He gave a speech "The Storyteller" at the award ceremony for the Nobel Prize for Literature. In the speech, he said that Mo Yan's mother hoped that Mo Yan could be a quiet, generous and taciturn child, so that if he spoke less, he would offend less. That’s why he was named “Mo Yan”. Mo Yan himself said that he was a talkative child, which did not quite match his name.
Mo Yan (February 17, 1955-), formerly known as Guan Moye, was born in Gaomi County, Shandong Province. He is a famous contemporary Chinese writer. Honorary Doctor of Letters from the Open University of Hong Kong and a visiting professor at Qingdao University of Science and Technology. He has emerged in the mid-1980s with his rural works, which are full of complex emotions of "nostalgia" and "resentment for hometown" and is classified as a writer of "root-seeking literature". The work is deeply influenced by magical realism. In his novels, Mo Yan constructed a unique subjective world, made imaginative narratives, and used defamiliarization to create a mysterious and transcendent world of objects, which carry a distinct "avant-garde" flavor. In August 2011, Mo Yan won the 8th Mao Dun Literature Award for his novel "Frog". On October 11, 2012, Mo Yan won the Nobel Prize for Literature for his "use of magical realism to integrate folk tales, history and modernity". His representative works include: "Red Sorghum", "Sandalwood Punishment", "Big Breasts and Wide Hips", "Wine Country" 》"Life and Death Fatigue", "Frog"
Mo Yan: Storyteller (Excerpt)
Dear academicians of the Swedish Academy, ladies and gentlemen:
Through TV or the Internet, I think everyone here has more or less understanding of the distant Northeast Gaomi Township. You may have seen my ninety-year-old father, my brothers, sisters, my wife, my daughter, and my granddaughter who is one year and four months old. But there is one person I miss the most right now, my mother, who you will never be able to see. After I won the award, many people shared my glory, but my mother could not share it.
My mother was born in 1922 and died in 1994. Her ashes were buried in the peach garden east of the village. Last year we had to move her grave further away from the village because a railway was going to go through there. After digging the grave, we saw that the coffin had rotted and the mother's bones had been mixed with the soil. We had to symbolically dig up some soil and move it to a new grave. From that moment on, I felt that my mother was a part of the earth, and what I said while standing on the earth was my talk to my mother.
I am my mother’s youngest child. One of the earliest things I remember is carrying the only thermos bottle at home to the public cafeteria to open the water. Because I was hungry and weak, I accidentally broke the thermos bottle. I was so frightened that I got into the haystack and didn't dare to come out for a whole day. In the evening, I heard my mother calling my baby name. I emerged from the haystack, expecting to be beaten and scolded, but my mother neither beat me nor scolded me. She just stroked my head and let out a long sigh. One of the most painful things in my memory is following my mother to pick up wheat in the collective field. The people guarding the wheat field came, and the people picking up wheat ran away one after another. My mother had small feet and could not run fast, so she was caught. The tall watchman slapped her across the face. She staggered and fell to the ground. The watchman confiscated the ears of wheat we picked up, whistled and walked away. My mother was sitting on the ground with blood coming from the corner of her mouth, with a look of despair on her face that I will never forget. Many years later, when the man who guarded the wheat field became a gray-haired old man, I met me in the market. I rushed up to avenge him, but my mother stopped me and said calmly: "Son, that beater I am not the same person as this old man.”
The thing I remember most is that at noon during the Mid-Autumn Festival, our family had a rare meal of dumplings, with only one for each person. bowl. While we were eating dumplings, an old man begging came to our door.
I picked up half a bowl of dried sweet potatoes and sent him away, but he said angrily: "I am an old man. You eat dumplings, but let me eat dried sweet potatoes. How did you grow up?" I said angrily: "We I can’t eat dumplings more than once a year. It’s only a small bowl for each person, and I can’t even eat half of it! I’ll just give you dried sweet potatoes. If you want it, get out!” My mother scolded me and then picked up her half. Bowl of dumplings, poured into the old man's bowl.
One of the things I regret most is that I followed my mother to sell cabbage, and intentionally or unintentionally paid an old man who was buying cabbage an extra cent. After calculating the money, I went to school. When I came home from school, I saw my mother, who rarely shed tears, burst into tears. My mother did not scold me, but said softly: "Son, you have embarrassed your mother."
When I was a teenager, my mother suffered from severe lung disease, hunger, pain, and fatigue. Our family is in trouble, with no light or hope in sight. I had a strong sense of foreboding, thinking that my mother would commit suicide at any time. Whenever I come back from work and enter the door, I call out to my mother. When I hear her response, I feel a stone fall in my heart. If I don't hear her response for a while, I will be frightened and run to the side room and Searching in the mill. Once, I searched all the rooms but could not find my mother. I sat in the yard and cried. At this time, my mother walked in from outside carrying a bundle of firewood. She was unhappy with my crying, but I couldn't express my concerns to her. My mother saw through my mind and said, "My child, don't worry, even though I have no fun in life, I will not go as long as the Lord of Hell doesn't call me." I was born ugly, and many people in the village laughed at me in front of my face. , a few classmates with domineering personalities in school even beat me for this. I went home and cried bitterly, and my mother said to me: "Son, you are not ugly. You have neither a nose nor an eye, and your limbs are sound. Where is the ugliness? Moreover, as long as you are kind-hearted and do more good deeds, even if you are ugly, you can be beautiful." Become beautiful." Later, when I entered the city, some well-educated people still laughed at my appearance behind my back or even in front of me. I remembered my mother's words and apologized to them calmly.
Sorry, it’s a little late. . . But I am the most careful, choose me ~ choose me, choose me! ! !