I was about to respond to your most recent post (Feb 3), when I found myself editing "An Incident" -- to see how it would read with all the framing and coaching removed. A disturbing reaction emerged when I thought about the result:
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It happened during the winter of 1917. A bitter north wind was blowing…
I was about to respond to your most recent post (Feb 3), when I found myself editing "An Incident" -- to see how it would read with all the framing and coaching removed. A disturbing reaction emerged when I thought about the result:
=====================================
It happened during the winter of 1917. A bitter north wind was blowing, but I had to be up and out early. I met scarcely a soul on the road, and had great difficulty in hiring a rickshaw to take me to S—— Gate. Presently the wind dropped a little. By now the loose dust had all been blown away, leaving the roadway clean, and the rickshaw man quickened his pace. We were just approaching S—— Gate when someone crossing the road was entangled in our rickshaw and slowly fell.
It was a woman. She lay there on the ground, and the rickshaw man stopped.
"It's all right," I said. "Go on."
He set down the shafts, and gently helped the old woman to get up. Supporting her by one arm, he asked: "Are you all right?"
"I'm hurt."
Still holding her arm, he helped her slowly forward. When I looked ahead, I saw a police station. Because of the high wind, there was no one outside, so the rickshaw man helped the old woman towards the gate.
I got down from the rickshaw.
A policeman came up to me, and said, "Get another rickshaw. He can't pull you any more."
Without thinking, I pulled a handful of coppers from my coat pocket and handed them to the policeman. "Please give him these," I said.
The wind had dropped completely, but the road was still quiet. I walked along thinking, what had I meant by that handful of coppers? Was it a reward?
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In reviewing my butchered version of the story, I began to see the excised portions in a different light. They seemed overtly manipulative, even tawdry, and in the aggregate, self-serving and obsequious. I couldn't shake the feeling that Lu Hsun was really just painting a picture of himself as a political sycophant, and not lauding the driver at all. He seemed to be contriving a "re-educated" image of himself that some Kafka-esque, dangerously judgmental government official would find acceptable. Almost every phrase of the excised "coaching" material seems directed to this end.
And now I find myself squirming at the political incorrectness of what I've just written!
I was about to respond to your most recent post (Feb 3), when I found myself editing "An Incident" -- to see how it would read with all the framing and coaching removed. A disturbing reaction emerged when I thought about the result:
=====================================
It happened during the winter of 1917. A bitter north wind was blowing, but I had to be up and out early. I met scarcely a soul on the road, and had great difficulty in hiring a rickshaw to take me to S—— Gate. Presently the wind dropped a little. By now the loose dust had all been blown away, leaving the roadway clean, and the rickshaw man quickened his pace. We were just approaching S—— Gate when someone crossing the road was entangled in our rickshaw and slowly fell.
It was a woman. She lay there on the ground, and the rickshaw man stopped.
"It's all right," I said. "Go on."
He set down the shafts, and gently helped the old woman to get up. Supporting her by one arm, he asked: "Are you all right?"
"I'm hurt."
Still holding her arm, he helped her slowly forward. When I looked ahead, I saw a police station. Because of the high wind, there was no one outside, so the rickshaw man helped the old woman towards the gate.
I got down from the rickshaw.
A policeman came up to me, and said, "Get another rickshaw. He can't pull you any more."
Without thinking, I pulled a handful of coppers from my coat pocket and handed them to the policeman. "Please give him these," I said.
The wind had dropped completely, but the road was still quiet. I walked along thinking, what had I meant by that handful of coppers? Was it a reward?
====================================
In reviewing my butchered version of the story, I began to see the excised portions in a different light. They seemed overtly manipulative, even tawdry, and in the aggregate, self-serving and obsequious. I couldn't shake the feeling that Lu Hsun was really just painting a picture of himself as a political sycophant, and not lauding the driver at all. He seemed to be contriving a "re-educated" image of himself that some Kafka-esque, dangerously judgmental government official would find acceptable. Almost every phrase of the excised "coaching" material seems directed to this end.
And now I find myself squirming at the political incorrectness of what I've just written!