光天化日

by Ha Jin

在這個時代、這個地方，人民沒有隱私權、偏執狂肆虐，鄰居成仇、夫妻反目、國家反對個人，歷史抹煞人性──這些故事展示了人類驚心動魄的愚蠢。

　　「這是一本真實的書，沒有任何事件是虛構的。」　
　　哈金唯一一部自傳性小說集。
　　描寫在大連長達十二年的童年生活，期間經歷文化大革命。

　　哈金寫下了一個過去時代的不忍卒睹，
　　不寒而慄的是，當代中國種種現狀，今日讀來依然熟悉。

　　「我必須說真話，必須對抗遺忘，必須關注那些比較不幸以及一無所有的人。我必須嘗試超越任何國家。不管它們令你悲哀、或震驚、或沮喪，這裡描述的不過是千百萬大陸上的中國人曾經經歷過的生活。」——哈金

　　《光天化日》中十二篇故事都發生在中國文化大革命時期。在中國長大，1989年天安門事件後移民美國的哈金，用一個倖存者的敏銳寫出了道德的淪喪，他說了一個鄉村小鎮歇馬亭的生活，那裡的男人和女人充滿了感情和執迷，但他們被榮辱、生死、背信和壓抑控制著，因而被短視所蒙蔽。街上的群眾鎮日期待著政治運動、公審，乃至於大肆舉辦婚喪喜慶，但凡是在公眾面前的批鬥或是耀武揚威都不放過機會，人人藉由打壓異己，塑立個人服從看不見的指令的虛幻形象。盲目的群眾接二連三地視其他鄉民遊街為好戲，這不僅是當局者殺雞儆猴，對於旁觀者同樣是藉由打倒他人來作為保全自己的偽裝。

　　好比〈葬禮風雲〉，操辦家中長輩的身後事竟與子孫仕途升遷禍福相依，而人們為了向黨表忠罔顧孝道。或是〈男子漢〉中一名丈夫到村里吆喝弟兄們到他家睡老婆，以及〈光天化日〉因為和多位男人睡覺遭當眾遊街的婦女。婦女和丈夫以外的男性睡覺便遭謾罵，然而男性卻是為所欲為，如〈復活〉中外遇的男人自閹便換來自由，重新生活……各篇看來光怪陸離、荒謬奇異的故事。卻是真實在中國發生的故事。

　　「哈金作品往往比華文創作更能讓中國以外讀者一窺中共統治的實相。他的寫作環境沒有文字審查，因此中國作家不方便寫的，他都可以大寫特寫。沒經歷過中共統治的華人，例如臺灣人，特別應該讀哈金小說，因為哈金作品最能呈現中共統治怎麼改變了中國社會，怎麼扭曲中國人的性格。」──顏擇雅（專文導讀，全文收錄書中）

　　■《光天化日──鄉村的故事》中文版二十週年紀念新版■
　　特別收錄作者新版序、顏擇雅專文導讀。

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, China, Literature, Historical Fiction, Asian Literature, Anthologies

167 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1997

About the author

Ha Jin is the pen name of Jin Xuefei, a novelist, poet, short story writer, and Professor of English at Boston University.Ha Jin writes in English about China, a political decision post-Tiananmen Square.

Ha Jin grew up in mainland China and served in the People’s Liberation Army in his teens for five years. After leaving the army, he worked for three years at a railroad company in a remote northeastern city, Jiamusi, and then went to college in Harbin, majoring in English. He has published in English ten novels, four story collections, four volumes of poetry, a book of essays, and a biography of Li Bai. His novel Waiting won the National Book Award for Fiction, the PEN/Faulkner Award, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Ha Jin is William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professor in English and Creative Writing at Boston University, and he has been elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His writing has been translated into more than thirty languages. Ha Jin’s novel The Woman Back from Moscow was published by Other Press in 2023.

Reviews

[Derek · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderful stories that fit together in terms of tone and context. Equally funny and tragic, the stories explain the impact of China’s politic regime and former political culture on everyday people, but not in a heavy-handed or didactic way. The language is amazing. The author fills the text with what seem to be Chinese proverbs, insults, and working class expressions.

[Moktoklee]

I don't know exactly what to think of this collection. Some of the stories were really blockish and felt cobbled together from left over ideas. Sometimes there were certain parts of stories that have just stayed with me: Like the unhappy bride who throws herself into a well, the pigs crashing through the outhouse, or feasting on top of a great mountain overlooking the town. Some of were also pretty funny as well. I liked this in the overall, but something prevented me from liking it as much as I could have. It was good, no doubt. I just wasn't outright in love with it. I just don't have time to persue everything I only half liked.

[Velvetink]

epub tuebl

[Linda · Rating 2 out of 5]

Finally, a book I really didn't like of Ha Jin's and stopped my obsession.

[timon mcphearson · Rating 5 out of 5]

this is the first ha hin book i read. incredible look into china's past. as educational as it is amazing.

[Fred Daly · Rating 3 out of 5]

The writing style is a little flat, but the stories in this collection are interesting. There's a lot of sex and violence, often together, so most of the stories are not teachable.

[Ashley perry · Rating 4 out of 5]

well written. very depressing.

[Autumn Riehemann · Rating 3 out of 5]

stories are a bit flat
the second story is major >:(
but, I mostly read this for perspective, and that's what I got! I think I'll read more by this author, though

[globulon · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like Ha Jin for the simplicity of his stories. The characters tend to have basic motivations that are easily comprehensible. The plots of the stories also seem basically simple. They are neither fairy-tale's nor determined to show a malevolent fate. What's successful is that he is able to make these stories interesting, and even to take unexpected turns within the simple framework.

Obviously some of the interest is generated by cultural difference, both the Chinese culture in general, and the specifics of the Cultural Revolution period. But as I mentioned in my review of "Ocean of Words", the stories are definitely about people. So while the stories are flavoured distinctively by the settings, they remain definitively about the human side of these situations. I think this worthy of respect. It seems to me there must have been some temptation to politicize the writing, but instead of making me fear and hate the time period, it actually makes me more comfortable, with it. I feel I can understand better how people lived through those situations. At the same time the oppresion of people's lives is clearly shown. It's just that it ends up seeming more like the way any society has negatives and positives that effect the lives of the people who live in it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not left with any desire to live there. I don't mean to say all societies are basically equal or anything like that. Just trying to frame the feeling communicated by these stories. Both the wickedness and the naturalness of the times.

[Cynthia · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found this book to be strange but interesting, since the author began his tale by telling us a short story of how prositution was consider illegal. The "new country" which is the Communist China began to change so many things were expanding. The poor farmers were still poor but the rich was thrown into jail for sent to be reform as peasants and farmers.

Ha Jin had told a ale of hardship and woe that appeared during the Communist Revolution. People were dying and losing their spouse or were sent to the Commune leaders since they committed a crime. Even a small crime was a price to pay. However, some of the stories involve rape and violence. It brings out the characters of each short story and describes the unfortune things happening. In one story, a man lose his son since he believed that his son was stealing his fortune since his name was mightier then his. He thought of a prank to play and in the end the cart reer off course and crushed his son of the chest.

During the Communist time, people believe that farmers were given good fortune however they are wrong. They were still consider lower class unless your a communist leader, but in everyone's eyes you all achieve the status as a farmer. Unless one rebels they will be reported as a antirevolutionist. This book brings out the conflict that is occuring throughout the time of the cultural revolution.

[Roger DeBlanck · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ha Jin’s first short story collection examines the oppressive measures the Chinese communist government inflicts on its people. The stories cover themes and issues that are touching, shocking, and heartrending in their depiction of simple people living under the constraint and surveillance of a government seeking to dictate their every move and thought. Jin makes clear how the ideology of communist China preaches that if something is not good for the state, it must be eliminated or punished. Conscience is strictly a creation of the state, not of individual freedom. The characters are often reduced to pawns of the state. People are seen as malleable. They can either be reformed or sacrificed if necessary. For example, in “Winds and Clouds Over a Funeral” a grandmother’s wish not to be cremated is rebuffed by the commune leaders who make her death a political issue and force her son to submit to their demands. In every one of the stories, Ha Jin does not back away from problems of morality and identity. He captures the oftentimes violent and rebellious reactions of citizens caught under a repressive government and within a society that does not value the idea of selfhood.

[Lindsay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Each story on its own is well-written and powerful. All of the stories express the conflicts of villagers living in communist China. Most of the stories are gruesome and violent and involve bad fortune or outside forces imposing on individual lives. While these common threads make Under the Red Flag a logical collection, when read all at once they sometimes feel a bit formulaic. The reader is not surprised when things don't end well for the characters. My thought just now is that it becomes a bit oppressive to read all of these at once, and oppression is exactly what these stories are meant to convey. Even so, I gave it three stars because I think some stories were stronger than others in conveying this point and I would have rather read them outside of a collection.

[David Marxer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading any of Ha Jin's short stories it becomes no surprise he won the Pen/Hemingway Prize or any prize with Hemingway in mind because Jin's blunt,direct, you're right here with the charcters now reminds me of Papa Hemingway best short work. Even a general fiction reader who is not familiar with the history of China or the Chinese people and their everyday customs in rural China will enjoy the stories as much as someone who does because all of Jin's charcters are, most of all, human.
For my part it was hard to pick a favorite story,but I'll give the nod to "Newest Arrival", the story of a childless older couple who become foster parents to a young boy and how it changes their life.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

amazing in my world that the book ends on page 207, such an auspicious number in my forlorn life. meaning that it means nothing to anybody except me. but this book has many stories to entertain the modern reader and enlighten the Americans who actually care about human relations meaning that this man came from China and is now an American and he writes so incredibly well that I feel lucky to have found him.

How did I do that?

Not sure but that doesn't matter.

Read him if you can. Enlighten yourself. Have a laugh, shed a tear. His stories run the gamut of human emotions and I think maybe this is why he is so universally loved by so many.

YES

[Matteo Cavelier · Rating 3 out of 5]

The premise and tone of Ha Jin’s stories are interesting, playing on conceptions of change and progress in a small Chinese town. Nevertheless, the style can seem dry and occasionally monotonous. As far as spare contemporary Chinese writers are concerned, Ha Jin is not unique.

Nevertheless, some stories are more compelling. “A Decade” ties together a string of the speaker’s memory together in a seemingly unrelated way, but eventually using stories-within-stories to bring up ideas of nostalgia, passion and coming of age. Similar ideas were at play in the rest of the book, although not as compellingly.

[Jerry Peace · Rating 4 out of 5]

Twelve marvelous stories, written it seems with the fierce yet focused determination of an arrow flying straight to the target. The stories are housed during the Cultural Revolution in China but are neither apologies nor denunciations. They are much more revolutionary, much more insidious than that. The stories simultaneously stretch through the vast breadth of humanity while feasting us to a buffet of our alikeness. Ha Jin's poetry is next on my list. Don't do like me and miss this guy until you're old. My three favorites- "Fortune," "Again, the Spring Breeze Blew," and "A Decade."

[Robyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Under the Red Flag is a group of short stories from author Ha Jin about a village under the rule of Communism and the hand of the People's Liberation Army in China. I remember that these Honor driven stories are violent and at times dark. While my particular recollections of these stories are a bit vague, I do remember liking the collection. I am intrigued by social/cultural manifestations under rigid social, political and cultural restrictions and the stories are that precisely.

[Mandi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book as I did his other, The Bridgegroom: Stories. It's an easy-to-follow read, simple, composed of several unrelated short stories. Although pretty shocking and depressing with its upfront sexual violence and controversial social behavior, I did like the shock value and the flow of the read. A great travel book, something easy to put down and pick back up again with much interruption.

[Will]

While reading 1997's Pushcart Prize collection, I came across Ha Jin's short story "Man-to-Be," which is a surprisingly beautiful and empathetic parable about a militiaman who attempts to participate in the gang rape of a local woman but loses his nerve after looking her in the eyes. If it is any indication as to the quality of the other stories in this book, then Ha Jin should be on everybody's reading list.

[Lance · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this while working design hack work at the University of Georgia Press. I used to read all of their books as I scanned in photos, made copies and various other grunt work. I was completely taken aback by how powerful these stories are. Jin manages to chronicle the horrors of the Cultural Revolution in an incredibly beautiful way. I'm not sure how else to explain it. It is one of the most beautiful books I have ever read.

[Judy]

Tthis is a fine collection of short
stories by one of my favorite Chinese
authors. He writes from the standpoint
of a person living in a village during
the cultural revolution.
Many of the stories are disturbing and
I believe are meant to be so. Tthey
give a hint of the mindset of a person
during that period of time.
I recommend it.

[Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a former communist, I always enjoy coming across books that prove me exactly how wrong that I was. These short stories depict the degradation and brain-washing that accompanied the great Chairmans reign. I found each story to be quite interesting and, at times, funny. Nothing says good times likes learning through short stories.

[CAG_1337 · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've slowly been working my way through all the Flannery O'Connor Award winners; this was the first I didn't care for. Apart from providing a mildly interesting glimpse into another culture, this collection didn't have much else going for it. The writing didn't seem to have the grace and elegance as others that have won the award.

[R/P · Rating 3 out of 5]

Individuals coping with the limitations imposed on them in the New China forms the theme of this book. Each story details the struggles of ordinary Chinese who feel unable to break free from the grip of either their own traditions or the Cultural Revolution. I liked the final three stories, "Again, the Spring Breeze Blew", "Resurrection", and "A Decade", the best.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first two stories made me really nervous -- one about stoning a woman as a whore and one about a man asking other men to rape his wife.

The rest of the stories were really good, with subject matter that didn't disturb me.

Read this while in Hong Kong.

[Delie Dell Chua · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wonder how did this book got an award? I was kind of disappointed and was unimpressed with this book. The stories were basically about life under a communist regime. How women are treated, provincial life, soldiers, etc. I find most of the ending in the stories weird and hanging...

[Eric Dear · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of short stories offering a glimpse into life in rural China during the cultural revolution.
A depressive reminder on how blind adherence to ideologies distort basic human relations and values. A powerful read.

[Laine · Rating 4 out of 5]

While a bit depressing the stories certainly describe in intimate detail the pleasures and pains of life in villages during the Cultural Revolution. The human emotions and needs are quite universal but the setting is utterly foreign and unique to China under Mao. Fascinating and easy to grasp.

[Kathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some of the stories were a bit disturbing, but all were well-written and thought provoking.

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good, not great. Ha Jin is one of my favorite writers, but this is not quite as cohesive as his other short story collections. The quality of the stories is a bit inconsistent.