我在那个世界里的事情

现在是半夜，朋友，外面漆黑，天上下大雨，院子里人群涌动，闹哄哄的，大雨打在他们的油布雨披上，“蓬蓬蓬蓬……”地响个不停。他们正在挖那棵樟树，在樟树边上放着一棵油桐树，是他们刚刚从很远的地方拖来的。昨天傍晚，他们冲进我的房里，商量的就是这件事。他们商量来、商量去，一会儿闹，一会儿哭，一会儿跳，一会儿又疑神疑鬼，开始在我房里找什么东西。一个壮汉抽起筋来，一下子叫出了声：“原来如此，要栽一棵油桐树！”

“要栽一棵油桐树！哈！哈！哈！”他们全体疯叫，流着口涎，忽又用小眼瞪住了我，那些眼睛是一个个隧洞。壮汉专心致志地做了一个圈套，还眨着眼，将那圈套往我脖子上扔。“你，怎么敢占据这间房子？”他谴责地低语。我也搞不清我怎么在这里。我记得一开始外面正在下雪，空旷的原野里渺无人迹。后来雪停了，月白色的天庭里垂下刺目的冰凌，我仰面躺着，伸出一个指头，指头上长满了霜花。原野里有冰冻的仙人掌，还有透明的爬行动物，那些精致的冰柱从天上垂下来，戳到了地面。我侧了侧脑袋，听见一种“哧哧”的响声，那是冰柱在向地底生长。然后他们进来了，这些人全都自称是我的远房亲戚，在我小时候救过我的性命的。我的眼睛从他们的肩头望出去，看见奔丧的队伍绕过光秃秃的小山坡，人影像一条条细绳子飘上飘下，一管箫在空中时隐时现，哀哀地吹出听不出来的调子。

“首先得除掉那棵樟树。”门角上的老婆子突然说。她是一只老鹰，全身裹着黑披风，肩头一耸一耸地抽搐，嗓子却细得像小鸡叫。

“对，挖掉樟树。”大家同意。忽又慌张起来：“莫非有人偷听？到处都是贼，什么事都不可靠，我们不要忽视这类问题。从刮大风的那天起，天上就出现了裂缝……”

“我们要栽油桐树！”他们用劲而肯定地说，边说还边跺脚，激动得大哭起来。一些人眼里噙着泪花，相互喋喋不休地诉说多年来的惶恐和即将展现的前景，完了你踢我的背，我踢你的屁股，还像猴子一样攀上窗棂，眺望暮气中的小山包。

老鹰变的黑婆子偷偷抄起门后一把锄头，冷不防向门外挖去，听见一声婴儿的惨叫，公鸡在远方错误地啼起明来，许多布鞋在尘埃里飞奔，“砰！”地一声，有人在屋当中砸烂了一个瓶子。

我看见奔丧队伍中的那管箫在窗玻璃上探来探去，像一个鬼头鬼脑的窃听者。壮汉发现了我的目光，立刻冲上前，用宽背严严实实地挡住了窗玻璃。

“在外面，”我开始讲话了，从他们进来，我就想讲话，我总忍不住，像有鬼使神差一样，“石灰岩上的池塘里，有一件永恒的事：只要天上开始落霜，死水就丁冬作响……雪地上有一条巨蟒，盘成一个耐人寻味的大圈套……有一个灰色的影子，在池边弯下腰去打捞……”

他们没听到我的话，或许在他们看来，我根本就不曾说话，只不过在奇怪地摇着头部，扭着身子，像一条蚯蚓。他们小心翼翼地踮起脚避开我，有一个婆子还好奇地用一把削铅笔的小刀在我腰上刺了一下，然后对什么人说：“原来里面是不锈钢，啧啧啧，嘘……不要出声，门外有人在偷听。”

我闭上眼蜷缩在墙根，朋友，我在想那座冰山。我想，只要海洋解冻，冰山就开始游移，我从水中抬起头来，看见它缓缓而行，像一只庄重的白鲸在沉思。苍穹里的冰凌在滴水，“滴滴答、滴滴答……”一根通天冰柱“咔嚓”一声断裂了，碎冰晃耀着梦幻的蓝色，飞快地划出一道道弧线，一眨眼又消失了。冰凌的光芒是永恒而刺目的，朋友，你是否体验过？当你的胸腔打开，头颅变成反光镜，繁星便黯然失色，太阳也变得不知所措，幽幽地一亮一黑。我从水中抬起头来，抖掉额头上的冰渣，眯了眯眼睛。天上在落霜。“有那么一天早上，”我轻轻地对自己说，“我说‘就这样。’于是一切又重新开始。大地又变得混沌。在巨大的、毛茸茸的毯子下面，生长着朦胧的欲望和异样的骚动，植物便渐渐洋溢着淫荡的绿色……但我没法重新开始，我已经进入了这个世界，冰凌的光芒是永恒而刺目的，流星也要惊骇地坠落下地，变成丑陋的石头，沉默的雪峰大放异彩。我固守在这个世界里，朋友，我正在向上生长，长成无数通天冰柱中的一根。当那种颤抖的回光晃耀起来时，我的周身痒痒的，像许多叶芽要从内部暴出，我动了动脖子，听见清风在叶片间吹口哨，饱满的汁液在腋下流淌。”

我的眼睛透过蒙灰的玻璃瞪着外面。

樟树已经挖出来了，一个婆子嘻嘻哈哈地跳进那个洞，在泥水里向上一蹦一蹦地疯闹。大家铲着土往她身上扔。

“这里还有一个！”壮汉忽然笔直地指着玻璃后面我那双眼睛，阴险地“嘿嘿”直笑。

“还有一个？？”人群一愣，接着又骚动起来，四处逃窜。被埋在坑里的婆子默不作声，一下子就变成了一块化石。

我知道他们马上要回来抓我了，我把门紧紧拴上，然后钻进一口大木箱，盖上盖子。我想赶紧向那里飞升，我想赶紧再变成那根冰柱，一切都要赶紧。这皮囊的桎梏被挣开，鲜血像喷泉一样飞溅。时间不多了，因为奔丧的队伍已经临近那片荒野，北风将那些细绳子刮得乱成一团，而在沼泽那一边，奔跑着一群饿狼。“哦、哦、哦～”一个老头唱道，含混的声音被传得极远、极远。在我听来，他仿佛一直唱着一个单调的词：“绳子哟，绳子哟，绳子哟～”于是绳子们纠缠得更欢，老头消失了，歌声在天边回响，“当啷”一声，那管黑色的箫被撞落下来。

我听见了狼群的脚步。

当海洋微微蠕动起来时，我把背部露出水面，灼热的强光扩张着我的心脏。我翻过身来，寻找那面镜子，在疾速的一瞥中发现自己的眼睛变成了两朵紫罗兰。白鲸的沉思是永恒不破的，碎冰在远方撞击……冰的世界里没有昼夜。我从水中抬起头来，使劲地打开胸腔，雪白的火星向天际喷射，冰峰也冒出紫烟，深沉地隆隆作响。

你当然知道这是怎么回事，朋友，我是说关于那个世界，关于冰凌。从前有那么一次，天上飘着雪花，我们并排坐在街沿上，合唱“妈妈的鞋子”，然后你跪下去，开始舔地上的那些白色精灵，你说那是白糖，你把小脸冻得冰冷发青，指头肿起好大。那一次，在一道电光中，我就见到了，但我还不会传达给你。待我想起来要传达给你的时候，你已经长成了沉着的男子汉，浑身都是那种烟味。多少年，多少年，我一直在徘徊。我在河边疯走，将折断的柳枝扔得到处都是。有时我停下来，用泪眼凝视前方，它在向我微笑，但它不来。我笨拙地唱出记忆中的“妈妈的鞋子”，呼唤那远古的幽灵。日复一日，年复一年，它仍然躲藏在雾里。

有一段时间我曾经不再等待，因为亲戚们发现我在河堤上跑来跑去，便认定我出了毛病。他们趁我熟睡时捆起我的手脚，将我关进一个破庙。到夜晚，庙里活动着数不清的鬼魅，还有什么东西在地底狂奔乱跳。他们放我出来时，我果真出了毛病，我的脸部肿起老高，一天到晚往外渗出粘液，两条风干的腿子直打哆嗦，我逢人就揪住他们的衣袖，一个字一个字地说：“夜晚真快乐。”下陷的两眼闪着凶光，手指头在衣袋里扭来扭去。我还制了一个猴子的假面，闯进亲戚家中，随随便便地搂住他们的脖子，大声嚷嚷：“夜晚真快乐！”他们审慎地打量我，点着头，窃窃私语，我知道他们决定了什么。他们在等一个机会，正如等老母鸡下蛋。

那门已经被撞出了一条很宽的裂缝，有人探进来一把铁铲。

朋友，时候到了，你听，燃烧的冰雹正像暴雨一样落下来，透明的大树摇摆着洁白的华盖，海水肉感地跃动。我和你手牵手升出海面，眯缝着眼沐浴着冰的光焰，用胸腔唱出“妈妈的鞋子”…

Can Xue’s novel Frontier, translated by Karen Gernant and Chen Zeping, and with an introduction by Porochista Khakpour, comes out March 14 from Open Letter Books. 

Can Xue is the greatest living writer on earth, I’ve often said. And I am the luckiest living writer on earth for being not just a fan but the friend of the greatest living writer on earth. Can Xue often emails me with talk of literature and politics, checks up on my social media outlets to see how I am doing, offers all sorts of health advice (we are both chronically ill), and sometimes just drops a simple hello from Beijing. I had read her for years before meeting her—at first, thanks to stumbling on a story of hers in a Daniel Halpern international literature anthology, The Art of the Story. Soon I realized that Bradford Morrow had published her in Conjunctions for ages and I went back through the issues. (Years later, I got a job as writer-in-residence at Bard College and he became my colleague.) Everything I read I fell in love with, even as it was always over my head on some level; I’d never enjoyed feeling so inadequate more than when reading Can Xue! But I’d also feel her work deep in my body and soul, in a way I’d never quite experienced with experimental writing, art that often only fed the top layer of my brain. The experience of reading Can Xue cannot be compared to any other reading experience.

Then when I served on the Neustadt Prize jury in 2015, I finally had direct contact with her, as the Neustadt Prize—what some call “the American Nobel”—requires that we notify who we nominate (of course, she was my nominee). Can Xue was most excited about the part of the prize that involved coming to the United States, where she feels her best readers are. In the end, she was a close finalist but didn’t win—and so we decided to figure out a way to arrange for her to visit the States anyway. I helped organize a tour for her, which would include her ever-adoring tailor husband, Lu Yong (it would be his first visit to the States). The tour this past fall was an enormous success: a whirlwind of excellent talks in Chinese and English, huge crowds and long lines of scholars and students, endless Q&As, never a boring meal all over the country, and conversation-packed walks through several cities. (Walking with Can Xue through Central Park and then spending a day with her at the Metropolitan Museum of Art might be one of the highlights of my life!) At Bard and MIT and the Asian American Writers Workshop—the events I worked on most closely—students are still talking about her visit. When I ask them what touched them the most during her talks, their thoughts mirror mine: how she never tried to write creatively until she was thirty, how she endured the horrors of life in the labor camps during the Cultural Revolution that interrupted her education at age thirteen, how she refuses to revise her work and believes in the performance of the first draft, how she holds on to optimism and a belief in the future while also revering the riches of past (modernist writers, canonical philosophers, iconic artists of ages ago)—and how she is so transcendently alive. Truly, her laughter can fill a room with light just as her intellect can set pages on fire.

With six novels, fifty novellas, 120 short stories, and six works of literary criticism and commentary—only a fraction of which have been translated in English—as well as a 2015 BTBA Award in 2015, Can Xue should be more well-known, greatest living writer that she is.  But while she might not be a household name, she is no secret in the literary world either. She counts among her fans the late Susan Sontag and Robert Coover, as well as John Darnielle and Eileen Myles—and I discover many more every time I speak of her publicly. I wrote to my friend Eileen about her recently again and she had a few words to say: “Can Xue walks an urgent and excited line between reality and fantasy, legend and presence, politics and surrealism. The moment I picked up her work I felt like I had found a friend and an inspiration. Her feminism is in the gut of the work and in the uniquely radiantly mad mind. It feels like work that had to be written. Like we have to take our suffering and our precious time and infuse it with magic. I’ve learned so much from her.” Indeed, we are all her students. The following interview was conducted over email over the course of months and is a fairly typical interaction between this master and this apprentice, creator and reader, icon and fan, two writers and two friends.

Porochista Khakpour (KP): I’ve had the great honor to write the introduction of your new book Frontier (pictured left). I wonder if you could tell us where you first got the idea for Frontier. The origin story of this tale, the genesis of this project, very much interests me as I consider this the most mysterious of Can Xue’s work!

Can Xue (CX): I think this is a very good question. Let me explain how I create and build up a novel. It’s a long journey, a special kind of journey that is realized through my continuing performances. It’s impossible for me to “have an idea” for a novel before the novel is being created, step by step, through my daily improvisational performances until it is finished at last. Because when I am writing, what I depend on is mainly the performance of my body, not just my thinking. In my view, the performance of one’s body is much more difficult than the thinking that occurs in one’s brain. You can’t know the meaning of your words and sentences before they are actually written down; you can’t know even after that. I usually know the “meaning” several months after I finish a novel. In the process of the writing, all you need is a strong passion and firm resolution—a resolution of performance. Of course, this sort of creation also needs a powerful original force to sustain it from start to end.

I always think that my writing is somewhat similar to Isadora Duncan’s dance. It’s not something external that gives you an idea about your tale; it’s a body’s passion and resolution that produces an essential movement. So when I am writing, I don’t need inspiration in the usual sense. Because at that moment, I am the inspiration, and I am Great Nature, which, as a Chinese writer, means the ultimate setting in my philosophical and artistic view; a warmer setting than God in the West. My body also becomes the body of Great Nature. As soon as I start the performance, the beautiful pattern of Great Nature gradually unfolds. What I need to do is just concentrate on my acting, indulging in the wildest fantasy. By the end, everything I write down forms that pattern naturally. I know this explanation is still mysterious for readers, but it is a matter of practicing, not just “thinking.” You have to do it very often; then you may understand it step by step. That means that reading works by Can Xue is also a sort of performance.

Before I start a novel, I sometimes say to myself: “I’m going to write a big thing this time. Because recently there are so many things surging and tingling in my dark heart.” Usually whatever I write down first is perfect—I call that “material thinking.”

PK: How do you see this work as fitting into your canon? I often wonder what order you would have readers read you or which books you now favor or how you see them all next to each other.

CX: Actually I view all of my works as a whole that is indivisible. I think my writing can be seen as a tree that is growing continuously all the time. It has its specific pattern in each growing period. Maybe some readers like works that are from an early period, while others like the later ones better, according to their personalities. As for me, when I consider my fiction—a lot of stories and six novels—as a whole, I like to list them according to the time that they were written. Strangely, I feel that each of my six novels is my favorite. Maybe by the time I wrote them, my artistic self was fully mature. From Five Spice Street and The Last Lover to Frontier and Love in the New Millennium, and two others, I think every one of them ranks first in the literary circles of the world. They are so beautiful, and each one reached a higher level of body and spirit. When you list them according to the time they were written, you can see this clearly. So I can’t decide which is best, because each one displays a unique kingdom of beauty.

My performance have never failed me in these long, sustained projects. And Frontier is a mature novel, one of my best. Every time I reread, it gives me new ideas. I view the book as the most successful pursuit of freedom. The border town in the story is not the type that people see or think about in daily life, but a more real small cosmos that is described as an ideal of nature and humanity. I build up the kingdom of freedom, and everything in it (people, plants, animals, and so on) presents an immortal painting. These people force themselves to lead a brave life—a free life that is like always getting ready to fly across an abyss. One thing I would like to share is that the English translation is beautiful and poetic.

PK: What were your influences on Frontier outside of the performance of Can Xue? I think about the animals in particular, and the actual town we have here. If you had to be your own psychodetective, could you say where this imagery came from?

CX: Usually when I work on a big new project, I try hard to exercise more seriously every day (jogging twice a day), and to keep myself in a state of high tension. When I wrote Frontier, I jogged in our community (in 2006, Beijing was not as dirty as nowadays). The sky was so blue; I felt that those trees were spring up freely, and I was melting into the sky, the trees, the grass . . . I call this exercise “drawing information from Great Nature.” After that, the grotesque images will surge out even when I am not writing. Sometimes I write down one or two words as a note, but my writing is an improvisation—the strange animals will come, the plants that belong to a paradise will come too, when I am acting. Because as soon as you launch the mechanism of the paradox of your body, every image evoked is aimed toward freedom automatically. But in my view, to an artist, psychological levels are relatively superficial. The best reader for this sort of fiction should not only look for clues from the field of psychology. They should be more profound and broad. I think all of the clues are in an artistic self. The best reader should draw wisdom and nourishment from literature itself, from philosophy and history, and then build up his modern view of the world or the arts gradually.

PK: How long did it take to write and what were your habits when writing Frontier?

CX: I took about a year (or less?) to finish Frontier. That was in 2006 (it was published in 2008). I remember how happy I was during that time. The setting of the story seems to be the Xin Jiang province in the northwest of China, although I have never been there. But during that time, my wonderful Xin Jiang remained in the depths of my mind all day long—even I myself didn’t realize it. That was really a fantastic experience.

In terms of my writing habits, I always write for an hour every day, usually in the morning. Just one thousand words (a page), not more, not less. Because I want to keep my images fresh. I sit down, a pen in my hand, and after one or two minutes, I begin to write sentence by sentence. This acting continues for about an hour; then the page is finished, I stand up, and do other things and forget my writing for the time being. Strangely, there’s no need for me to change anything I have written down. It’s there, neat and beautiful, just like my handwriting. . . This is my habit when I write fiction, and for Frontier, of course, the habit remained the same. Actually, I have not changed my writing habit for thirty-three years!

PK: You often write of surreal realities. “Other worlds,” one might even say, or “dream realities” or the realities of subconscious. But what do you think when the surface is also so surreal? For example, America right now is in chaotic, almost psychedelic, upheaval. What happens when the truth is stranger than fiction? What do you think of Trump and the chaos in America at the moment? I know things have not been easy in China either, but how do you handle it? Do you think much about politics anymore? Do you feel it matters for art? How can readers and writers alike approach this—should we immerse or ignore?

CX: As the saying goes, “onlookers see more than the player.” As an eastern artist and a foreigner who has closely watched the changes in the United States, I don’t think the current situation in the country is that strange. Although American people have a long excellent tradition of democracy, and the system of the country is relatively good, at the same time, the country also has a long conservative tradition. This tradition usually functions as nationalism. For many years the political elite who led the country followed the principle of “political correctness.” They neither really knew their own people, nor understood people in other countries. The only thing they usually did was to hold high the banner of justice for their policymaking. So I think that the phenomenon of Trump is a great explosion of contradictions. It shows that the leaders of the country are more and more out of touch with the American people. They don’t know what people think about, and how they feel about their lives nowadays. And also, the theory the leaders depend on to rule the country, to deal with their foreign affairs, is a very old one that is not suitable for the situations of the world that is changing rapidly.

Because of great disappointment in their leaders, the people turned to Trump—a nationalist, and a conservative strongman—hoping that he would bring a better life for them. “The people get the government they deserve”—this is what happened in the United States recently, I think. Although Trump represents only half of the people. It is a very serious problem, and how to enlighten the masses is still a long tough task before the intellectuals. But first, the intellectuals have to find the right theory, change their outdated worldview, and explore humanistic ways to administer their country and to deal with their foreign policy. In these aspects I think President Barack Obama has done a better job than other leaders. But the time was too short, so he couldn’t change the past during his term.

Yes, I always pay attention to politics. And I feel it matters for art. But as a modern artist, I take a historical perspective to exam events that burst out suddenly. The history of human beings is long; we can’t measure it in a decade or even decades. Historical events are the power source for my creation; I have always been angry or excited for the events. But I think the main duty of an artist is to change the souls and bodies of common people. We must do more work, and enlighten people with our work. Our work is very important to politics in the world—as the events of Trump and Brexit show. Of course an artist is also a common person. If someday people here take to the streets, it’s possible that I would join them.

PK: When you came on your US university tour this autumn, no matter where we were—Bard College, MIT, the Asian American Writers Workshop—I was taken with how much young people loved you. I’ve never seen more young people ask questions and want to simply be around an author. I know you also love your young readers. I wonder if you could talk about who your ideal reader is, as well as why young people matter so much to you.

CX: In my heart, an ideal reader is someone who believes two things—love and creation. Those two things are also the core of my work. Can Xue loves people and the world. Communication is the most important thing for her. And at the same time she pursues a life of creation that is always new, that changes every day; she welcome challenges, and never stays in one place.

Why do young people matter so much for Can Xue? Because they are Can Xue’s hope. The works by Can Xue are the fables of beauty—they may not be realized right away—but young readers will realize them someday, I think. 

Read Kate Prengel’s review of Frontier

Read Can Xue’s essay “‘The Fair-haired Princess’ and Serious Literature

Read Can Xue’s story “The Old Cicada”

Can Xue, meaning “dirty snow, leftover snow, but also pure snow on the top of a mountain,” is the pseudonym of Deng Xiaohua. She was born in 1953 in Changsha City, Hunan Province; her parents were sent to the countryside during the Cultural Revolution, and she only graduated from elementary school. Can Xue learned English on her own and wrote books on Borges, Shakespeare, and Dante. Her publications in English include Frontier, The Embroidered Shoes, Five Spice Street, Vertical Motion, and The Last Lover, which won the 2015 Best Translated Book Award for Fiction.

Published Mar 13, 2017   Copyright 2017 Porochista Khakpour

Porochista Khakpour is the author of the forthcoming memoir Sick (Harper Perennial), and the novels The Last Illusion (Bloomsbury, 2014)—a 2014 “Best Book of the Year” according to NPR, Kirkus, Buzzfeed, Popmatters, Electric Literature, and more—and Sons and Other Flammable Objects (Grove, 2007)—the 2007 California Book Award winner in “First Fiction,” one of the Chicago Tribune’s “Fall’s Best,” and a New York Times “Editor’s Choice.” Her writing has appeared in or is forthcoming in Harper’s, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, Al Jazeera America, Bookforum, Slate, Salon, Spin, The Daily Beast, Elle, and many other publications around the world. She’s had fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the University of Leipzig (Picador Guest Professorship), the Corporation of Yaddo, the Ucross Foundation, and Northwestern University’s Academy for Alternative Journalism, among others. Born in Tehran and raised in Los Angeles, she lives in New York City’s Harlem. She is currently writer-in-residence at Bard College.

Dan, this was another wonderful review! I don’t think Can Xue is for me, but I see that Scribd has it on audio so I might as well give it a try at some point, hey? Can’t wait to see what weird book you pick up next!

I’m so intrigued, slightly nervous but intrigued and must hunt out some Can Xue immediately, If only to find out how Daybreak Nation matches the tone of the book

Well, as you know, I did read this book... And it's recently been usurped as the weirdest book I've ever read, by Near to the Wild Heart by Clarice lispector. After reading lispector, I realize that there is a certain logic within Can Xue's work, and I appreciate it more now. And of course, since I've watched your video, I understand it, well, maybe 5% more LOL. I like that you picked up on the nostalgia and the history, I don't think I picked up on that on my first reading. Did you have to read this twice before you could do a review? I think I would have to. And yes, I did do women in Translation month, I read The Unit by ninni holmqvist, which is about as different from this as you can get, a very straightforward piece of dystopian fiction oh, but it was quite enjoyable. Or maybe not that different, since in the unit, there's definitely been some sort of major world changing event, and we never find out exactly what it is. And now I'm reading My Brilliant Friend, in other words, the most basic bitch thing you can read for women in Translation month LOL

I love it when I get haunted by the text. Then I'm left later with just the remnant of the feeling, but forget a lot about the actual text. Maybe that's the beauty of it?

I've read a bunch of her stories, including The Last Lover. I highly recommend her book of short stories, Vertical Motion.