中国作家协会主管

流动，近四十年最主要的中国经验

先说一个小故事。

故事发生在我写这篇发言稿的前一天。一位三十年没有联系过的初中同学加了我的微信，他说当年他也是文学的狂热爱好者，每次语文老师将我的作文当范文读时，他都暗暗地不服，认为老师没眼光。他甚至偷偷藏了我的一个作文本。后来，他和我一样，初中没有毕业就离开家乡，长江中游，江汉平原南岸一个算不上富与算不上穷的小村。和我一样，到广东。在东莞的工厂打工，做过各种苦逼的工作。但是，他对我说，在当下的中国，生于1970年之后的这一代人是最幸运的。我们不像父辈那样，纵有天大本事，也只能面朝黄土背朝天地过一辈子。出生在城里的，进工厂，经历下岗，或者在一个厂里工作到老也很难升职到处长，厅长。我们这代人面临着更多选择，更加自由，有更多机会。当然，他最后没有忘记告诉我，说他现在做生意做得还可以。

他特别强调了一句，说比我想象的可能会更成功一些。

我告诉他，我对他生意做多大并没有想像。他说，他在一个行业的细分领域，做到了全球老大，一年营业额有七个亿。他前年将工厂从东莞搬到湖北，建占地几百亩的工厂，有上万员工。公司正在IPO。我对他说，作为一名苦尽甘来的成功者，你当然可以说我们遇上了最好的时代，那些没有成功的人，遇上了这么好的时代都没有成功，是因为他们笨。但在我看来，少数他这样的成功人士背后，是无数人在血汗工厂里打工，付出全部努力，青春，最后一无所有。我的富豪同学说，这是经济学的规律。只有大量人的付出无所得，才会造就少数人的成功，才会推动社会经济发展。

对于经济学我是外行，也许，我的富豪同学是对的。作为作家，我观察的立场和角度，显然和他不一样。他关注的是时代带给了我们这代人机遇，造就了许多如他的成功者，而我关注的是这时代车轮滚滚背后，那失败的大多数。我想起了我的同事，诗人郑小琼的一首诗。许多年前，我还在深圳当自由撰稿人，年轻的郑小琼还在东莞一间五金厂打工。一次偶然的聚会，我读到了她的一首诗，《黄麻岭》，当时泪奔，嚎啕大哭，把聚会的朋友们吓坏了。后来，我在散文《寻亲记》中，引用了她的这首诗，以表达敬意，同时，也是向千千万万的打工者们致敬。

现在，我想再读一读她的这首诗：

我把自己的肉体与灵魂安顿在这个小镇上 

它的荔枝林，它的街道，它的流水线一个小小的卡座 

它的雨水淋湿的思念，一趟趟，一次次  

我在它的上面安置我的理想，爱情，美梦，青春 

我的情人，声音，气味，生命 

在异乡，在它的黯淡的街灯下 

我奔波，我淋着雨水和汗水，喘着气 

——我把生活摆在塑料产品，螺丝，钉子 

在一张小小的工卡上……我的生活全部 

啊，我把自己交给它，一个小小的村庄 

风吹走我的一切 

我剩下的苍老，回家 

有人衣锦荣归，有人只余下苍老回家。有人生活鲜花著锦烈火烹油，有人两手空空一无所有。

接着讲故事。我的这位同学和我的争论没有结果。我们观察社会的角度不同，结论自然不一样。富豪同学告诉我，当年的初中同学建了一个微信群。群里的同学们时常聊起我。他把我拉进了群。三十年前的同学，大多数我已记不起名字，没有一丝印象。同学们热情欢迎了我这个所谓的大作家。我惊奇地发现，当年湖北石首调关镇一所普通乡村中学，一个班五十个同学，现在群里聚集了近四十七人。这四十七人中，身家过亿的富豪居然有十多位。我发现一件很有意思的事，当年这批同学，初中毕业就出门打工的，大多成了富豪，而当年学习成绩好，上高中大学的，现在或者当普通教师，或者在政府某个部门混个小处长。我突然理解了富豪同学所说的，我们这代人是幸运的。1987年，我们初中毕业，那些早早离开农村到广东打工的，在经历磨难之后，抓住改革开放之初的机遇，实现了他们的财富梦。

似乎可以换个角度来看中国的这三十年。

说完富豪同学，我再说另外一个人的故事。这个人是我的叔叔。我曾经在散文《四十年来丹青梦》中写过他。我把这篇文章中叔叔的一段读读：

当作家，是许多年以后的事，我少时的梦想，本是想当画家的。

这梦想，大抵源于我幺叔的影响。我幺叔是乡间少有的才子，写一笔漂亮的赵体字，会许多种乐器：月琴、口琴、琵琶、二胡、手风琴、脚风琴、笛子、吉他……幺叔讲过，他童年时，一次放学路上，听见有人吹口琴，那是他第一次听人吹口琴，听得入了迷，跟着那人走了很远，天黑了，他迷了路。后来，我以此为原型，写成了短篇小说《口琴，獐子和语文书》，那小说，是幺叔的故事与我的故事的结合体。

幺叔还会写鹊体字，用一块橡皮，沾了广告色，几笔就画出一只喜鹊、蝴蝶，再添几枝梅花、竹枝、兰草，组合成字。过春节时，别人门前贴墨笔字春联，幺叔家门前贴神奇的鹊体字。我在南方的工业区和一些旅游景点见过写鹊体字的，给人写一条姓名收费三十元，全是一些弯弯绕，一只鹊也没有，比起我幺叔，相差远矣。

幺叔还会作画，常画迎客松和桂林山水。天知道，他怎么会那么多！

我父亲说，这些都是他瞟学的。

所谓瞟学，瞟一眼就会了。我父亲说这话时，很是骄傲。父亲从未因我而骄傲，却常为我幺叔骄傲。

我的整个童年和少年时期，幺叔是绝对的偶像，我无限崇拜他，喜欢听他坐在月光下用二胡拉《天涯歌女》，“小妹妹唱歌郎奏琴，郎呀咱们俩是一条心……”

幺叔本有极好的前程，他学习成绩好极了，从来都是老师们的宠儿，但“文革”开始了，幺叔扎根新农村，一扎，就是一辈子。

我曾偷偷翻看过幺叔的毕业留言册，上面写满了同学们真挚豪迈的祝福，“翠竹根连根，学友心连心，我们齐努力，扎根新农村。”幺叔回家后进了大队小学当民办教师，教了一辈子书，大队变村，后来，村里的孩子越来越少，村小撤了，幺叔下岗，拿了国家三千元补贴。幺叔老了，不再吹拉弹唱，不再画画，只在春节写春联时，才拿一下毛笔，也不再写鹊体字。再后来，年近六十的幺叔出门打工，在佛山、东莞漂泊。年纪大了，不好找工，在陶瓷厂当搬运，那是我当年干了几天就逃之夭夭的苦力活。

读到这里，我们不妨假设，如果我叔叔和我一样，遇上了农民可以自由流动的时代，他会成为怎样人？比我优秀得多的作家？音乐家？大企业家？他的人生有无数种可能，但是他们这代人只有一种可能。

我甚至想到了我的父亲。我父亲只上过半年学，可他不是文盲，他能读书看报，会打算盘，年轻时当过大队的财经大队长。我父亲在本村农民中有很高的威望。有些人家里遇上纠纷，会请他去主持公道。他有很强的统筹管理能力，乡亲们家有人办喜事，往往会请他当“都管”。我记得在上世纪八十年代中期，农民没有自由买卖粮食的权力，生产出来的粮食只能以规定的低价卖给国家。称之为交余粮。余粮上交，拿不到现金，只有一张白条。农民没办法生存，于是我父亲带领村民抗粮不交，被乡政府派人捆走，我记得那一夜晚，村里的父老乡亲聚集在乡政府请愿，地上跪了黑压压一片，在他们的压力下，乡政府放了我父亲。我说这些，是说，我的父亲是个有组织能力的人，是个意见领袖。我写小说《寻根团》时，里面写至乡间的意见领袖王中秋时，就想到了我父亲。但是，他一辈子的命运只能在乡间老去。

说了这些人，回到这次论坛的主题：地域，流动和文学。

我想说，一个时代的文学，要关注这个时代最主要的问题。那么，对于中国来说，这几十年来最主要的问题是什么？或者说，中国最大的改变是什么？是人口不再受出生地域的限制，可以自由流动。当然，改革开放之初，大量人口自由流动，几千万人涌入广东，广东无法承接这么多的劳动力，许多人找不到工作，招一个工人，往往有上百人抢。劳资关系中，资方处于绝对强势地位，于是，工人的利益被最小化，而资方的利益被最大化，劳资关系十分紧张。那些在早期开始开工厂做经营的，他们的第一桶金，充满了原罪。过多的劳动力涌入，给广东的治安带来了尖锐的问题，于是，收容遣送，成为反人性但又行之有效的手段。直到那个叫孙志刚的青年大学生被收容遣送致死后，收容遣送条例才废止。收容，成为我们那一代打工者无法回避的命题，也是无法忘却的噩梦。而这背后，是复杂的中国问题，中国经验。这就是中国，我的富豪同学的命运，我的叔叔和父亲的命运，无数打工者带着苍老回家的命运。这是中国制造背后复杂而纠结的关系。这是我们这个时代最大的改变。

2008年，我的中篇小说《国家订单》在人民文学刊发，卷首语曾这样写道：三十年来，无数的中国人在这样的清晨离开了他们的村庄，怀着对外面的广大世界的梦想开始漂泊与劳作。他们是“中国奇迹”的创造者，他们使中国成为世界工厂，使“中国制造”遍布世界的各个角落。与此同时，他们也在创造着自身的生活和命运，他们梦想着奇迹，而前所未有的机会与自由在这个时代正向着人们敞开。王十月和小说里的那些打工者是一样的人，和小说里的“小老板”也是一样的人。他知道他们为什么走出来，也知道他们是怎样复杂地酸甜苦辣地走向今天。

流动。

这是中国前所未有的景象，数亿农民离开了土地，离开了固守的地域，在大地上流动。而这流动带来的一系列复杂的改变，这背后的酸甜苦辣，这背后的国家意志与个人梦想，造就了中国神话。这这近四十年来，中国最主要的真实。如果中国作家无视这个巨大的真实，回避它，不去书写，这代作家是不称职的。正如，如果唐诗没有杜甫用他沉郁的诗歌将个人离乱与家国动荡记录在案，那一代诗人是失职的一样。所幸，有许多人在书写中国这一段经验，这样的书写被称之为打工文学。打工文学这个叫法自然不科学，我们可以不去管它叫什么文学，我想介绍的是这样一种文学的存在。在中国，它被认为是低级的，是边缘的，是登不了大雅之堂的。但我想，这样的中国经验，是我们这代作家必需面对和回答的：

我们这个时代，究竟发生了什么。

Mobility, the Main Chinese Reality in the Past Four Decades

Wang Shiyue

I want to share with you a story first.

Just about one day before I wrote this speech, one of my junior high school classmates, with whom I had been out of touch for nearly 30 years, contacted me on WeChat. During our conversation, he told me that back then, he was just as passionate about literature as I was, and “unconvinced” that our teacher always praised me for my articles and read them aloud to the whole class, because he thought the teacher did not appreciate his writing for its true value. He even secretly hid one of my composition notebooks. Afterward, just like me, after graduating from junior high school he left the hometown, an average village, on the south bank of the Jianghan Plain, in the middle reach of the Yangtze River. He made the same choice as me: leaving for Guangdong. He worked in Dongguan and did toilsome manual work. Even so, he thought Chinese people born in the 1970s were lucky enough, for the generation of our parents, born in rural areas, had no choice but to toil hard in the fields for their whole life, even when they actually might have the ability to do much more. For those who were born in the cities, there were just as few options. They might work in factories as ordinary workers until retirement, with no chance to get promoted. People of our generation have more choices, freedom and opportunities. Of course, he didn’t forget to mention that his business was successful.         

He made a point of saying that he was possibly even more successful than I could imagine.

I told him that I had no idea how big his business was. He explained that his company was a market leader in a specific field of a certain industry, with an annual turnover of RMB 700 million yuan. Two years ago, he moved his factory from Dongguan to Hubei Province. That factory occupies a surface of dozens of hectares, employs more than 10 thousand employees, and the company has launched an IPO. I told him he thought our generation was lucky because he succeeded after all the bitter years he endured and he naturally considered those who still had not succeeded in such wonderful times as stupid. From my perspective, such successful stories represent only a small part of the whole story of this era; behind each of them stand numerous average workers who work in sweatshops and contribute all of their energy and youth, but harvest little in return. My billionaire friend said it was an economic law that many people’s efforts have to fail in order to bring about the success of a few, and to trigger social and economic development.

I’m a layman in economy, and perhaps my friend is right. As a writer, my perspective is obviously different from his. He pays attention to the opportunities the times bring to our generation and create successful people like him; by contrast, what I’m concerned about is the unsuccessful majority who are carried away by the overwhelming tide of the times. I remember a poem written by Zheng Xiaoqiong, my colleague and a poet. Many years ago, when I was a free-lance writer in Shenzhen and she was working in a hardware factory in Dongguan, at a party I happened to read one of her poems, Huangmaling. At that time I was in tears, and crying so loudly that my friends were left speechless. Later on, I quoted a few verses of this poem in my essay Looking for My Kin to show my respect to her, and to all the hundreds of thousands of migrant workers.  

Now please allow me to read this poem to you:

I rest my body and soul in this small town

Among its lychee trees, its streets, on the small seat by the assembly line  

Its rain soaks my nostalgia through, over and over again  

Here I lay down my dreams, my love, my fond dreams and my youth

My lover, my voice, my scent and my life

Far away from home, in the dim street light

I run, drenched in rain and sweat, gasped

I build my life from plastic products, screwdrivers and nails

On this small work card, my whole life stands

Ah, I give everything to it, this small village

And the wind scatters it all away

Only my old age remains—time to go home  

Some people return to their hometowns with fame and wealth; others, only with their old age. Some people lead a life full of glory and abundance, while others gain nothing at all.

I will go on with my storytelling. My classmate and I didn’t come to a common understanding of things during our discussion, for we had different perspectives on society. My rich classmate told me our junior high school classmates had set up a WeChat group, and they often talked about me. He then invited me into the group. Having lost contact with these classmates for 30 years, I couldn’t recall most of their names or faces. They welcomed me warm-heartedly, as in their eyes I was a famous writer. Among the 50 students in our class, 47 of them were present in the group. Our school was just an ordinary school in Diaoguan Town of Shishou City, Hubei Province; but to my surprise, more than 10 of my fellow students possess assets of over RMB 100 million yuan. What I found interesting was that the rich classmates were those who had worked away from our hometown upon graduating from junior high school, and those who had academic abilities and went to high school or even college now were only ordinary teachers or held humble positions in governmental departments. I suddenly realized why my rich classmate believed we were lucky. In 1987, when we graduated from junior high school, those who went to Guangdong to make a living seized the opportunities brought by the reform and opening-up policy, and eventually made a fortune thanks to their efforts.

It seems that we can look upon China’s past 30 years from another angle.

After the story of my rich classmate, I want to talk about my uncle. I depicted him in my essay The Painting Dream of 40 Years, and I want to read an excerpt of it:

To be a writer is a goal I decided upon after I grew up; when I was young, I always dreamed of being a painter.

This dream is probably due to the influence of my uncle. He was a rare talent in such a rural place. He had beautiful handwriting with Zhao Mengfu’s characteristic, and he could play many instruments, including the yueqin, the harmonica, the pipa, the erhu, the accordion, the harmonium, the bamboo flute, and the guitar. My uncle told us that once, when he was a kid, as he was on his way back home from school, he heard someone playing the harmonica. That was the first time he had ever heard anyone playing the harmonica, and he totally lost himself in the melody. So he followed that person for a long way, until it got really dark and he lost his way. When I became a writer, I wrote a short story titled Harmonica, Musk Deer and Chinese Textbook, which was based on a combination of my uncle’s story and my own story.

My uncle could write a special style of calligraphy called “the magpie style.” With a rubber eraser dipped in paint, he could draw characters that were a combination of magpies, butterflies, plums, bamboo branches and orchids—all in just a few strokes. During the Spring Festival, while other people’s doors were framed by new year scrolls written in black ink, my uncle’s doorway was decorated by these mysterious “magpie calligraphies.” I saw other people writing such calligraphy in industrial parks in south China and in certain touristic locations. The painters usually charged RMB 30 yuan for writing a customer’s name. But these “artworks” were actually nothing more than a cluster of curvy strokes without any magpies at all, and were definitely no match for those that my uncle wrote.

My uncle could paint too. He loved to paint The Pine Greeting Guests and Guilin landscapes. How could he be so gifted!

According to my father, my uncle learned all these just by glimpsing.  

What he meant was that my uncle only needed to catch a few glimpses of others drawing or playing instruments to master these skills. My father was very proud when he told me all these. While he never felt proud about me, he often talked about my uncle proudly. 

My uncle was my absolute role model during my childhood and adolescence. I worshipped him so much, and enjoyed listening to him playing the Erhu and singing The Wandering Songstress in the moonlight: “The girl sings while the boy plays music, they are made for each other so wonderfully…”

My uncle could have a promising future, because he was so academically gifted and praised highly by his teachers. But the Great Cultural Revolution changed his fate. My uncle was sent to work in a rural area, and he stayed there until he was old.

I used to secretly leaf through my uncle’s school yearbook. The pages were covered with the sincere wishes and ambitious words by his classmates, such as: “The roots of bamboos grow close to each other; our hearts are linked, and we will strive together to serve the rural places”. My uncle became a primary school teacher in our production brigade, teaching for all his life. Many years later, the brigade was turned into a village. The school children grew fewer and fewer, until the school was closed at last. My uncle lost his job, and received state subsidies of RMB 3000 yuan. He was not young any more. He didn’t play any instruments, nor did he paint. He used a brush only for writing Spring Festival couplets, and he just wrote ordinary characters instead of the “magpie characters”. At the age of nearly 60 years old, he decided to make a living far from home, drifting to Foshan and Dongguan. He was too old to get a good job and had no choice but to become a porter in a ceramics factory, an exhausting job that I did, too, and quit only a few days after I started.

Now let’s suppose that my uncle had been lucky enough to have the same options as me in an era where people from rural areas had the freedom to seek chances wherever they wanted. What could he become? A much better writer than me? A musician? A successful entrepreneur? His life should have had numerous possibilities. But for his generation, there was only one possibility.  

I even think of my father, who only received education for half a year. He isn’t illiterate. He can read, he knows how to use an abacus, and when he was young, he did the financial management for the village. He was highly admired in his village, and people often asked for his help in settling disputes. Because he also possessed strong organizational abilities, the villagers often counted on him to organize wedding dinners. I recall that in the mid-1980s Chinese farmers were not allowed to trade grain, and were ordered to sell agricultural produce to the government at very low prices. This was the so-called “hand in the extra food” policy. Usually, the villagers handed in their “extra food” but received no cash in exchange, only a debit note issued by the government. The villagers struggled to make a living. My father led his villagers to oppose the policy, and was arrested by the local government. On that night, many of his fellow villagers kneeled in front of the government office, petitioning the authorities to release my father. Under the pressure, the government set my father free. What I want to say is that my father is a man with excellent organizational capacity, an opinion leader. When I was depicting the character Wang Zhongqiu, an opinion leader, in my novel Seeking for Roots, I thought of my father. My father spent his lifetime in the village; he had no other choice. 

Let’s return to the topic of this forum: “Region, Mobility and Literature”.

I’d like to say that a writer should pay close attention to the main social reality of his time. What has been the main social reality in China over the past few decades? Or what is the biggest change happening in China? The answer is that Chinese people are no longer constrained to remain where they were born, and are able to move around freely. During the first several years after the reform and opening-up policy was announced, thousands and thousands of people flooded into Guangdong Province to seek for jobs. But the province hadn’t enough “carrying capacity”, many migrants couldn’t find jobs, or hundreds of people had to compete fiercely for a single position. The employers had the absolute upper hand in the labor relations, where the interests of workers were disregarded, and those of the employers overvalued. The relationship between employers and workers was very tense. People who started their own business early earned their first pot of gold by taking advantage of the workers. Besides, the huge migrant population brought the province serious security issues. To respond to such problems, the government adopted the Housing and Sending back policy, which was inhumane but effective. The policy was not abandoned until Sun Zhigang, a college student, was tortured to death after his sending back. The policy was a nightmare that no migrant worker of our generation could ignore. Underlying this was the complex issue of China itself, and of the Chinese experience. This is China. This is the destiny of my rich classmate, of my uncle and my father, and of numerous migrant workers who returned home in their old age. What lies behind the “Made in China” phenomenon is a complicated tangle. This constitutes the biggest change of our times.

In 2008, my novella The Nation’s Order for Goods was published by People’s Literature. In the preface, I wrote: “For nearly 30 years, numerous Chinese have departed from their villages in such an early morning to the vast outside world, and began their journey of dreaming, drifting and striving. They created the Chinese Miracle, making China the “world factory” and making “Made in China” products ubiquitous all over the world. At the same time, they were building their own lives and writing their own fates. They were dreaming of miracles taking place, with unprecedented opportunities open to them. I was the same as the migrant workers and small business owners in my fictions. I know why they chose to leave their hometowns and all the vicissitudes of life they have tasted from the beginning until now.”

Mobility.

This is an unprecedented phenomenon in China: tens of millions of farmers leave their lands and seek opportunities all over the country. Dramatic changes happening everywhere, a huge number of people experiencing ups and downs, the will of the nation and the dreams of individuals—all of these elements, together, have created the “Chinese Miracle”. This is the main social reality of China. If a writer ignores such a reality and refuses to talk about it, he or she isn’t a qualified writer. Similarly, if the Tang-dynasty poet Du Fu had not written verses full of melancholy about people’s misery in the country’s turmoil, he would not be a great poet. I’m glad that there are so many writers recording what is happening in the country. Their works have been called “the migrant worker literature”, which actually isn’t a proper name. I don’t mind what it is called; I just want everyone to know it does exist. In China, such literature is considered rustic, marginal and not worth mentioning. But I think Chinese writers have the responsibility to think about what on earth is happening in this era.