For more than 900 miles, the empty-handed young man *** and the equally empty-handed young man Xiao Zisheng started a "poor tour" to study in five counties in Hunan.
106 years later, the well-known reportage writer Ji Hongjian re-embarked on that study tour.
I'm a little curious, what is their way of survival? What are their hobbies and habits? What are their contradictions and differences in personality traits and political opinions? How did they deal with people from scholars and celebrities, farmers, merchants, Buddhists, craftsmen, local officials, and so on, to understand the real situation in China? How does the real situation of China affect them, and what kind of resonance does it have......”
Ji Hongjian set off with many questions. And when more than 900 miles of old ways answered all his doubts, this "Study Tour 1917", which was selected as a good book in January 2024, was born.
After a hundred years, we will re-take the road of youth study tours
On August 23, 1917, the 24-year-old *** wrote a letter to his teacher Li Jinxi, who was 3 years older than him. The beginning of the letter reads: "On the side of the provincial capital, I tried to ask several times, but I was lazy and unsuccessful. Recently, there have been a lot of miscellaneous thoughts, and there are no relatives, so there is nothing to say. The younger brother is like a loving mother to a baby. Covering the world is dim, all of them cut off my soul, lose my ambition, have no way to discuss knowledge, talk about the great plans of the world and the country, fulfill morality, and be suitable for the way of living in the world. I mourned that I was out of school at an early age, and I was worried about my father and teacher. Who doesn't want to be motivated? When they can't ask for it, they hesitate on the wrong path, and their suffering is unspeakable, and they should be young and full of suffering. ”
This letter was written by *** and Xiao Zisheng after returning from Ningxiang, Anhua, Yiyang, and Yuanjiang counties, and he did not give a detailed introduction to the reason for the study tour at that time, but simply said "change the air a little and exercise your muscles and bones". Nearly 20 years later, **In an interview with an American reporter in Yan'an**, he finally mentioned that the reason was that after seeing the story of *** students learning to walk the whole country in the "Minbao", he wanted to emulate them but was shy, so he wanted to try it in Hunan Province first.
So in the summer of the following year, I traveled around Hunan Province on foot and visited all five counties. I was joined by a student named Xiao Yu. The peasants feed us and give us a place to sleep. ”
**The mentioned Xiao Yu is Xiao Zisheng, and the 5 counties are Changsha, Ningxiang, Anhua, Yiyang, and Yuanjiang. Decades later, Xiao Zisheng wrote a book with the title of "A Tortuous Experience Between Me and ***", recalling their study tour in 1917. Although Xiao Zisheng wants to restore the whole process of their study tour as much as possible, after all, as time goes by, his memories are also vague and even biased.
106 years after their study tour, Ji Hongjian, a well-known reportage writer, embarked on their study tour again. As Ji Hongjian himself said in the prologue of "Study Tour: 1917", he was already middle-aged when he re-embarked on this study tour, but he couldn't wait to set off with the Chinese youth of a hundred years ago, hoping to go deeper into their hearts, and also hoped that through some looming clues, the two seemingly unrelated years of 1917 and 2023 would be connected in some way, bringing people some thinking and enlightenment.
I want to follow this clue, sift through and extract fragmentary and even hidden historical information, and form my own understanding and opinions on this study tour with reasonable evidence—it must be a brilliant historical torrent. ”
From the beginning of this thought, Ji Hongjian knew that he was going to take a road that was not so easy to walk - the ancient post road had long been submerged in the barren mountains and mountains, and it was difficult for him to see much of the past scenes by "exploring" an old road that meandered for more than 900 miles 106 years ago. So he went to the starting place of the youth *** study tour - Hunan Provincial No. 1 Normal School, and began his journey.
Collect 900 miles of wind and reproduce the original face of the lost old ruins
When I came to Lijiawan, the sun was almost in the west. Lijiawan is a large bay, where the terrain is flat and open, and the houses are many and dense. Each house is closely connected, with small alleys crisscrossing it, like a labyrinth. This is the scene described by Ji Hongjian when *** and Xiao Zisheng visited Shuyi Village, Baijipu Town, where Li Xiaodan's house is located. In fact, Li Xiaodan's old house was demolished as early as the end of the 50s of the last century, and on its old site, Ji Hongjian only saw the outline of the weed-covered slot door and the foundation of the house, as well as the well in the courtyard courtyard. So in addition to what he saw with his own eyes, he also referred to the memories of local elders to write this vivid text that aims to restore and have a sense of imagery.
The text description of "Study Tour: 1917" has a sense of déjà vu, such as the section "Wind and Rain Shilong Pass", the opening "black clouds rolling, the mountain wind howling" seems to put the reader in the sheep intestine path between the crevices of the cliff before the rainstorm, and those tea pavilions and restaurants are crowded with guests who come and go to Bao'an Yigu Road, "temporarily put aside the plan to hurry, here or anxiously, or leisurely waiting for the arrival and departure of the heavy rain". This is not Ji Hongjian's utopia, in 1938, when he recalled his study tour experience with the poet Xiao San in Yan'an, he mentioned that he had written a seven-law poem, in which "the shower and the east wind pass through the far bay, and the Shilong Pass is connected to Shilongguan" and "The four sentences of "What road do you follow here, and sit and look at the long pavilion to turn idle" are the basis for reconstructing these pictures.
In order to reproduce what he saw during his study trip with Xiao Zisheng, Ji Hongjian adopted a "three-dimensional perspective" narrated from three clues at the same time - the first is Ji Hongjian's own search and his thoughts on the way to search; the second is the research of Party history experts in various places along the route, as well as the memories of witnesses and relevant people; The third is to analyze *** and Xiao Zisheng's memories of the study tour back then. The interweaving of these three threads makes the work present a three-dimensional effect as if time and space overlapped.
I stood on the remnants of the ancient city wall of Yiyang and looked out, ** and Xiao Zisheng took a boat from Dadu Port to cross the Zijiang River, and then entered the county seat from the south gate, and walked along Shili Mashi Street. The "I" here is the author Ji Hongjian, and the perspective of "traveling" similar to the overlapping time and space is a writing technique that often appears in "Study Tour 1917". Based on the author's profound writing skills and a large number of references to relevant materials, such a "crossing" can also make readers immersive, as if they are really chasing the young *** and the young Xiao Zisheng to embark on the road of study tour a hundred years ago.
Dialogue丨Ji Hongjian: No matter whether 10 years or 1,000 years have passed, a thing will always leave traces
Xiaoxiang Morning News: "Study tour" is now a hot word, and many teachers and parents let primary and secondary school students participate in various study tours. Do you think there is any difference between the study tour of young people *** and Xiao Zisheng more than 100 years ago and the popular study tour now?
Ji Hongjian: I think it's essentially the same thing. More than 100 years ago, young *** and Xiao Zisheng went on a study tour, essentially to enter the society and understand the society. More than 100 years later, for example, my children, I especially want my children to know that reading is of course important, but in the end, all people have to return to society and real life, so we hope that children can have an experiment, understanding and correct understanding of society and real life.
The study tour in 1917 played a good role in paving the way for young people to embark on the road of Marxism in the future, and it can be said that this is a very important part of his ability to become a revolutionary leader.
Xiaoxiang Morning News: Do you think it was his spirit of exploration that prompted him to go on a study tour?
Ji Hongjian: Yes. Of course, he himself told the American reporter that he saw that the "People's Daily" said that *** students traveled all over the country and went to the arrow furnace of **. Personally, I think this is just an inducement, and the most fundamental reason is that the young man wants to explore in his bones.
Xiaoxiang Morning News: The *** in "Study Tour 1917" is not a *** written from an upward perspective*** This kind of treatment is good.
Ji Hongjian: As a writer, since you want to write, you have to write a real *** and write about the real situation in different time periods. At the age of 24, he is in a stage of improvement and exploration. His desire to explore, whether it is his personal reasons, or the influence of some teachers of a normal school, in 1917 his study tour, the motive is very pure, there are no other ideas, he and Xiao Zisheng just want to feel how to live and survive without taking money out, that is, to force themselves into the society, to survive in the society. They are as simple as that, so I can't write that he had a very lofty revolutionary goal, to change China, to change the world. Many of his ideas at that time were not so mature, so when I interviewed and wrote, I did not take it for granted that his study tour was associated with the revolution in the future, but only wrote very objectively about the very simple thoughts of a Chinese young man in the early days.
Xiaoxiang Morning News: Their study tour is different from what we call poor travel today.
Ji Hongjian: Yes, it's different. I don't think anything can cut off history. More than 100 years ago, *** and Xiao Zisheng's study tour was not original to them. Chinese intellectuals have a long history of studying abroad. Haven't many intellectuals in history, including Li Bai, Du Fu, and Xu Xiake, actually traveled to study? The predecessor of the First Normal School, Chengnan Academy, has a very good inheritance in this regard, and it advocates reading both books with words and books without words. This is very important.
Xiaoxiang Morning News: In order to write this book, you re-followed their study tour. Why do you have to do it all over again?
Ji Hongjian: I think that a thing, whether it is 10 years, 20 years, 100 years or 1000 years, will always leave traces, but it is just a matter of the depth of the traces. I think as a writer is good at discovering. Of course, writing "Study Tour 1917" faced a big problem, there is very little literature, although Xiao Zisheng, who was in the same company, wrote about his experience with ***, but more than 40 years have passed when he wrote this experience, and he is also old, his memory is not very clear, and even a little confused. But I'm a firm believer that wherever they pass, there are traces. There is a characteristic of my reportage that I have not seen with my own eyes, I have not thought about it, and I will not write it lightly. Therefore, I started from a normal school, went to Chuyi, and then crossed the river from Pozi Street to the riverside to Qinwan Town, and Qinwan Town has an ancient post road from Changsha to Ningxiang, which passes through Wangchengpo ......In the past, there was a small shop in five miles, a big shop in ten miles, although the ancient post road and shop have been demolished, but there are still some old people who still remember, or there are records in some local materials, young people and Xiao Zisheng are along these ancient post roads, after arriving in Ningxiang, they are going to Anhua ancient post road, from Anhua back, they take the ancient post road from Baoqing Mansion to Yiyang, go to the Yuanjiang River and then take a boat back to Changsha. They can't leave these tracks, and if they do, they'll get lost.
What makes me very happy is that where they traveled, there were a large number of local party history experts along the road to study the course of the study tour in 1917, the most authoritative of which was Ningxiang, Anhua and Yiyang in the sixties and seventies of the last century. I've seen all of these materials in the local archives, and when I put them together, it's very complete, and I know where they went, what their routes were, who they met, and which of their classmates they visited......In addition to these materials, there are also the oral traditions of the common people along the road, they may not have seen them, but they have heard of them, and when they compare the things passed on by word of mouth with those materials and Xiao Zisheng's memoirs, I can distinguish which ones are true and which ones are false, and connect all the things I think are true, and this work is very complete.
Xiaoxiang Morning News: After you completed the whole process of their study tour and wrote this book, has there been any change in your understanding of young people?
Ji Hongjian: There are some changes - objectively speaking, this change is quite big. **Stories from his teenage years, such as he didn't want to do what his father asked him to do, he wanted to study, from Shaoshan to Dongshan School, from Dongshan School to Provincial Middle School, and then to the Fourth Normal School, First Normal School, etc., probably all know. After taking their study tour this time, I really knew that he was also very entangled at that time, he was the same as many of our ordinary young people, although he knew to explore, to study, but at that time he didn't know that his future was in**. What I show in my work is the real youth *** In 1917, he didn't know what his future was, he had not yet built a theory, and he had not yet connected with Marxism, but what he did very good was that he knew that he had to find experience, direction, and future from practice. He mastered an important method.
Xiaoxiang Morning News reporter Liu Jianyong.
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