Drawing: Zhang Ji Reporter Wang Xueying.
Recently, "Harvest" announced the 2023 Harvest Literature List, "Writer" announced the 9th Golden Short Story ** Award, China Writers Network 2023 Selected Short Story List was released, Qiu Huadong and He Ping edited the "2023 China Short Story ** List" selection, and Chen Tao edited "The Road to the Future: 2023 Chinese Short Story ** Selection". At present, the creation of short stories is showing a creative trend of a hundred boats competing for the current and a hundred flowers blooming, but there are also some young writers whose short story writing is getting longer and longer, lacking the restraint of narration.
If the long story is the "heavy weapon" of literature, then the short story is the "light cavalry" of literature, the long story challenges the reader's fragmented reading time, and the short story challenges the writer's writing talent.
Why do young writers' short stories get longer and longer?
At present, the form of short stories is very rich, Deng Yiguang, Li Rui, Dongxi, Zhang Chu, Yi Zhou, Zhong Qiushi and other writers of all ages, Li Zishu, Zhang Huiwen and other overseas writers, various styles and types of works are blooming, especially the rise of young writers born in the 80s and 90s, their creation of short stories is very active, and their individual strength should not be underestimated. Founded in 2016, the Harvest Literature List is a comprehensive literary list covering fiction and non-fiction works, long and short stories.
Judging from the short stories on the list of harvest literature, it projects the exploration spirit of writers who respond to the times and are unwilling to be mediocre, and also outlines solid traces for delineating the frontier of current literature. Zong Renfa, a judge of the harvest literature list and editor-in-chief of "Writer", outlined to reporters the works on the list that impressed him: "Sonam Cairang's "Midnight Haiyan County Street" gives the characters the ability to create an atmosphere of activity can be said to be superb. Niu Jianzhe's "Sound Anecdotes" is a very impactful short story, the writer breaks through the barrier of avant-garde and realism, cuts into people's spiritual dilemma with ease, and the language is full of fun. Zhao Ting's Tropical Assassin takes a different approach, deciphering the subtle relationship between the virtual world and real life, and pitting and canceling out the game and the real world. ”
Whether a horse grazes on the pasture or gallops on the track, whether a person lives according to his own heart or follows the trends of the world, how does an unruly young rider get along with his police sister? Sonam Cairang's "Midnight Haiyan County Street" won the first place on the 2023 Harvest Literature List's Short Story ** list, and judge Liu Daxian praised his ability to extract poetic moments in trivial and ordinary daily writing, just like brewing soft and strong wine from rice grains and clear springs.
Deng Yiguang's "Once Upon a Time in Huaqiangbei" presents the flow of information that comes in like the historical evolution of the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone, from the military restructuring to the transformation of state-owned enterprises, from the fierce maker to the fierce geek, from the flood of copycats to the original summoning ......Judge Liu Daxian pointed out: ** shows a small and majestic history of economic transformation in a very short space. The "Sky Crossing a White Line" is vivid and full of philosophical thoughts, which is very popular with the judge Xu Kun, ** describes the mutual search and waiting between the three relatives, like a kind of "philosophy", the true meaning of waiting is just like the white line crossed by the sky, the antelope hangs its horns, and there is no trace to be sought.
The subject matter of the short story should be the freest, but the short story is not a superficial shorthand for social news, and the short story pays attention to the trajectory and pause, speed and force, take-off and landing, posture and figure, and requires a high level of skill and technique. After analyzing the characteristics of short stories, critic He Ping admitted that many short stories are still not up to standard in terms of style, and it is also in this sense that the stylistic consciousness of Shuangxuetao's short stories is noteworthy. His "Visitor from Xiangshan" contains and provides the greatest richness to the reader: the friendship of teenagers and the "expedition" from their hometown to Beijing, the past of Northeast China that is still warm in the media, the development of Jingpiao and the director and their psychology, crime investigation and revenge, etc. Shuang Xuetao represents the most outstanding stylistic skills and techniques among young writers.
Dongxi, Deng Yiguang and others show the creativity of mature writers, Shuangxuetao and Sonam Cairang are powerful young writers born in the 80s, and younger writers who have grown up from creative writing in universities are emerging, He Ping believes that "Jiao Dian, Ye Xinyun, Wu Qihong and Chen Xiaoshou of Beijing Normal University, Shi Yueqi of Fudan University, have a good performance in this year, but the creativity of stylized industrialization of creative writing and the personal creation of literary expression cannot be equated." The path dependence of creative writing has attracted the attention of some critics, and the number of short stories by young writers has been published in large numbers, but the quality is uneven. ”
The difficulty coefficient of short story writing is very high, and the writer needs to accommodate rich content, deep thoughts, and artistic feelings in a short space as much as possible, and needs skills and methods, intelligently looking for angles and structures, and also portraying characters with exquisite and accurate language. Cheng Yongxin's comments and analysis on the difficulty, situation and quality of short story creation can be described as pertinent, "On the one hand, major literary journals have launched short stories, presenting readers with a wide range of themes and a considerable number of works, but the real masterpieces are not as many as imagined, and it is not easy to select excellent short stories for the annual selection." Zong Renfa also said bluntly: "The creation of short stories means that there is a more rigorous test of the writer's writing ability, and in recent years, the phenomenon of writing short stories longer and longer is more common, especially for young writers, a short story is often 17,800 words, and it lacks the restraint of narration." ”
Diverse narrative modes and themes reach the depths of human nature.
Deng Yiguang's "It's Noon When I Wake Up", Mo Yan's "Little Relatives and Pimples", Duan Aisong's "Galaxy in Dreams", Cui Gu's "Shengzhi", Fan Jianjun's "Tale of Mortise and Tenon" ......Together, these short stories frame the landscape of the short stories in 2023. "If the river is used as a metaphor for life, the passionate upstream represents youth, the deep and distant middle is like middle age, and the downstream is more like old age. Everyone's life is like a river, it seems that it can be gathered into a long story**, and those waves splashed from time to time can be turned into a short work. Chen Tao, deputy editor-in-chief of "People's Literature", has a poetic understanding of short stories, and he has read a lot of short and medium stories in his editorial work, and compiled a selection of "Selected Chinese Short Stories".
Zhou Yuyang's "Through a Cornfield" is a science fiction **, starting from the childhood adventures of the Romanovs, and telling the pursuit and redemption of people in the narrative mode of growth history. ** It has multiple directions: personal development, loneliness, and the contradiction between "poetry" and "truth". Yang Qingxiang, a judge of the Harvest Literature List, believes that these story materials have been written in many works, but Zhou Yuyang integrates them into a story organism with his excellent narrative ability.
Jing Ge projected reality to the sky, and looked at the surface of the earth from the depths of space, which opened up the story space and greatly expanded the meaning space. When fun and contemplation are combined, this ** blooms with a charming charm. Jing Ge's short story "Prairie Star" exudes poetry and leads the 9th Golden Short Story Award. ** tells the story of several young people who meet to go to the grassland to see the stars, and their life path hidden in the fog slowly reveals its true outline. "Aliens" are both clues and images, making the ** narrative full of mysterious and strange beauty.
The annual "Golden Short Story Award" of "Writer" is mainly to select the outstanding short stories published in "Writer". Zong Renfa told reporters: The judges focused on the artistic quality of the selected short stories and the stylistic awareness of the writers when they were selected. While paying attention to the masterpieces of famous artists, we also pay special attention to newcomers. Among the award-winning writers of the ninth session, Guo Shuang and Cao Bai are post-80s writers who have grown particularly well in recent years.
Writer Wang Xiaofeng believes that it is the writer's responsibility to pay attention to the situation of the elderly in writing. Winner of the "Golden Short Story Award", "Aquatic" tells the story of an old man in the countryside after "moving" to the city, presenting the problem of life and death to the hearts of the people, he calmly uncovers the surface of life with superb skills, presents the hidden pain, and also treats the characters with tenderness and affection, and the sad brushstrokes contain the warm current of true feelings between people.
What is more symbolic of homesickness that cannot be placed than a disappeared mother, and what is more a metaphor for the power of hometown in life than a returning mother? In "Return to Xiaonanpu", Zhu Chaomin uses two mother figures walking in the opposite direction as a contrast between suffering and hope, which complements each other with the main line and writes about our complex feelings about our hometown. Guo Shuang's "Wandering Diseases" portrays a pair of twin brothers in the form of a unity of opposites, writing about their fate and the preciousness that have been missed in the process of growing up, showing the author's ability to control short stories and his unique way of observing the world. She expressed her creative experience: "Because of weaving this world, the old problems disintegrate in front of me, and the drumbeat of the future gradually sounds, calling me to accept a new self." ”
In the writing of short stories, the writer strives to express abundant and complex emotions in short words, and constantly reaches the depths of emotions in the concise and delicate narrative, and arouses unforgettable memories with stories that deeply care about the reality of life, and go to a spiritual gathering that witnesses the secrets of human nature and life ideals.
*: Wen Wei Po).