Respectfully wishing you
Happy writing!
Your disciple
Li Yidou
III
My Brother Yidou
I received your letter and the manuscript. The research material on liquor hasn’t arrived yet, but printed matter usually takes longer.
I do indeed understand how you feel, since I've been there myself. To be honest, I've done or considered doing just about anything I could think of to see one of my manuscripts get into print. As soon as I received your letter, I placed a phone call to Zhou Bao, who told me he’s read all three of your stories, several times each. He said he still can’t make up his mind, that he simply doesn’t know what to say. He wanted me to tell you he’s agonizing over it. He’s sent all three to Li Xiaobao, asking him to give them a quick read and let him know what he thinks. The last thing he said was that even though there are parts of all three stories he has some problems with, the author’s talent is unquestioned. That should make you feel better. For a writer, talent is everything. Lots of people make a career out of writing, producing many works and knowing exactly what it takes to become a great writer. But they never break into the big time, because they lack one thing: talent, or a sufficient amount of it.
I’ve already read ‘Donkey Avenue’ three times, and my overall opinion is that it is unrestrained, bold. It reminds me a bit of a wild donkey rolling on the ground and kicking its legs in the air. In a word: wild. You didn’t happen to write it after drinking some Red-Maned Stallion, did you?
There were a few spots where I didn’t understand what you were getting at, so here are some hastily formed opinions:
i. Is that scaly boy who rides the little black donkey in the story, the one who can fly on eaves and walk on walls as if his feet were on solid ground, a chivalric hero or a thief? He has already made appearances in ‘Meat Boy’ and ‘Child Prodigy’ (he is the same person, isn’t he?), and always as a mere mortal, it seems. Now in this story he has become a sort of superman, half genie and half goblin, which may be a bit much, don’t you think? Of course, you never said that these stories comprised a series. But there’s also the question of his unclear relationship to the little goblin in red. In ‘Child Prodigy,’ if I’m not mistaken, you said that the little goblin was in fact that little scaly creature, right?
I’ve never dared to disparage kung-fu novels. Their ability to attract so many readers is enough to make them respectable. I read a stack of them last year over the summer break, and I was so absorbed in them, I nearly forgot to eat and sleep. But when I was finished, even I was baffled. Why, knowing full well there wasn’t a truthful word in any of them, was I so mesmerized? Some say kung-fii novels are fairy tales for adults, a theory I find convincing. Of course, after reading dozens of them, I’ve discovered that they’re heavily formulaic and that it wouldn’t be hard to cook up one of my own. But it would be no easy feat to reach the artistic level of a Jin Yong or a Gu Long. You attempted some ‘cross breeding’ in your novel, which is an intriguing idea, whether it succeeds or not. There is, as a matter of fact, a decidedly avant-garde woman writer named Big Sister Hua, whose experimentation with ‘cross breeding’ has been remarkably successful You might want to read some of her works. I hear she lives in Seven Stars county (where the county head is famous for selling rat poison), not far from Liquorland. When you find some free time, you should go see this ‘ladybug’ writer.
2. I once heard Big Mouth Zhao, a student at the Lu Xun Academy of Literature, say that Dragon and Phoenix Lucky Together is a classic Cantonese dish. Its ingredients are poisonous snakes and wild chickens (needless to say, in this age of cutting corners, there’s a very good chance that river eels and domestic chickens have taken their place). For your Dragon and Phoenix Lucky Together, however, you use the external genitalia of male and female donkeys. Who would dare dip his chopsticks into that? I’m concerned that this dish, given its blatant bourgeois liberalization potential, might not be accepted by literary critics. Currently, some popular ‘heroes’ in the literary field are intent upon finding ‘smut’ in literary works, with their dog-keen noses, eagle-sharp eyes, and a magnifying glass. It’s hard to escape them, just as a cracked egg can’t be safe from a fly looking for a place to deposit its maggots. Ever since writing ‘Ecstasy’ and ‘Red Locusts,’ I’ve been coated with the stinking saliva they spit on me. Adopting a battle strategy from Gang of Four days, they scrutinize my works by taking them out of context, attacking a single point without taking the whole text into consideration, ignoring the functions of those ‘unsavory details’ and their particular settings. Instead of focusing on a text’s literary value, they employ biological and moral viewpoints to wage a violent assault, and deny me the opportunity to defend myself. Therefore, based on personal experience, I urge you to choose a different dish.
3. Now about Yu Yichi. I’m deeply interested in this character, although you didn’t devote much space to describing him. The portrayal of dwarfs is not uncommon in literary works, either in China or abroad, but few could be considered typical. I hope you’ll utilize your talent to memorialize this dwarf. Didn’t he ask ‘you’ to write his life story? I believe this would be a fascinating ‘biography.’ He’s a dwarf who, born into a literary family, has read all the classics and is well versed in statecraft, yet has endured decades of humiliation. Then, through some magic intervention, he enjoys a meteoric rise, obtaining wealth, fame, and position; now he vows to for all the beautiful women in Liquorland.’ But what sort of psychology motivates this grandiose boasting? What sort of psychological transformation occurs in the process of acting upon this grandiose boast? What sort of mental state is he in after carrying out this grandiose boast? Behind all these questions lie numerous brilliant stories; why not try your hand at one or more of them?
4. As to the opening of your story, please forgive my directness, but it reads like meaningless grandiloquent gibberish. The story would be tighter if you deleted it altogether.
5. In the story, you characterize the father of the twin sister dwarfs as a leader in the Central Government; if you intend this to be viewed positively, the higher his position, the better. But your works frequently reveal derogatory criticism toward those in power, and that’s a no-no: society is shaped like a pagoda, getting progressively smaller toward the top; that makes it easier to link the characters in your story with real-life people. If someone from the top of the pagoda were to set his sights on you, it would be a lot worse than a head cold. So I suggest that you give the twin dwarfs a less illustrious background and their father a somewhat diminished official position.
These are just some random jottings, filled with contradictions. Disregard what I’ve written after you read it, and don’t be too conscientious. In this world, one should never be too conscientious about anything; it’s a sure path to bad luck.
I think it’s best to send your masterpiece ‘Donkey Avenue’ to
I’ve written several chapters of my long novel
Wishing you
Good Luck!
Mo Yan
IV
Donkey Avenue, by Li Yidou
Dear friends, not long ago you read my stories ‘Alcohol,’ ‘Meat Boy,’ and ‘Child Prodigy.’ Now please accept my
