Gao Xingjian - One Man

Tolstoy's play The Forces of Darkness lay at the top of a box; water seeping through the cracks had added yellow streaks to old Tolstoy's beard on the cover. The play was about a peasant killing a baby, and its dark intense psychology had once shaken him; it was totally different from the early aristocratic feel of War and Peace, written in Tolstoy's early years. Afraid it would disturb the inner peace he had only just achieved, he didn't open the book.

He felt like reading some books that were remote from the environment he lived in, some faraway stories that were pure imagination, something puzzling, like Wild Duck in The Collected Plays of Ibsen. Also, there was the first volume of Hegel's Aesthetics, which he had bought years ago but hadn't even opened. Doing some reading would help relieve his physical weariness. He put all his copies of Marx and Lenin on the desk, and, before going to bed, took out of the box the book he wanted to read, and, sitting up in bed with the light on, leisurely flipped through the pages. The light globe hung from the rafter, and, without a shade, lit the window. The peasant homes near and far were in complete darkness at night. People were frugal in their use of electricity and went to bed right after the evening meal. Only his solitary hut had a light on, but he thought that to try to conceal it was pointless and would be sure to arouse suspicions.

He was not reading seriously, but was lost in thought and just turning the pages. He couldn't understand the characters in Wild Duck, because old man Hegel would always materialize out of nothing and turn aesthetic feelings into a morass of intellectual analysis. The characters lived in some fictitious village, but if they were to see this real world of his, they would not be able to understand or believe it either. He lay there, listening to the patter of the rain on the tiles above him. In the rainy season, it was wet everywhere, and the grass along the road and the seedlings in the paddy fields grew madly at night, becoming taller and greener by the day. He was to spend his life in the paddy fields, growing and harvesting, year after year. Generations of life would be like paddy rice. People would be like plants, they would not need a brain, wouldn't that be more natural? And the total collected strivings of humankind-that is, culture-would, in fact, be so much wasted effort.

Where was the new life? He recalled these words of his classmate Luo, who had come to this realization much earlier. Maybe he should just find himself a peasant girl and raise children. This would be his home forever.

Before the harvest, there were a few free days, and all the men of the village went up the mountains for firewood, so he also went along, a hacking knife on his belt. He went to the county town once a month, to collect his salary along with other cadres who had been sent to the countryside, and often bought a load of charcoal that would last a few months. Nevertheless, he went up the mountains with the men for firewood just to get to know the situation in the four villages of the commune.

In the gully, before going into the mountains, was a small village of just a few families, which was the commune's most far-flung production team. There he saw an old man with metal-rimmed glasses, sitting in the sun outside his home, squinting at a hand-sewn book riddled with wormholes. He was holding the book in both hands, away from himself, his arms stretched right out.

"Venerable elder, do you still read?" he asked.

The old man took off his glasses, looked up, saw that he was not one of the local peasants, grunted, and put the book down on his lap.

"May I see your book?" he asked.

"It's a medical book," the old man explained immediately.

"What sort of medical book?" he went on to ask.

"Treatise on Chills. Do you think you'd understand it?" There was derision in the man's voice.

"Venerable elder, are you a doctor of traditional medicine?" He changed the topic to show his respect.

It was only then that the old man let him take the book. This ancient medical book printed on smooth gray-yellowish bamboo paper, was most certainly a Qing Dynasty edition. Between the wormholes were punctuation circles and commentaries in red cinnabar, written in script the size of a fly's eye. These notations could have been made by his ancestors, but, more likely, had been made long ago by the old man himself. Holding the precious book in both hands, he carefully returned it to the old man. It was, perhaps, his respectful attitude that moved the old man, who called to the woman inside the house, "Fetch a stool and a bowl of tea for this comrade!"

The old man's voice was still loud and clear, because of his many years of physical labor; moreover, his knowledge of traditional medicine, no doubt, kept him in good health.

"There's no need to go to any trouble." He sat down on the stump for chopping firewood.

A sturdy woman getting on in years, who could have been the old man's daughter-in-law or a second wife, emerged from the main hall with a stool, then, from a big earthenware pot, she poured him a bowl of hot tea with big leaves floating on top. He thanked her and took the bowl in both hands. There were green mountains all around, and the tops of the firs moved silently in the wind.

"Comrade, where do you come from?"

"The county town, from the commune," he replied.

"You're a cadre who has been sent to the country, aren't you?"

He nodded and said with a smile, "Is it obvious?"

"You're not a local, anyway. Are you from the provincial capital or from somewhere else?" the old man went on to ask.

"I am from Beijing," he said succinctly.

At this, the old man nodded and asked nothing more. "Then don't leave, just settle here!"

He normally adopted a joking tone when the peasants questioned him during the rest breaks, and he did this without fail, so that he wouldn't need to explain himself. At most, he would add that the mountains were green, and the rivers clear, and how wonderful it all was! But this old man was clearly educated, and it wasn't necessary to say this to him.

"Venerable elder, are you a local?" he asked.

"For many generations. No matter how splendid it is elsewhere in the world, it can't surpass one's home village," the old man said passionately. "I've been to Beijing."

He was not surprised, and went on to ask, "What year was it?"

"Oh, that was many years ago, during the Republican period. I was at university, it was the seventeenth year of the Republic."

"Is that so." He made a calculation. According to the Gregorian calendar, it was forty years ago.

"At that time, the trendy professors wore Western suits and top hats, carried canes, and came to classes in rickshaws!"

Nowadays the professors were either sweeping the streets or washing out lavatories, he thought but didn't say.

The old man said he won a government scholarship to study in Japan, and he had a degree from Tokyo Imperial University.

He fully believed this, but what he wanted to know was why the old man had returned to the mountains. However, he couldn't ask him this directly, so he approached from another angle, "Venerable elder, did you study medicine?"

The old man didn't reply. His half-closed eyes looked across to the forests swaying in the mountain wind, and he seemed to be dozing in the sun. He thought, this was the old man's refuge, and he had studied traditional medicine so that he could treat the villagers if they were sick, it was a means of survival. He had married a village woman to have children so that he would have someone to look after him in his old age, and, now that he was too old to work in the fields, he just sits in the sun reading medical books to pass time.

At night, he wrote a letter to Qian, telling her that he was in a village, that he had settled down more or less for good, and that he had a house. If she wanted to live with him, they would have their own home. He was still receiving his salary, and, being a university graduate, she would also receive a salary. With their joint incomes, they would be able to live comfortably in this village, spend their days peacefully as human beings. He filled the squares on the top and bottom of the letter paper with the word "human," written big and very neatly. He was hoping that she would seriously consider his proposal and give him a positive answer. He also wrote that the primary school was preparing to start classes again, and the plan was to convert it into a middle school. When the children started school again after a break of these few years, they would already be of middle-school age, and one or two middle-school teachers would be needed, she could come and teach. The school would have to reopen sooner or later. The only thing he didn't mention was love, but when he wrote all this, he had a lucky feeling. He again experienced the feeling of hope; it was a hope that needed only Qian's consent. This hope was realistic, and it required only the two of them to realize it. He was even moved by the fact that, in this chaotic world, a refuge could be found. All it needed was for her to be willing to enjoy it with him.