Qiu Xiaolong - A Case of Two Cities

Hong really knew a lot about Chen. Was Chen reported so much here? Bao felt uncomfortable. It was time for him to stop drinking, he knew. He did not want to go back to being a drunkard. It was against a working-class poet’s image, which he had cherished for years.

THE CONFERENCE WENT ON as before, though not without a few skirmishes between the writers from the two countries. In spite of his earlier, pacifist intentions, Chen could not help getting into heated discussions.

One particular topic that came up upset the Chinese. In the contemporary Chinese literature sessions, the Americans kept talking about a handful of dissident writers, making it seem as if they were the only worthy ones. Bonnie Grant, a senior sinologist with an exclusive translation contract with Gong Ku, a leading Misty poet who had killed his wife and then committed suicide, praised him at the expense of other Chinese poets.

“Those Misty may not be bad,” Chen responded, “but that does not mean they are the only good poets. Their introduction to the Western world could have been done in a more objective way.”

Bonnie hastened to defend her choice, concluding with a sarcastic note, “Gong wrote under a lot of political pressure. For instance, the last two lines in his poem ‘After Rain,’ ‘A world of colorful poisonous mushrooms / after a sudden rain.’ Why poisonous? It’s not about mushrooms, but about new ideas. New ideas that are poisonous to the official ideology. As a member of the Chinese Writers’ Association, you were probably not aware of any political pressure.”

That rattled Chen. It was so ironically untrue. Some Chinese orthodox critics had condemned his own work as being “modernist decadent” too. Chen had intended to argue that the Misty poets had courted Western attention through their political gestures. Instead, he checked the notes and counterargued by pointing out her erroneous rendition, particularly with regard to the image of poisonous mushrooms.

“Your interpretation about ‘poisonous mushrooms,’ I have to say, is farfetched, though you are certainly entitled to your reading. After all, every reading is said to be a misreading in deconstruction. But I happened to be with Gong that day-at a conference in the Yellow Mountains. As always, Gong wore a self-made tall red hat, imagining himself to be a child lost in the woods. That was his adopted persona, and he played that role so completely that he could hardly distinguish between it and his real self. That day he talked about picking mushrooms. It was after a rainfall, the hillside was a riot of them. He declared that he would make mushroom soup that evening, and I told him that some mushrooms could be poisonous-”

“But we can judge only by the text, not by the real or imagined experience behind it,” Bonnie interrupted. “Writing is impersonal, Mr. Chen, haven’t you learned that?”

“You don’t have to use Eliot’s theory to show off to me,” Chen retorted. “In the fifties and sixties, we judged Chinese writers only by political criteria. That was wrong. But today, there seems to be another trend, the opposite political criteria. I liked Gong’s poetry because it was fresh from his deliberately childish perspective-fresh after the Cultural Revolution. How can such a child be so political?”

Chen’s speech nettled Bonnie, but she was at a disadvantage. Chen was far more familiar with the background of the lines she had quoted. The Americans did not make an immediate response. Zhong applauded, and the other Chinese followed. Afterward, Martin Beck, an American publisher, asked Chen to write an article for his magazine.

As they left the conference hall at the end of the morning session, Chen got an unexpected call from Tian. It would be unrealistic, Chen had believed, to expect any breakthrough from a bookish businessman who had had no experience in investigation, but Tian surprised him with new information.

“Xing’s mother will go to the Buddha Glory Temple this afternoon. She is a devoted believer. She goes every Thursday afternoon, her weekly routine, like other people going to church here. And Xing will be with her.”

“That’s something, Tian. What does she do there?”

“Burn tall incenses, I think, and draw bamboo sticks of divination.”

“I see,” Chen said. Buddhism remained popular among old Chinese. His mother, a passionate believer, kept burning tall incenses to a Buddhist shrine in her attic home, praying that Chen might settle down with a family of his own in the near future. Years earlier, she had taken him to an ivy-mantled temple in Hangzhou, he remembered, where she drew bamboo sticks of fortune shortly before the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution, but that marvelous oracle did not prove true. Her husband passed away with the Red Guards’ slogans rattling the window over his deathbed. And her son later became a cop. “And what does Xing do there?”

“He keeps her company. He has made several donations on her behalf.”

“How have you learned all this, Tian?”

“I called local Chinese newspaper editors. Now don’t worry, Chen. I haven’t approached any of them directly. Xing’s going to make another statement exposing and condemning his persecution by the Beijing government. So they brought up the subject.”

“Thanks, Tian. That may be really important to my work.”

That afternoon there was a scheduled visit to Disneyland, Chen knew. During the lunch, he found himself finally embraced as “one of us,” as approval poured in from the delegation members.

“You have reasons, and you have principles, Chen,” Zhong said.

“You have said what we all would have said,” Peng nodded vigorously.

“I am glad that Beijing has chosen you.” Shasha patted his hand. “You are experienced in dealing with those Americans.”

“Those Misty poets are groveling dogs,” Bao said, “chewing a pathetic bone thrown out by the foreigners.”

Chen complained of a headache, making little response.

Shasha said that Chen looked pale, touching his forehead. Zhong claimed that the delegation head had worked too hard. That was probably true. Bao, not unpleased to assume his Party secretary responsibility for one afternoon, urged Chen to take a break in the hotel. Chen agreed reluctantly, like a responsible delegation head.

The moment the delegation left the hotel, Chen changed into a T-shirt and jeans, picked up a mini recorder, and sneaked out. There seemed to be no suspicious-looking people outside. He hailed a taxi.

“To the Buddha Glory Temple,” he told the driver.

It was a long drive. Sitting in the back of the car, he tried to think of a plan for the afternoon. It was out of the question for him to approach Xing. No point revealing his identity as a Chinese investigator. He wondered whether he would be able to talk to Xing at all. Perhaps, as in a proverb, he told himself, there will be a road with the car reaching the mountains.

The temple turned out to be a rather splendid one, made of red walls and yellow roofs and upturned black eaves decked with mythological figurines, like those seen in Suzhou and Hangzhou. There were not only Chinese monks and believers kowtowing and scripture-chanting in the courtyard, but also Americans, some in Asian costumes or with a large Chinese character Fo -Buddha-printed on their T-shirts. No one paid him any special attention.

He walked to the large main hall, in which towering clay images sat majestic in the front. There was a huge bronze incense burner before the gilded Buddha. He bought a bunch of incense, put it into the burner, and imitated others by clasping his palms piously. He then turned around, noticing an oblong mahogany table at one side of the hall. There were books and bamboo containers holding bamboo sticks on the table, behind which stood a middle-aged, deep-wrinkled, clean-shaven monk in a scarlet and yellow patchwork gown, apparently in charge of interpretation.