Gao Xingjian: Soul Mountain

Are you also here because of Lingshan? You should have been able to say something smarter than that. Her hair shakes again, then you begin to chat.

On your own?

She doesn’t answer. The front of the hairdresser’s shop is fitted with neon lights and you see her face. It’s youthful and that slight weariness is distinctly attractive. You look at the women with their heads under the dryers and getting their hair done and say that modernization has been most rapid in this. She looks away, laughs, and you laugh with her. Her hair covers her shoulders and is black and shiny. You want to say, you have lovely hair, but think it would be going a bit too far, so you don’t say it. You walk along with her, and don’t say anything else. It’s not that you don’t want to get on closer terms with her but that you can’t think of the right words to say. You can’t help feeling embarrassed and want to get out of this dilemma as quickly as possible.

May I walk with you? Again, this is really a stupid thing to say.

You’re really a funny person, you seem to hear her mumbling. She looks reproachful and yet approving. However you can tell she’s trying to look cheerful, you must keep up with her quick steps. She’s not a child and you’re no teenager, you try flirting with her.

I can be your guide, you say, this was built in the Ming Dynasty and goes back at least five hundred years, you’re talking about the heat-retaining wall behind the Chinese herbalist’s shop, one of the flying eaves of the gable curls upwards out of the darkness into the star-lit sky. There’s no moon tonight. In the Ming Dynasty, five hundred years ago, no, even just a few decades ago, to walk along this road at night you had to carry a lantern. If you don’t believe me you only have to go off this main street and you’ll be in pitch-black lanes. You don’t even have to go back a few decades, just take twenty or thirty paces and you’ll be back in those ancient times.

While chatting you come to the front of the First Class Fragrance Teahouse where there are adults and children standing along the wall. You stand on tiptoes to look inside and stay there as well. The narrow door leads into the long teahouse where all the square tables have been put away. On the rows of benches are the backs of craning heads and right in the middle is a square table draped with a yellow-bordered red cloth: a storyteller in a robe with wide sleeves is seated on a high stool behind it.

“The sun goes down, thick clouds hide the moon, and as usual the Snake Lord and his wife lead their pack of demons back to the Palace of Blue Vastness. On seeing the plump fair-skinned boys and girls and the lavish banquet of pork, beef and lamb, they are delighted. The Snake Lord says to his wife: This good fortune is due to you. Today’s birthday celebration is magnificent. One of the demons says: Today being her Ladyship’s birthday requires wind and string music and the Master of the Grotto has had to busy himself with these.” Bang! He slams his wooden clapper on the table, “Indeed, lofty aspirations produce ideas!”

He puts aside the clapper and taking the drum stick strikes a few dull beats on the slack drum skin. In his other hand he takes up a tambourine threaded with metal bits which he slowly shakes so that it tinkles. Then in his old rasping voice he begins to explain:

“The Snake Lord gives instructions and in all four quarters are activities which immediately transform the Palace of Blue Vastness with colourful decorations and a medley of wind and string instruments.” He suddenly raises his voice, “And, when the frog heard, it croaked loudly and the owl waved his conductor’s baton.” He deliberately imitates the recitation style used by TV performers and makes the audience roar with laughter.

You look at her and both of you laugh. This is the happy face you’ve been hoping for.

Shall we go in and sit down? You’ve found something to say. You lead her past wooden benches and peoples’ legs, find a bench which isn’t full and squeeze in. Just look at the storyteller trying to get the audience worked up. He’s standing up and banging his clapper again, very loudly.

“The birthday salutations now begin! All the lesser demons —” he gaily hums as he turns to the left performing the actions of bowing with hands cupped together in salutation, then turns to the right to wave his hands and sing in the voice of the old seductress, “Thank you, thank you.”

They’ve been telling this story for a thousand years, you say close to her ear.

And they’ll still go on telling it. She seems to be your echo.

Will they go on telling it for another thousand years? you ask.

Mmm, she replies, pursing her lips like a cheeky child. You feel very happy.

“Let’s go back to Chen Fatong. He makes it to the foot of Donggong Mountain in three days, a journey normally taking seven times seven equals forty-nine days, where he encounters the Daoist Wang. Fatong bows in salutation and says: I have a request of the Venerable Master. The Daoist Wang responds with a salutation and Fatong asks: May I ask where the Palace of Blue Vastness can be found? Why do you ask? The demons there are really fierce. Who would dare go there? My surname is Chen and my name, Fatong, means ‘comprehending Buddha’s laws’. I have come especially to capture the demons. The Daoist Master heaves a sigh and says, young boys and girls have just been sent there today, they may already be in the Snake Lord’s belly. On hearing this, Fatong exclaims, I must go quickly to their rescue!”

Bang! You see the storyteller raising his drum stick in his right hand and rattling the tambourine in his left hand. His eyes open wide until they show the whites and as he recites a chant his whole body begins to shake… You smell something, a subtle fragrance in the midst of the strong smell of tobacco and sweat, it’s coming from her hair and from her. There is the cracking of melon seeds as people eat the seeds with their eyes fixed on the storyteller, who has donned a monk’s robe. He is holding a magic sword in his right hand and a dragon’s horn in his left and talking faster and faster, as if he is spitting out a string of pearls.

“Laying down three times the magic tablet, one-two-three, three troop-summoning amulets instantly muster the divine troops and the generals of Lu Mountain, Mao Mountain and Longhu Mountain, o-ya-ya a-ha-ha da-gu-long-dong cang-ng-ya — ya — ya — wu-hu. Emperor of Heaven, Emperor of Earth, I am the younger brother sent by the True Lord Emperor to exterminate demons. Holding the precious magical sword and treading on the wheel of wind and fire I wheel to the right and wheel to the left —”

She turns and stands up, you follow after her, stepping over people’s legs. They all glare at you.

“Quick, quick, you’ve got your orders!”

A roar of laughter follows the two of you.

What’s the matter?

Nothing.

Why didn’t you want to stay?

I was feeling sick.

You’re sick?

No, I feel better now, it’s stuffy inside.

You walk outside and the people sitting on the street chatting look up at the two of you.

Should we look for somewhere quiet?

Yes.

You lead her around a corner into a small lane, the sound of people and the lights of the street fall behind you. There are no streetlights in the lane, just the weak glow coming from the windows of the houses. She slows down and you think back to what has just happened.

Don’t you think you and I are like the demons being pursued?

She chuckles.

Then you and she can’t stop laughing. She laughs so much that she doubles over. Her heels clatter noisily on the cobblestones. You emerge from the lane and before you are paddy fields bathed in faint glimmering light. In the hazy distance are a few buildings, you know it’s the one middle school in town. A little further off are sprawling hills beneath the grey star-lit night sky. A breeze starts up, bringing ripples of cool air which sink into the clean fragrance of the paddy rice. You draw close to her shoulder, and she doesn’t move away. Neither of you say anything but go wherever your feet take you along the greyish paths between the fields.