Poet Profile. Liu Nian, whose real name is Liu Daifu, was born in 1974 in Yongshun, Xiangxi, and is now teaching at Zhangjiajie University. Loved the sunset, the moors and the snow.
1. In what year did you start writing poetry? What first inspired you to write poetry?
In junior high school, Chinese teacher Tian Yuanzhi assigned an essay question, which was to write a poem. At that time, I thought it was fun, and students could also write poems, and I wrote about leeks, singing about its vitality that is not afraid of a thousand cuts. I can't remember the specific sentence. The second poem was written by myself, on Sunday I drew an ink rooster in the art book, there was a blank space, I couldn't handle it, and I wrote a poem "Laughing Rooster", because it was short, so I remembered, "In vain to the rock, empty to the clouds and geese." has the heart to spread its wings, but is powerless to fly. "In 1994, after graduating from secondary school, I entered the factory and wrote bits and pieces. Around 2006, I started writing amateurishly. In 2011, when my father passed away, I was very touched by the fact that I began to live and write to death.
2. Please choose 2-3 ancient and modern Chinese and foreign poets or artists who have the most influence on your poetry creation.
Cao Xueqin's Dream of Red Mansions brought me into the palace of literature, especially the poems in it, which made me fascinated with the Chinese language. The paintings of the Bada Shanren made me understand the artistic means of simplifying the complex. Van Gogh, let me understand the pious attitude towards art. Li Yu's words made me understand the importance of natural language.
3. Do you write poems with a wave, or do you revise them repeatedly, or do you have other ways of writing?
It's done in one go, but it's rare, and most of the time, it's still repeated revisions. The pen is like a pet, and if you don't pet it for a long time, it will become more and more rusty. Don't put it down easily. I don't have much talent for writing poetry, so I can't do it all at once. When a poem first comes out, it always feels good, and after criticism from readers and a long period of calmness, the faults will appear one by one. Then, I changed it repeatedly, all the things that were a few years ago, and the ones that were published and the books that were published were also changed. Some poems have been changed to rot, some poems have been changed to death, and most of the poems are slowly finalized in this repeated revision, and I enjoy the process of revision, like a small general, commanding an army composed of more than 2,000 Chinese characters in a war, sometimes losing, sometimes winning, but we do not step on crops, do not burn houses, do not occupy land, and do not worry about being buried alive after surrendering. Poems that change the dead, and do not throw them away. In a few years, with new discoveries, it may come back to life. It may also come to life as part of other poems. Modification can make loneliness warm, and thunderstorms and lightning can gradually subside. Modification can make people feel emotion and feel for words, and can make late at night into deep mountains. Modification is practice. —Excerpt from my essay "Paper, What Are You Singing".
4.How do you see your life, your career, and your poetry writing?
In the beginning, the three were independent, non-encroaching and non-interfering with each other. When I was living, I was Ah Fu. When I was working, I was Liu Daifu. When I was writing poetry, I was Liu Nian. In 1994, after graduation, I entered the factory and wrote bits and pieces. Poetry accounts for one percent of life. Around 2006, I can't remember it, so I started writing on the Internet as an amateur. Poetry accounts for about 10 percent of life. It was 2011 to really write poetry seriously, write it as a hobby and dream, and practice it as a part of life. At this time, poetry was sixty percent of life. It is only in family life and social life that poetry is put aside for a while. Then, he gradually got used to Liu Nian's identity, gradually integrated, gradually regarded poetry as life, and tried to treat life as a long poem with one line a day. In 2017, it accounted for 70 percent. In 2019, more than 80 percent, I am now a poet, with friends, colleagues, and lovers. Familiar friends and even colleagues around me still like this kind of poet's simplicity, sincerity, persistence, and clear love and hate, they know that you don't hurt others. There is no need to be defensive and suspicious of each other, everyone is relaxed, and it can be very long-lasting. But it's hard to deal with strangers who don't know you well, after all, it's an impetuous digital age full of conjecture and calculation. I like the state of life writing that people and poetry are gradually united, it makes me slowly feel what freedom is and what happiness is, and makes me more and more attached to the world.
5. Do you pay attention to the poetry commentary? Do you write poetry reviews, reviews, and research articles?
I pay attention to poetry criticism, but I personally feel that there are not many honest critics who can really sink their hearts to read the poems at the moment, and have a broad vision and originality. Many times, I prefer poetry reviews written by poets. I usually refuse to write a review for others, because when I talk about poetry, I take it seriously as I talk about faith. The good places will be praised, and the bad places will be criticized mercilessly, so they will not achieve the effect of increasing influence and sales that they want.
I like to promote poetry, and I like those who work hard to promote poetry, and I even think that promoting poetry is a merit in an era that only pays attention to mathematics, physics and chemistry, an era in which money and power are supreme, and an era that lacks aesthetics. At present, many people, and even the poets themselves, have a lot of misunderstandings about poetry, so they also write some words about poetry. A few years ago, "Poetry is the Medicine of the World" and last year's "Paper, What Are You Singing", two poetry chapters, reflected my understanding of poetry in a concentrated way. However, this kind of article takes several years to write and requires a lot of experience, observation, and understanding.
6. How do you evaluate the current Chinese poetry scene?
I am very disgusted with those who say that Chinese poets in the Chinese poetry circle are useless. These shrewd people know that to hype themselves up, to attract attention, there is no safer than to scold poets, because poets who write piously do not echo, their time and energy have to be used to create and make a living, and besides, poets who write piously are themselves weak, troubles to the world, and objects of oppression by power. In fact, compared with other industries, Chinese poetry is very respectable, because poets have natural independence and creativity. In my field of vision, there are many excellent poets who are silently persevering and continuing to write excellent works.
There is a misunderstanding here, which needs to be explained, many laymen think that as soon as a poet makes a move, it must be a masterpiece, not like this, good art must be helped by God, writing bad poems is the norm, and writing good poems is an accident. A person can't write a few good poems in his life. Li Bai and Du Fu, whom I admire, have mediocre works accounting for more than eighty percent of their lives. My idol-level male god, Su Dongpo, has written more than 3,000 poems, and I like less than 30 (only poems here, except for words).
Generally speaking, China's current poets, because of the increase in self-confidence, their works have also become original, and the new Chinese poetry has become an irreplaceable part of the world's poetry forest. Every year, just in WeChat, you can see a lot of favorite poems, but these poems, like gold in the sand, have no **, no critics, and no textbook compilers are willing to sift through all the hard work.
7. Write down the three elements of poetry writing that you think are most important.
First, love, love is the greatest talent, love makes persistence a breeze, and overtime becomes a matter of course. Love can make the eyes more penetrating and more able to find details that others can't find. When you love the craft of poetry enough, you will be like a hunter and a hunting dog, and you will not hesitate to search for it and will not let go of any interesting details; When you love life and life enough, you will pay attention to some subtle changes in it, and this subtle change is often a poetic hiding place.
Second, fieldwork. Go deep into life, into the fields, into people's hearts, so that your writing will continue to be fresh and wild. I love to travel, and I feel that nature is a vast and boundless scripture, containing magic and mystery, and is an inexhaustible source of poetry. The big society is too, to interview seriously, to read humbly, everyone, is a legend.
Third, read and reflect on it to improve one's aesthetic and philosophical accomplishments. While reading, the ability to reflect is very important, otherwise your reading will be harmful and unhelpful. You must have the courage to question all the sages and masters, and even question yourself, because writing poetry is an illusion, don't think that you are good at everything, everything is right, in the vast sea of poetry, everyone is just a small fisherman.