes from? Everybody knows where he comes from,
we know his aunt, father, wife and brother, as far as they have been
interviewed and compared to how they might appear in his novels. That's
What Mo Yan said in his speech. Is that all we need to know? Mo Yan spoke
about is mother. It was very moving, at least to me. It'a great text, that
speech. Censorship-resistant. Available in six or seven languages on the
official website. Which is blocked in China, of course.

Gao Xingjian and Mo Yan are very different in their language. Everyone who
has read Soul Mountain and One Man's Bible in the original knows that. Mo
Yan and Gao Xingjian are very different in their attempts to overcome
Mao-ti. Both have written great novels, in my experience. Both stay away
from day-to-day political issues and debates. But Gao Xingjian emigrated in
order to write and paint in peace, comparatively. Mo Yan worked on his
spoken Mandarin. Ok, that was unfair, I don't know how he sounded in the
1980s. His novels from back then are great, especially The Garlic Ballads.
Liu Xiaobo liked Red Sorghum, because it was very sexy, in the 1980s. I
Like The Garlic Ballads, and The Republic of Wine. Life and Death Are
Wearing Me Out and Big Breasts And Wide Hips are fascinating, too. All
stories about more or less recent decades. Sandalwood Death is a
19th-century-story. Sex, gore and folklore. Very well done. And maybe as
moving as Mo Yan's words about his mother.

Yu Hua's first novel Cry In The Drizzle has a guy running amuck in China's
1970s. The hero's father, if I remember correctly. Gao Xingjian's Nobel
Made many exiled and self-exiled writers and other culture workers think
about their paths. Maybe the prize was for all of them, in a way. Is Mo
Yan's prize, in a symbolic way, a reward for everyone in China? Depends on
your ideology.

Martin