January 26, 2001 - "Literature is essentially an individual's personal affair."
--- Gao Xingjian, "Without Isms"
Chinese people have wondered for decades why a Chinese writer never received the Nobel Prize for Literature--after all, they reasoned, even Japan has received two. In their eyes, this was both an insult to their excellent writers, and a slap in the face for their nation.
Yet when the prestigious prize was finally awarded to their compatriot Gao Xingjian late last year, both Chinese and international commentators seemed shocked at the Swedish Academy's decision rather than joyful. The official news media in China had enthusiastically reported all the other Nobel Prize winners but remained strangely quiet about the literature prize this time.
Then a director of the Chinese Writers' Association declared: "This shows that the Nobel Prize for literature has virtually been used for political purposes and thus has lost its authority...China boasts many world famous literary works and writers, about which the Nobel Committee knows little (People's Daily, English Online Edition, Oct. 13)."
The Taiwanese and overseas Chinese media have also joined the fray, questioning whether the exiled Gao can still be called a "(Mainland) Chinese writer." After all, most of his works first appeared in Taiwan, and he even wrote and directed some of his plays in French. Clearly, they wish to appropriate Gao as one of their own.
By contrast, reports in the Western media praised Gao for his "dissident" status and for being an exile from communist China. They pictured him as a victim of the Cultural Revolution in the '60s, and emphasized his protests to the Chinese government during the 1989 Democracy Movement.
But while some Western sinologists, especially Dr. Goran Malmqvist, Swedish translator of Gao's works and Swedish Academy member, believe he is a worthy choice for the prize, most professors of Chinese were extremely surprised that the "obscure" Gao had won. Many hastily offered their opinions on electronic bulletin boards, suggesting Gao's writing only suited the tastes of the Nobel committee, in particular, "Professor Malmqvist's perceived preference for difficult and doom-laden writing (Richard King, MCLC bulletin board, Oct. 16)."
In fact, most Chinese and Western readers, even including sinologists, knew virtually nothing about Gao and have had little chance to read his works. In China, people have only heard of his early plays, written before he left China in 1987. None of his later works are available there. The situation is little better on the other side of the Pacific: even the most "comprehensive" online bookstores have found to their embarrassment that they don't carry Soul Mountain, the novel which largely led to Gao being awarded the Prize.
Ironically, winning the Nobel Prize may be more of a curse than a blessing for this independent-minded author. For the past two decades he has attempted to flee from politics in his plays and novels, but now he is again being labeled as a purely political animal and is being used by various interest groups on both sides for their own ideological purposes. His only hope might be that with the extra publicity surrounding the award, people will now actually read his books.
We are not trying to claim that the Nobel Prize selection process is completely fair and objective. The prize committee is known for using both the literature and peace prizes to call the world's attention to regions torn by political struggles. But before we make snap judgments as to whether this Chinese writer deserves the prize, we should at least find out what he has written, and how it contributes to Chinese or world literature. To make superficial assumptions about "politics" before even reading the works is putting the cart of blind judgment before the horse of informed understanding.
Of course, the rush to brand this Chinese writer as political is understandable. Western ideas about modern Chinese literature have long been influenced by Cold-War stereotypes. In fact, ever since the '50s, scholars have considered most Chinese literature produced under communism as only fit to provide raw source material for social studies, history and political science. They have not read it for its intrinsic beauty, but simply as the best way to find out what was happening in that "crazy" enclosed society. The recent popularity of harrowing "factual"" memoirs such as Wild Swans, describing the miseries of life under communism, well illustrates this tendency.
True, in the last decade or so the works of many excellent Chinese writers, such as Mo Yan, Yu Hua, Su Tong, Can Xue, and the poet Bei Dao, have been translated and praised for their literary talent. But Chinese fiction writers simply cannot compete in the popular market with "true" memoirs. This is because, according to one American publisher, they are "too similar to Western Literature," not "Chinese"" enough. So Americans now decide who is suitably Chinese!
Likewise, the English translation of Gao Xingjian's Soul Mountain only came out in Australia last year, long after European language editions (Swedish and French translations in 1992 and 1995 respectively). And no North American publishers showed any interest in the book, since "they did not think Soul Mountain would find an audience/readership in North America (Tom Moran, MCLC bulletin board, Oct. 13)." Now, with the Nobel Prize announcement, publishers and bookstores, as well as specialists and ordinary readers, cannot wait to embrace this long-ignored "genius."
Strictly speaking, Gao's works are all "outside politics," as he put it. Even in his plays from the early 1980s (Alarm Signal, 1982, Bus Stop, 1983, and Wilderness Man, 1985), which made him famous and caused him to become a target in the government's Spiritual Pollution Campaign, he never directly accused the communists. Bus Stop, for example, presents a varied crowd of Chinese people waiting for a bus that never arrives. One silent man sets off walking on his own, while the others argue fruitlessly about what to do. Reminiscent of Samuel Beckett, these plays express deep suspicion of the masses and their lack of initiative and individual responsibility.
Since he left China in 1987, Gao's plays have shown even less interest in politics. Gao incorporates stories from Chinese Zen koans with elements from ancient drama and folk theatre, illuminating the existential predicament of Modern Man. In Henry Zhao's words, Gao has developed "a modern Zen theatre," where he stages the universal "gritty realities of life, death, sex, loneliness, and exile," and the individual's struggle for inner peace and enlightenment, played out in the most abstract, symbolic and minimalist form. "In contrast to Brecht, Gao's view is that the difficulty for human beings lies not in changing the world, but in understanding one's self critically,' Zhao said.
The esoteric world of Gao's plays may not appeal to a broad audience even now that he is more famous. For a richer experience that still incorporates the fascinating inner landscape and journey towards enlightenment of the plays, we can read his novel Soul Mountain. Based on Gao's ten-month journey to South West China in 1982, an area where he had spent some years during the Cultural Revolution, Soul Mountain is the personal pilgrimage of the novel's protagonist. It is an unashamedly autobiographical account, an attempt to deal with all the troubles and doubts facing a middle-aged man--fears of death, suffering, betrayals, and separation--in a society plagued by its catastrophic past and chaotic present. The metaphysical search for Soul Mountain, a place the protagonist knows from the very beginning doesn't exist and ultimately cannot be found, reflects modern man's search for roots, inner peace, and freedom.
The book intrigues the reader with its various "skillful means": a polyphonic structure where "I" and "you" hold a complex dialogue between aspects of the self; a hybrid genre and self-reflective narrative where the act of writing is itself placed under scrutiny and problems of knowledge and meaning are constantly debated; and layers of symbolism intertwining the natural landscape of South West China with the cultural landscape of ancient Chinese history, legends, indigenous myths and folk customs. Gao's innovative style and dazzling, evocative use of language make his novel well worth reading, whatever one's views on his suitability for the Nobel Prize.
Shuyu Kong and Colin S. Hawes are assistant professors of East Asian studies at the University of Alberta.
