Keywords: Shen Congwen's "Border Town" social ideal contradiction
First, Shen Congwen's social ideal
Shen Congwen was born in the picturesque Fenghuang county in Xiangxi legend. The blood of Miao, Tujia and Han nationalities runs through his body, which brings him special temperament and colorful fantasies. There are also ethnic minorities who have been oppressed for a long time and have accumulated heavy sadness and pain in their hearts. As a teenager, Shen Congwen often witnessed famines, riots, killings and robberies in his hometown. He developed a kind of humanity: humanitarianism and the idea of going to big cities to find an ideal. The fuse of Shen Congwen's running away from home was that several local rich gentlemen wanted to accept him as a son-in-law. This is actually a strategy. Those who are dominant in the local area can establish and consolidate the intricate ruling network of the upper class through marriage. However, the independent Shen Congwen refused to be their son-in-law and a country gentleman. He felt that he should have his own "first love". He fell in love with a girl and was convinced that she loved himself. Shen Congwen's thought is the same as Nuo Song in Border Town. What he really needs is the activity of life. He wants to go out, but he doesn't want to take the inherent squire's disorderly road. Shen Congwen finally decided to go out of Xiangxi and think about more serious life and social problems.
From the countryside to the big cities, Shen Congwen witnessed the depraved upper-class life, and had an inexplicable aversion to the vulgarity, meanness and selfishness of urban people. This triggered his homesickness and made him yearn for the simple folk customs in his hometown that were not completely destroyed by modern material civilization. What he saw when he returned to his hometown made him very disappointed. In the inscription of Long River, he said: "On the surface, everything has naturally made great progress, but if you look closely, you will see the declining trend in change. The most obvious thing is that the simple and honest human beauty in rural society is almost disappearing, and it is replaced by a realistic and profitable outlook on life that has been successfully cultivated in the real society in the past 20 years. " It is not difficult to understand that most of his works are rendering the simple style of Xiangxi people. There are many chapters in his works that explicitly or implicitly criticize the hidden dangers and ugliness of Xiangxi society, which are often in sharp contrast with the beautiful pastoral pictures.
After Shen Congwen left the tea cave, he contacted some people at the bottom of society and felt that the profound secular concept was far from real life. All the social phenomena he felt were "darkness" and "evil", but behind the evil were all things for "people" and dazzling light. He found that the folk customs of Xiangxi, such as chivalrous, generous, vigorous and rough, contained vigorous vitality and the natural humanity of Xiangxi people who were born without affectation and true temperament. In social life, Shen Congwen emphasized the loss of humanity and ethics caused by the abnormal development of urban modern civilization, but he also realized the adhesion between traditional morality and closed conservatism, so he thought about the weaknesses of "country people" and put forward how to organize them to compete in new ways. Shen Congwen reflected on Xiangxi culture and felt that Xiangxi people compromised naturally, which was more humane and natural on the surface, but as a result, they could not adapt to the trend and were forced to withdraw from the historical stage. Shen Congwen's feelings for his hometown are intertwined with love and hate, hope and disappointment.
The story of Border Town is very simple: in the early years of the Republic of China, grandpa and Cui Cui were ferrying at the ferry, and Cui Cui's marriage became the biggest worry of the old boatman. His only worry was to give Cui Cui to a reliable person. There are always four boats and two sons on board. Big brother Tianbao is honest and silent by nature, and they are handsome, lively and kind. At the age of fifteen, in "Descendants", he met Nuo at the Dragon Boat Festival, which made him feel strange, but he was evasive in front of two guys, which made the old boatman very unhappy. The boatman sent someone to propose to the boss, and the old boatman was in a dilemma. The two brothers explained the story and sang a love song on the mountain. When Cui Cui heard this love song, her throat moved. The old boatman was so happy that he told the boss about it. Half a month ago, the old boatman was killed in Tianbao before he heard the folk songs. The Tianbao family blamed Tianbao's death on the old boatman's evasion when he asked for relatives. After a long time, the old boatman understood Cui Cui's concern. When he was sent to entertain him, he was greeted with cold eyes. Unwilling, the old boatman went to the boatman's house to propose marriage, but he was rejected. Wang Tuan has been asking her daughter to take the mill as a dowry, but the ship has always agreed and sent her out on the grounds of trespassing. The old boatman was exhausted and died in the night of thunder and lightning. After this incident, I grew up and waited for promise all the year round. In Border Town, Shen Congwen did not describe the Xiangxi society in the 1930s in real time, but tried to rebuild the past yearning for Xiangxi and infatuation with romanticism. Shen Congwen is seriously thinking about the future of society, grasping the crux of all the problems of our nation, and understanding the weakness of the national outlook on life, futile superstition, laziness, and the karma that exists due to the bad influence of history. And in the works, it is enough to warn people not to be ignorant, otherwise, there will be more tragic scenes. The author is thinking about what he should do.
In Border Town, the author wrote his spiritual accumulation and unforgettable feelings in a romantic atmosphere. This is a desolate and dreamy song, but the author always pays attention to social changes, hoping to find a good medicine to change the national spirit. However, there are also some dark sides of human nature in the primitive culture of Xiangxi, such as superstition, ignorance and belief in karma. Moreover, Xiangxi is not as pure as it used to be, and it is being impacted by modern civilization, and people have already produced Vishville's values in their hearts. These make Shen Congwen's social ideal have a profound contradiction.
Second, the contradiction of Shen Congwen's aesthetic pursuit
Border Town is a famous novel that eulogizes the beauty of human nature and human feelings, but it has experienced the most inhuman and inhuman things in this novel. A pair of true lovers-Cui Cui's parents: a soldier in a tea cave and a woman in western Hunan hand in hand to die. Actually, can't you escape? Why did you choose to end your life? Did you ruin the reputation of a soldier by running away? Until Cui Cui grew up, her grandfather still felt inferior and blamed himself. When the old man came to propose to Cui Cui, his grandfather saw Cui Cui's mind. The author wrote: "He still remembers the poor mother's past, with a little pain in his heart but a smile on his face." Their death is irresponsible, an escape, and there is no courage to dare to love and hate. Their love for each other is no greater than their love for vanity and fear of rigid rules. Their love is real, attracted to each other, and has a crystallization. They should have a marriage relationship, because they were pregnant before the wedding and they lost three lives?
This is not beautiful human nature, nor is it great without fear of death.
In addition, Border Town is extremely tolerant of prostitutes, which shows the simplicity and sincerity of the love between men and women in the tea cave. "Short-term engagement, long-term marriage, one-time deal", these transactions in women, because of the simple folk customs, the parties are not ashamed. This may explain Shen Congwen's inner contradiction: on the one hand, he rejected this kind of openness without moral constraints from his own heart, but this kind of feeling is the essence of primitive people and he admires it. The concept of life and death in Border Town loves and hates nature, but this nature is only because Xiangxi has been experiencing social turmoil and has not accepted new ideas for a long time. People's ideas are inherited from their elders, and nothing will cause fierce conflicts in people's minds, thinking that all this is correct. Shen Congwen used a romantic and poetic style when describing this kind of life-and-death love and hate, and he was far-sighted and idyllic. It feels like a painting, perfectly integrated with nature, and the real life story that happened there is far from our border town, so it will be difficult for people to feel and understand behind this calm and cruelty.