介绍:
In 1990, a TV series named "Fortress Besieged", or widely-known as "Wei Cheng" in Chinese, became a national hit. Adapted from the namesake novel and set in the 1930s, the drama won the hearts of many, not only by its vivid display of the hypocrisy and pedantry of Chinese intelligentsia, but also thanks to its satiric presentation of wedlock.
Although the show uses the metaphor of a besieged fortress to illustrate the predicament in marriage and life, its original author Qian Zhongshu, on the contrary, had a blissful and happy one. Married for over six decades, he and his wife Yang Jiang were commonly regarded as the model couple in the literary world. On more than one occasion, he attributed the success of their marriage to Yang Jiang. In his eyes, she was "the most virtuous wife and the most talented lady".
Yang Jiang, whose birth name was Yang Jikang, grew up in a well-to-do intellectual family in east China's Jiangsu Province. From an early age, she had demonstrated a strong interest in reading, a habit that accompanied her throughout her life. In 1932, due to the student strike at Soochow University, she travelled all the way to Beijing to study at Tsinghua University, where she met her future husband, Qian Zhongshu. It was love at first sight.
In her later work, she described their first encounter like this:
"In March, 1932, I met Zhongshu for the first time. Dressed in a long black gown, he wore a pair of clothes shoes and old-fashioned glasses, but still appeared to be refined and scholarly looking. After the first meeting, he wrote to me and asked me to meet him at the H-shaped Hall. When we met, the first words out of his mouth were: 'I am not engaged.' I replied nervously: 'I don't have a boyfriend'. So we started to exchange letters. We wrote so frequently that later, we exchanged one letter a day. When he went back home for holidays, I felt awful for such a long time. When I calmed down, I thought: I am done, I am falling in love. "
Three years later, the two lovebirds got married and headed to University of Oxford to further Qian's study. Spending probably the most carefree time of their life together, the couple also welcomed their only child, a daughter named Qian Yuan. She was the second Chinese baby born at Oxford and in the eyes of her mother Yang Jiang, the "sole masterpiece" she had ever created.
But the bliss and peace of this small family didn't last long. In 1938, after finishing their studies in England and France, the couple went back home, just one year after Japan's invasion of China. Staying in the war-torn Shanghai, Yang started to put pen to paper. Within two years, she wrote several plays that feature the complexity of human relations at that time, causing quite a stir. One of her comedies, "As You Wish It", or known as "Chen Xin Ru Yi"in Chinese, was so successful that it's still performed on stage today.
Yang's success seemed to awaken the muse inside her husband. In 1946, Qian published his collection of short stories, "Men, Beasts and Ghosts". One year later, his most prominent work, Fortress Besieged, came out. Steeped in wisecracks, epigrams and profound wisdom, this powerful satiric fiction, as the famous critic C.T. Hsia once put it, is one of the greatest Chinese novels of the 20th century.
More than once, Qian Zhongshu attributed his achievement to the dedication and encouragement of his wife. Xue Hongshi, a family friend, recalls.
"As friends, we loved to tease Qian about his tendency of praising Yang Jiang all the time. He adored her very much. He once said that she is wife, lover and confidant all wrapped into one. "
But the couple gradually shifted their interest.
In one of the interviews in her later years, Yang Jiang explained.
"When Qian Zhongshu was young, he once revealed his life goal to me. He said: 'I am not an ambitious man. I'd rather spend my entire life in research.' It may not sound like some grand dream, but the aspiration sounds big enough to me. "
From the early 1950s, Qian started to focus on the study of ancient Chinese poetry. Meanwhile, Yang became a researcher in foreign literature at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. From French novelist Lesage's magnum opus Gil Blas, to the legendary masterpiece Don Quixote, Yang took a special interest in translating European picaresque novels. In order to be faithful to the original classic, this fluent English and French speaker even taught herself Spanish.
However, as the storm of the Cultural Revolution raged across China, all their academic works were forced to stop. The couple, both nearly 60-years-old, were stripped from their positions and placed in a cadre school of central China's Henan Province to be "reformed through labour".
Yet according to the translator Ye Tingfang, who also stayed at the school around that time, the couple always remained in high spirits during those tumultuous years.
"All of us had a small stool. Madam Yang always sat on the stool and put hard board on her knees. I always spotted her writing something on it. Mr Qian would pay her a visit occasionally. Whenever he came, she could hardly wait for him to sit down and then pass her writing to him right away. Then the two of them started to talk. Sometimes they looked cheerful; other times, they appeared to be in a solemn mood. "
In 1972, after years of working in the countryside, Qian and Yang finally came back to Beijing. Yang continued her translation of Don Quixote.
However, according to Hu Zhencai, the editor from People's Literature Publishing House, Yang's hardship was not over.
"She started her translation around 1962, 1963. When the Cultural Revolution began, she already finished the first half of the book. However, the Red Guards confiscated her manuscript. One day, when she cleaned a dirty room, she accidentally found her draft under a pile of scrap paper. However, since she did not translate for nearly ten years, her style already changed. In order to preserve the consistency of the language, she decided to translate from the very beginning. "
In 1978, Yang Jiang published her translation of Don Quixote. Her version is not only commonly regarded as the definitive translation of this masterpiece, but also grants Yang an order from the Spanish king.
But what really elevated Yang to an internationally renowned writer is her 1981 memoir, Six Chapters From My Life "Downunder", an essay collection that is based on her experience during the Cultural Revolution. However, unlike many other memoirs of that period, the book doesn't pour out the pain, struggle and shame in great details. Instead, leaping through the mundane moments, the author narrated her everyday toils, her enduring love with her husband, the unlikely friendship with a puppy as well as the suicide of her son-in-law in a sober, subtle and mild tone. Despite the absence of victimization and accusations, the book echoes with profound emotional impact.
Xue Hongshi, a former colleague of the couple, explains.
"Those young red guards were quite vicious to her. But in her mind, they were merely sheep in wolves' clothing. She thought everyone was kind-hearted. She was a firm believer in the good nature of mankind. "
In the 1980s, after the overwhelming success of Don Quixote and "Six Chapters", Yang published a novel, Baptism. Featuring the lives of a group of intellectuals in the 1950s, Yang's fiction sheds lights on the mentality of Chinese people with wit and irony, which is no less a great reading than her husband's Fortress Besieged.
Guan Shiguang, Head of the People's Literature Publishing House, speaks highly of Yang's writing.
"I think a good literary work is produced based on the author's experience and perception of life. I think that's the reason why Yang Jiang's works always speak to us. She explained life philosophy in a very simple, clear manner and used vivid descriptions to bring those characters back to life. "
However, just as everything was on the right track, Yang Jiang's life had been turned upside down again. In 1997, her only child Qian Yuan, an English professor at Beijing Normal University, died from spinal cancer. One year later, her husband Qian Zhongshu passed away.
For the next few years, Yang lived her life away from the public eyes. At the age of 92, she published her most well-known work, We Three, which was initially suggested by her daughter.
In this heartbroken autobiography, she lamented.
"Life doesn't end like fiction or fairy tales. It doesn't end with 'happily ever after'. There is no pure happiness in this earthly world and happiness always comes with trouble and sorrow. There is no forever as well. As we go through so much, in our twilight years, we finally find a place to settle. However, as death and illness comes to us all, we come to the end of our road."
As the only survivor of her family, Yang Jiang spent the rest of her life restoring and compiling her husband's notes and unfinished manuscripts. In 2001, she donated all their remuneration and set up a scholarship fund at Tsinghua University.
During the ceremony, she emphasized the importance of self-cultivation to students.
"As I get older, I realize how profound the motto of Tsinghua University is. 'Self-Discipline and Social Commitment'. So, whom do we strive for? Why do we make an effort? These questions are worth pondering. "
In addition to "We Three," Yang Jiang remained prolific all her life. At the age of 96, she published the book, Reaching the Brink of Life, a philosophic work that clearly alludes to her late husband's collection of essays Marginalia to Life. Then at 103, she surprised the world by releasing a sequel to her novel "Baptism".
Yu Cijiang, a doctor of Literature at Beijing Normal University, has a high regard for Yang's achievements:
"When we think of a scholar and writer, they tend to excel in only one field, but Yang was strong in both areas. She was an accomplished scholar, a scholar with the most demanding standards."
On the morning of May 25th, 2016, Yang Jiang bid farewell to this world, finally reunited with her loved ones.
So how should we remember and pay homage to this great woman?
A poem by English writer Walter Savage Landor, which was translated by Yang Jiang years ago, may already provide the answer.
I strove with none, for none was worth my strife.
Nature I loved and, next to Nature, Art:
I warm'd both hands before the fire of life;
It sinks, and I am ready to depart.
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