I admired how the writer uses minimal means to tell his story - setting the scene in the third paragraph, outlining the character of the old woman in the following one, revealing the extreme arrogance, selfishness and lack of agency of the narrator in the following two paragraphs (his derogatory comments about the "officiousness" of the rickshaw man, how " he will have to find his way out on his own" etc., introducing a supernatural element with the appearance of the old woman - and the hallucinatory, humbling impression of the rickshaw man rising above him as the power balance shifts and the worker becomes a hero.
I'm slightly irritated, however, by the nearly caricatured selfishness of the narrator, the heroization of the rickshawman, and the didactic conclusion in the last paragraph, the promise to "reform" and be a better person, which I suspect has a political background. Without this 'tag-on', I think the story would have been even more satisfying. But that's just my feeling.
I see that ending of courage and hope arising out of the incident, as a true change in the narrator's character. He had been concerned only with his own well-being of arriving at the government office to take care of important affairs. But now, six years later, the care shown by the driver at his own expense of being detained is the stronger memory that is recalled often, and how this incident has changed the narrator.
I actually loved that didactic conclusion, because it feels like looking into the brain of a mid-level manager writing in their journal, exhorting himself to be a better human in vague, trite ways because he hasn't really learned the lesson from that experience.
I felt like the moralising in the final paragraph was, perhaps, linked to Daoism and confuscianism and their traditional, moralistic stories. Confuscianism strongly emphasises our own conduct and the need to conduct ourselves in a moral way, although confuscianism might also be allied here with the 'officiousness' he mentions? i don't know for sure, just a hunch i have about it.
You're probably right Justine, I know too little about Confucianism, and being an atheistic Swede I'm sadly a bit removed from discussions of morale. But it's good to be reminded that it can be a genuine goal in life, framfrom the cynical 21st century life style.
In case you want more reminder, different corners of the modern world are apparently different: over here, I seem to be surrounded by people for whom morality is a major genuine goal in life, and so was pretty surprised to read this comment! (The Effective Altruism community in particular seems to be full of sincere attempts at morality, and to be fairly short on cynicism).
What first hit me was the contrast between "big" and "small".
The story's title (一件小事) could be translated as "a small matter". It is contrasted with (所谓国家大事) "the so-called great affairs of state".
Then there is the north wind, which is alternately described as "great" and "small" as it waxes and wanes.
Finally, there is the way the rickshaw man grows in stature and the description of the "small" -- the word is in quotes in the Chinese -- being squeezed out of the narrator.
On closer reading, I became aware of how the narrator's mental states. The great matters, over which he had little control, caused him aggravation. The small matter, which was in his own hands, gave him cause for hope.
While Lu Xu's vision is typically dark, the narrator's willingness to learn from his shame is a welcome spark.
Mark, can I ask another thing about the translation? On my first read, one line alerted my
internal translator critic. It was this: 'someone crossing the road was entangled with our rickshaw'. One my second reading I tried to analyse why that sounded like a bad translation. First of all, if feels like the wrong tense. In the context of the previous lines shouldn't it be: 'someone crossing the road became entangled...' ? But secondly, both 'someone' and 'entangled' are unspecific. I wondered whether the original conveyed more precisely the level of chance/carelessness /accident/intention blame which the narrator initially assumes. Or was the sentence in the original equally ambiguous? Is the point that the narrator is distrait?
The following paragraph clarifies all these points about the reason the accident happened and the blame the narrator ascribes to the woman. But his judgement then struck me as suspect, because he had initially recounted the incident in such a vague way. I'm interested to know whether this was the author's intention.
The Chinese text also goes vague to specific. The only difference is that the active voice is used: 刚近S门，忽而车把上带着一个人，慢慢地倒了。"As we got close to S's gate, the rickshaw's handlebar caught someone, who slowly tumbled down."
Thanks Mark! That translation reads much better to me. I wasn't even sure whether 'was entangled' was meant to be passive voice. ('Was caught by our rickshaw' would have been clearer.) But active voice at that point does change the way I see the narrator. Passive is so often a way of avoiding responsibility. Now it's clear that the handlebar caught someone and then the narrator goes on to argue to himself that it was that person's fault and that she wasn't really that badly hurt etc.
Agreed! Thank you, Rachel and Mark. I had the same question, Rachel, and now with your translation, Mark, I can picture what I wasn't quite grasping before. Thank you :-)
Thank you for the translation, that is so much clearer. When I first read the story I thought "the shaft" was referring to the axle between the wheels.
This line reads so much better. Someone getting entangled in the rickshaw made the accident sound really bad, whereas the narrator was going out of his way to point out that it was no big deal. Thank you for the translation.
From what I have seen, a rickshaw (especially ~100+ years ago) was a relatively simple device with two 'handles' sticking straight forwards in the direction of travel, the 'driver' stood between these to pull the two-wheeled cart immediately behind him. It would seem that getting tangled in this layout would be somewhat difficult: maybe flowing robes, windy day, unsteady pedestrian (old woman), bad driver ... In the end, translation between two extremely different symbolic systems, one pictographic, one alphabetic: much wiggle room for the translator and therefore, substantial amplitude range on meanings, from the individual word to the cumulative story. Not to mention the socio-cultural differences!
I liked that effect of the word 'entanglement' too. It was the wonky grammar that made me question the translation. I suppose if we wanted to keep that word and the vagueness, but convey a meaning closer to Mark's version, then something like: 'As we got close to S's gate, the rickshaw handlebar became entangled in someone's garment.' ??
Thank you for these thoughtful clues on how to better understand this story in translation. Small and large - definitely at play throughout - and I hadn't noticed that.
I did wonder from the first reading whether translation could be misleading me. I felt like some word choices could have a big impact. For example, "She must be pretending, which was disgusting." I think of disgust as a powerful word and it makes me side strongly against the narrator who up to this point has been formal and cranky and officious.
I also struggled with the phrase, "Someone crossing the road was entangled in our rickshaw and slowly fell." I had great trouble imagining the action. The passive voice doesn't help but also the idea of slowly fell. Knowing the original language might have helped. I took it at face value though as a person wanting to take all agency out of the encounter. The sentence literally turns its back to the action.
I'm curious, Mark, about the lines, "It's all right," I said. "Go on." Followed by the driver's question to the woman, "Are you all right?" In the Chinese is there this repetition of "character usage"? I found it startling. The "It's" from the narrator and the "you" from the driver being the tell-all difference.
I must say, having no knowledge of Chinese, it's marvellous having fine distinctions of meaning explained by revealing the pictograms. (Is that the right word?) Thanks Mark!
Hi Rachel, it turns out that only a few of the oldest Chinese charactersars actually pictographs.
It's best to think of the individual characters as "meaning bits" that are combined with other "meaning bits" to come up with a vast array of complex meanings.
Take for example the English meaning bit "geo" as in geography, geometry and geology.
In Chinese a similar character would be 地 which means land or earth. It occurs in 地方 (place), 地址 (address), and 地毯 (carpet -- "earth blanket").
So, a Chinese speaker will readily recognize their language's "meaning bits" while English speakers must learn Latin, Greek and German to get a silimiar insight into their language.
Very cool indeed! That feels like using quite different pathways to get from the image on the page to the image in my mind. A more creative way of putting "meaning bits" together, perhaps? Also, doesn't it open up a more flexible space between literal and metaphorical than we have in English? Because "meaning bits" for concrete images could be combined with "meaning bits" for abstract concepts even if the two had never been put together before and without requiring the simile/metaphor formulae that we use? (Sorry, I'm straying rather far from Lu Hsun's story, but I'm intrigued!)
Hi Rachel, I think every language allows us to weave some magic. We just need to master it's warp and woof. I guess that why we are taking this course!
I'm new around these parts, so first off, apologies for jumping into an ongoing conversation. The art of Chinese translation has advanced a LOT over the past 40 years, along with the advances in the Chinese economy. As I'm sure Mark knows, the original translation, most likely, was done by a Chinese person (very few foreigners* had good enough Chinese to be translating literary works until well into the 90s). But now, with so many Chinese having come to the US or Europe for their undergraduate and graduate education, and so many foreigners* having put in a lot of time in the best Chinese universities, there are now many excellent translators who really understand the language and the culture. A quick and dirty internet search suggests that "Selected Stories of Lu Hsun" volume was published by a US company in 1978. I'd be really curious about the background of the translator.
Anyway, more to the point, Penguin published a "Complete Fiction of Lu Xun" ("Hsun" is, roughly, the Taiwanese way to transliterate the author's name, while "Xun" is, roughly, the mainland way to do so) in 2010, translated by a western scholar of Chinese, Julia Lovell. (Lovell's title for the story, by the way, is "A Minor Incident".)
Just as an example of the difference in the translation, here is the 1978 version: "We were just approaching S—— Gate when someone crossing the road was entangled in our rickshaw and slowly fell."
And here is Lovell: "Just as we were nearing my destination, someone caught on the handlebar of the rickshaw, and toppled slowly to the ground."
Quite a difference eh?
As a small example of another difference, Lovell adds a little footnote/parenthetical to this sentence: "It was the winter of 1917 - the sixth year of our new Republic - the north wind scouring the city in great, fierce gusts." (The 1978 translation: "It happened during the winter of 1917. A bitter north wind was blowing...")
Personally, I read the story as commenting on and expressing Lu Xun's well-known belief that the Chinese character "needed" to change for the modern world to arrive; that the change in people's character was more important than broad political changes.
Footnote: I'm using the word "foreigners" to refer to non-Chinese people who study the culture or language, as in Chinese itself this distinction is made very clearly and carries a lot of importance, in my opinion.
Okay, sorry, now I see that it's listed in this very post that the original translation is from 1960! So that translator(s), whoever they are, are truly from a different era.
Fascinating, thanks so much for the links to the translators! He translated The Odyssey from ancient Greek into Chinese prose? What?! How amazing! I learn so much because of you, Mark!
Mark, if I may I ask another translation-related question regarding the "so-called affairs of state" making the narrator "more and more misanthropic."
The word misanthropic, almost an end-stop to the first paragraph, grabbed me both as a listener and as a reader. It's such a powerful word (though in English perhaps an antiquated word) and in only that one word - misanthropic - we learn a great deal about the narrator who is contemptuous of humans - a contempt that runs like a thread through the events that occur until the rickshaw driver's humane response to the old woman teaches the narrator shame, motivates him to reform, but most importantly gives him "fresh courage and hope." I read those last four words to mean to have hope in humanity, in the individual who has the courage to act and in doing so becomes more human "the larger he loomed, until I had to look up to him." All of which is to ask, "misanthropic" might translate as?
I often wonder about translated works because it provides this intermediary step of interpretation (so readers in other languages end up interpreting an interpretation). I'm curious about the use of the term "make a living" early in the story. When I read the term it gives me the impression that the narrator nominally middle class (not struggling, but not thriving), which is an interesting juxtaposition with some other aspects of the story (his disdain for the poor old woman, his fur lined clothes, etc.). I'm curious if the original Chinese phrase has those similar connotations. Did you notice the phrase in the Chinese reading?
The term in Chinese is "生计关系". "To make a living" is a good translation. One could see a parallel with the rickshaw puller, who is also out making a living on that cold morning.
Thank you for this perspective! I was hooking onto specific words so much in going back over this, and was thinking about what power the translator wields in affecting interpretation.
Mark, thank you so much for translating the nuance based on your reading of the original! I had a question about the word "officiousness" (" I did not think the old woman was hurt, and there had been no witnesses to what had happened, so I resented this officiousness which might land him in trouble and hold me up.") It seemed like the wrong word, since the driver is not being officious in any way. I figured it was just mis-translated--how does this sentence read in Chinese? (also, is it Mandarin?)
Thanks. I just looked up "officious" to be sure I was defining it correctly. The first definition "assertive of authority in an annoyingly domineering way, especially with regard to petty or trivial matters," would absolutely be a mistranslation. However, I was unaware of the second definition, "intrusively enthusiastic in offering help or advice; interfering". It's a stretch, but I could see that being what the translator was trying to get at.
Spelling Bee has me looking up definitions every day!
This is great, I was especially curious over the direct translation of the title. I suspect that if a similar incident happened again to the narrator, it'll be called "The Accident," or something with bigger significance; as opposed to being called "Another Small Incident."
I really appreciate this choice for this story because it strikes a personal chord with me as a Chinese American writer currently studying/reflecting on classical/foundational texts from both East and West. For me, I am immediately brought back to a political consciousness of the high stakes of any literary endeavor in China, where a court system reliant on a divine emperor (and run by a powerful censorship machine) ruled much of the imagination even in Lu Xun’s days. There’s something about the voice in the beginning that waxes an aloof lament of all things to do with the state, and it’s a powerful contrast for him to say that out of all of the affairs of the state/court (which are famously ripe with corruption) this one minor incident sticks out to him. Though he is aware of himself as being a person of status/power, it is rendered utterly impotent when he cannot compel the rickshaw man to ignore the woman and go on with his day. I feel a bit of that glimpse of humanity in the way the rickshaw man grows larger in the distance, signifying that he realizes he’s been egotistical and petty. I’m reminded of a different scene just for counterpoint’s sake, in Dicken’s “A Tale of Two Cities” when the heartless Marquis in a huff runs over a boy in his carriage and just tosses a few gold coins (and the bloody revolution follows!). In my mind I see two authors from opposing sides of the world yet writing to such similar themes.
"rendered impotent". Well said. Very interesting. It's like the three of them ran into a little compassion zone where the wary, distrustful passenger doesn't know how anything works and a want of compassion buys you nothing.
I listened to the audio and read along the first time. The second time around, several hours later (last night), I read the story aloud. I had no idea what was going on in China in 1920 nor did I know what was happening in 1917 so there was a lot of Googling. This was easy and convenient because I am either working at my laptop or with my phone. I typed notes on a Google Doc for the same reason.
My Google searches from yesterday:
Republic of China
What was happening in China 1920s
China 1920s rickshaw
China 1917 winter
I learned about the May Fourth Movement, I learned about how China was the epicenter of the 1918 flu pandemic and “The Surprisingly Important Role China Played in WWI.” I was thinking about symbolism and communism and student protests and “Is that George Saunders reading the audio?” and “the narrator has a fur gown” and “is my visualization of a rickshaw accurate?” and “how old was Lu Xun when he wrote this?”
Many years ago, my grandma had a bad fall. She fell in the middle of the street on her way back from the grocery store. Her face was bleeding and I don’t know whether anyone helped her up or she got up herself. When the older woman falls and the rickshaw driver helps her–that is when I feel the most emotion. It’s the image of her falling–and the thought of someone helping her. I suppose it’s because I miss my grandma and know that she never owned any fur-lined gowns. She never owned a car and had to walk to Big Ben Market to buy bananitos and lemon drops. She walked to Saint Mary. She walked to Chan Dong Supermarket. The circulation in her legs got so bad that eventually both of her legs were amputated and she never walked again.
She lived through these times, a couple thousand miles south of Beijing. She survived the Spanish flu and the world wars. She was five years old when Lu Xun wrote An Incident.
What started as a lesson in Chinese history turned into a 42-year-old woman thinking of her Nanay, wishing she had held her hand more when they crossed the street together.
April, when I read your response, I remembered another fall. And so I am grateful for what you wrote.
I had a childhood friend and later lover that I had not been in touch with for a long time. He lived in another state. Then I heard he was not well. I called him. We would talk.
He had cancer and was very weak and no longer able to keep up with his gardening-landscaping business. One rainy day on the way to pick up a newspaper, he fell in the street in front of some shops in town, and he lay there for a long time in the rain before someone helped him.
Shortly after this, he was not able to talk much on the phone. His cancer escalated and when I traveled south to see him, he was already on pain-killers. I continue to regret very much those months before the fall -- that I didn't call him more often -- to talk more, to talk longer.
For me, the narrator in "The Incident" was someone who saw clearly the dark side of the world he lived in, and his move to the city intensified that vision. I see him not pessimistic as a child growing up in the country. Something changed him there. And the incident was a reminder of another way to be in the world that he admired once, but left behind. So regret and loss.
It is wonderful to think back, on a kindness, on love, on beauty. I think now of your Grandma as do you. There is a story there and you should write it.
Thank you, Ciaran. Funny that you should suggest this because part of the book I'm writing is inspired by parts of my grandmother's life, so that's what I did today. I revised the grandma part. This assignment completely–and surprisingly–intersected with and inspired my own writing.
I am at the early stages of research about me Great Great Grand Mother, I never met her, my sister did and was afraid of her as she was dressed in black. Yet she was a strong woman. We think she was about six years old when the potato(e) Famine hit Ireland.
An Incident cuts deep. Lu Hsun has deployed his pen as a surgeon’s scalpel and conducted a swift, forensic autopsy of a sick society. Seeing the body politic splayed on his slab, its classist, corrupt malignancy exposed, satisfied me greatly. But Lu Hsun wasn’t done. He wrote on to a powerful finale: Hope. It felled me, stirred in me the mix of shame and gratitude a sinner feels when being forgiven. Ashamed of my smug reactions when the story’s narrator was made small, when his bribery failed to assuage his guilt, my outlook which had favored the lowly rickshaw man and the old woman shifted to him. I saw myself, like him, in need of reforming, and felt grateful for the optimism Lu Hsun leaves him. Maybe there is hope for me, too?
How did his story work on me the way it did? With wind. The agency of wind propels his story.
In the Chinese tradition, wind is associated with sickness. A wise man avoids wind. But both the narrator of some rank and the rickshaw man must work. Work forces them out into the wind. An ill wind in the Chinese tradition and, like Hemingway’s rain in Cat in Rain, striking everyone irrespective of his rank. No one escapes the wind. It causes the incident. An accident easily foreseen. As Chinese classics admonish: What did you expect, going out in the wind?
The rickshaw man responds to the incident with action, aiding the wind’s victim without regard for himself. His selfless act of goodwill—at odds with classists, the corrupt state, and the self-serving narrator—sets the wind in a modern context. A new iteration of the wind appears. Fantastic and transformational.
No longer a malevolent force, the wind becomes an agent of reform causing the narrator to see the rickshaw man inflated and himself small, deflated. He senses his failings, though he cannot face up to them. Thus, his reform begins but remains incomplete. The incident stays with him. From time to time its wind returns to revive his sense of something wrong within him, which he remains unable to face. Yet, the reoccurring wind conveys courage and hope for self-reform.
A hundred years have slipped by since Lu Hsun chose to end his story with hope. Now, ill winds abound. Yet, his powerful word continues to blow off the page and provoke a new reader. A day later, An Incident returns to her mind and she feels hopeful. Thank you, Master Lu Hsun.
I appreciate the insight relative to the commentary on society that is embedded in the story that also functions on a personal level. On either level I am trying to understand the perspective (and meaning) that it is all self report, all in his head, untouched, even in his self report, of relaying commentary from someone else's sense of him then and/or "now". So I see him as potentially worse than his initial self description of "more and more misanthropic" and that for him it serves as a blanket excuse in the "I am just that way" without really examining his life - even with distance from when the incident took place. In the end, that he can still feel shame to learn from, as well as courage and hope, the incident has the power to provide him a lifeline to a sense of connection with humanity beyond himself. But given the context of only his perspective sparsely laid out, it is unclear if the hope and courage is just a feeling that he experiences sitting in his chair at home that might be acted upon some day, or if it is the basis for action in his life? Has he connected more or is it just hope?
Stepping back from that and in light of all of the comments, I am fascinated by the depth and breadth of experiences provided by deeply reading so few words written long ago, that to your point, reaches to us now in the midst of our own ill winds. Here's to hope and courage.
Yes, Lu Hsun provides a scan of the self-serving brain. The narrator knows he is wrong yet resists change. Change is inconvenient. Change alters one's privileges and identity. Change is hard work. Yet, the wind of change keeps blowing. He cannot stop it, but how long can he resist it? This is a question Lu Hsun leaves the reader, indeed, asks of the reader, suggesting an optimistic outcome. I think it is more than a cautionary tale, it is like a pep-talk. Come on, reader, you can do it! Reform yourself.
Thank you, Colleen! Your analysis is excellent and helpful. I so agree.
I started reading the comments after I did my own and posted it. For me, the wind was the key metaphor too, the central acting force. Am so grateful for your knowledgeable analysis. So interesting what you write that in Chinese tradition, wind is associated with sickness.
Colleen, I love your idea of the wind as sculptor of the soul. And the parallels between 1920 and 2022. My first reading of this story ended with happiness, feeling like the narrator had a chance to be different. I did not realize right away that this possibility of grace extended out from the story to everyone else in the world.
I love your thoughts about the wind. I have been thinking about its purpose and was confused by its changeability. The fact that in China, it is associated with sickness, is fascinating. Thank you for helping me understand its role in the story.
Colleen, thank you! So beautifully insightful and expressed. I did not know that wind is equated with ‘sickness’ in Chinese tradition ~ and I had not equated that ‘wind’ caused the incident! The old woman’s tattered and fluttering jacket becoming entangled - now I understand how she became entangled! Again, thank you so much, you shed great light on this story for me.
Twenty years ago, I was running an errand for my boss in midtown, NYC. As I came out from dropping off the package, I noticed actor Christian Slater leaning against the building. As I waited at the corner for the light to change, I took another look over my shoulder to take him in. Just then, a taxi turning a tight left ran over my foot and knocked me down. The other people waiting to cross pounded on the side of the car and it stopped. The taxi driver told me to get in. There was a businessman inside already, reading a newspaper. He looked up, annoyed, but didn't say anything. As we drove away, I checked for Christian Slater but he was gone.
The taxi driver dropped off the businessman and then brought me to my workplace. I tied my sneaker tighter because it seemed to help the pain and went on with my work day. About a week later, I got a phone call from the taxi driver, checking to make sure I was okay.
Reading this story, I wonder now if that businessman ever thinks about that day? Does Christian Slater?
Yes, this is so interesting! And one of those stories we love about NYers and the random acts of kindness from strangers. And your observations about the businessman and Slater are compelling. I'm also glad to hear your foot was not badly hurt.
I find it very interesting that so far maybe half of the commenters think that the narrator experienced a change of heart; the other half do not. Possibly one mark of good writing is that the story can be experienced in opposing manners. And possibly both takes are not only valid, but true.
I think the narrator *thinks* he had a change of heart. But I don't totally believe him. And as you suggest, maybe that dark irony -- like a Frost poem -- is the real beauty of this story.
I'm team "change of heart," too. I had a hard time distancing myself from this story because it made me think about my own way of lamenting my past—the times I’ve hurt someone, or said the wrong thing, or made the wrong choice . . . the memories I’ve chewed on, over and over, making them more and more significant and with time, “more vivid than in actual life.” The one consoling thought in reliving all the things that make me cringe: these memories haunt me because I am aware. Aware of my missteps, and aware that I can be better. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t think about these things at all. Trying to find my own hope and courage from the shame. So it's probably for my own sake, but I *have* to believe that the memory of the incident changed the narrator.
A spiritual awakening can have a real visual impact for some people, which would account for the narrator's nearly hallucinatory vision of the rickshaw puller becoming larger and larger. In the aftermath of realization, the vision clears somewhat -- but the person (if they're lucky) never fully recovers. Just my two cents. I love this story.
Thank you for that, Manami. The more I comments I read, and the more I think about it, the more I see that part of the dichotomy is because awareness is the easier part, and to change one’s outlook and especially behavior is extremely difficult; in fact it seems to require a high degree of resolve, not to mention commitment.
I agree! Change of behavior is the tricky part, and the narrator never states that he is a changed person in that sense, just that the incident has changed the way he tries to think about himself/aroused him from his "ill temper." I think to myself, well there's a start.
Yes, great point. I am team "change of heart," but I had a brief moment where I thought, "did the narrator actually change?" I then map out his slow and gradually change of heart in a "timeline" by whom he blamed for the incident...the woman, the rickshaw man, the woman again, the politics of the time, and finally himself.
I am also team "change of heart" but not full-on "change of heart." My impression is that based on Hsun's subtle rendering throughout, the main character is only "human," therefore forever flawed. In the beginning of the story, he seemed blind to his flaws. But later, the fact that he learns "shame," seems to point to a change of heart.
I like that you call this out. Thanks. I’m not sure about full change of heart but am sure that the man ended up on a different journey than he expected. His simple trip from A to B became a journey of awakening to his arrogance and to the rickshaw driver’s dignity. How much he changes from this unexpected journey is perhaps left to us to ponder, but I think he’s definitely been shown a different path.
My feeling was that he momentarily was jolted out of his auto-pilot, self-centered way of thinking into a kinder, more fulfilling state of conscience. I do not think this change was permanent. As the years pass he periodically reflects back on "The Incident" in a similar fashion, to snap himself out of himself, as a reminder to be better.
Yes, but I also like that each of us feels strongly enough about our own readings to feel protective of them. I want to abide the "change of heart" interpretation just enough to keep a debate going.
To me that is the central "moral"of the story: it is imperative to question oneself. I don't think it is clear at all that the narrator has a change of heart or believes he has. But he is spinning, questioning, kind of lost in himself since the incident, except for his questioning.
I thought so too. Upon first reading the final paragraph did not register at all. The second time I read it I realized why: it seems redundant to me. Maybe it is the passage of time, or the invisibility of moral lessons in my own life, but it feels like a much stronger story, ending with the next-to-last paragraph and “I could not answer myself".
Very interesting. When I read the story, I got the sense that the urge to 'reform' was not internal, but rather imposed upon the narrator - like a guilty child, scolded by his parents. As though the rickshaw man, growing in size, became an authority telling him to 'behave'. The fact that he still mulls over the incident seams revelatory: he still doesn't know what to make of it, and hasn't made up his mind as to how this 'life lesson' impacts his own path. However, he knows very well what he ought to do.
I don’t read this as the narrator having a real change of heart. Instead, the story strikes me as a subtle skewering of the way comfortable people can self-romanticize. And of how the narrator spins a pious arc of personal reform, while remaining oblivious to "actual life."
The narrator's self-involvement is constant throughout the entire story, starting with the wind being described in terms of how it makes it hard to get a rickshaw. As the driver walks the woman away, the narrator doesn't think of what the driver or the woman are actually feeling or doing. All his emotion and intense imagery is spent on his own reactions. Even when he hands coins to the policeman, the narrator doesn’t think about how the driver is doing, and whether he's been arrested, or what exactly has happened to him. Instead, he obsesses over his own actions in giving the coins.
His mention, at the beginning and the end, of “affairs of state,” or “military and political affairs” seems important. I wonder if these references are there as a way of drawing attention to the narrator’s narcissism. In the beginning, he describes the affairs of state only in terms of the impression they make on HIM. Not on the effects they have on the populace at large. At the end, again, these public matters are dismissed as unimportant, irrelevant to him. Is the story leading us to consider the situation of a man who views the vulnerability, suffering, compassion, self-sacrifice of other people -- of a whole nation, even -- only in terms of how those "incidents" play into his own private drama?
Another thing occurs twice in this very short story: “I was almost afraid to turn my thoughts on myself.” But his thoughts have been on himself the whole entire time. And “makes me try to think about myself.” Again, that’s all he’s been doing! The juxtaposition of his self-thoughts in the final paragraph with his continued disinterest in the larger affairs of society seems important. His self-satisfaction ends the story. He sees himself as having nobly -- even humbly -- passed through shame, and now being on an upward trajectory of reform, newly endowed with courage. His own personal drama is “more vivid” than what he sort of dismisses as “actual life.” Which the actual people around him are actually living.
I like how you highlight the narrator’s hubris. I’m wondering if it’s really necessary for him to totally transform in order for us to give him a break. Could it be enough that his unconscious and self centered journey was interrupted, the he was forced to see the value of compassion? The incident opened his eyes. He might not see everything we want him to, but he’s looking now. Doubt has been sown.
I agree with Kurt and Min. For me, two words stood out - "shame" and the fact that he is "taught" shame. Not to be tricky, but some H - U - M words come to mind. Humiliation, which hurts his ego and which he needs. Humility, which is the letting go of pride. And humbleness, which he begins to feel, or at least a little.
I agree Kurt and Min. We get quite a lot of information in the course of the story to show that the incident has made a significant impression. Before the incident he was 'misanthropic' but the incident 'aroused him from his ill-temper' so that 'even now I cannot forget it'. With time it 'remains fresh in my memory' and has grown 'more vivid' and causes 'distress', 'teaching me shame' and 'urging me to reform'. I was left with the impression that the narrator has been moved enough by the incident to return to the memory of it often enough to remind himself to be better.
the fate of good intentions is often to wither in the everyday, we lapse, and then that conscience pricking moment arises again and reminds us , if he had succeeded in reforming completely it would be the end of the movie (Groundhog day)
Kurt, yes, I like how you put it: "He might not see everything we want him to, but he's looking now." Or at least, he was looking for as long as he could. And there's something very human in his responses, even if they're not fully conscious.
This was basically my take— pretty cynical. I didn’t feel like the narrator really experienced a true change. The self awareness felt fairly shallow to me. I appreciated Min’s take above because it is more generous than mine. I find it fascinating how we bring much of ourselves to these readings which truly changes the very nature of the story and it’s impact. There is no correct reading… so much is based on perspective.
“We bring much of ourselves to these readings…” That must be the end result of great writing, to create the kind of mirror in a story in which everyone can see themselves, despite our vast differences in experience and outlook.
Betsy, my reading is like yours. The POV, beginning to end, is grounded in the man's self-regard; all events are all about *him*; he struggles, feels "distress" whenever they are not. He feels no further concern about the old woman's condition; in fact, she is incidental to the narrator's interests, although she is central to the meaning of the story, the event. He extrapolates or creates meaning that serves himself only. However, I agree with those who have commented on his nascent sense of empathy, but, because the language couldn't be plainer---"giving *ME* fresh courage and hope"--- his limited Point of View is emphasized and makes/carries the meaning, which could perhaps be the compassionate Chekhovian awareness of the limitations of self, the impossibility (difficulty?) of true and sustained empathy. The author intends us to shift our attention to the old woman rather than remain in the narrator's concerns, in part by the symbolism and detail of her tattered jacket contrasted with the zoom-in detail of the narrator's fur-lined gown, and as reflected also in the language, in the word "attention" and the POV-changing awareness that the rickshaw man was paying no attention to him, and instead "gently helped the old woman to get up" (graph 7). We now must follow what the narrator is experiencing, seeing, hearing, the events outside himself, his new awareness culminating in the phrase, "he helped her" (graph 11). His new awareness is short-lived; he hasn't the inner stuff (the soul) to sustain it or to adequately respond, thinking only of money---which was, after all, the thing that brought them all together, the need to earn a living, and so he tries to compensate the working man. Whose experience/POV matters? How are we shocked out of our locked-in self-absorption and self-interest? Takes a rickshaw wreck... A wise older friend once calmly replied to my frantic reporting of a bicycle crash I'd just witnessed on 17th Street, Union Square, by saying, "They found each other." Finally, I loved all the Chinese expertise above; thank you for all that translation, reference to Buddhist consciousness and symbolism. Beautiful help.
Rhonda, yes, thank you for your clear articulation. I agree, there's clearly more going on here than just a person romanticizing their own reactions. As you write, "the impossibility (difficulty?) of sustained empathy." There is indeed something that happens in the narrator's universe. And even if he can't fully sustain the new awareness, we see him react to it. And perhaps we as readers can find some empathy in ourselves for the narrator's imperfect moral journey.
I have just discovered this wonderful Story Club, and I feel inclined to join the conversation, albeit late. I appreciated the discussion on translation and all of the cultural context and insight. It is in regards to whether or not the misanthropic man did in fact grow that I too would like to weigh in.
In my first reading, I was sympathetic to the main character, as I tend to be, but upon a second reading, and with the instruction to take notes as I went along, the misanthropic man made me angry. At every turn, he was dismissive and disrespectful to the woman. Knowing what we now know about the ways that women are dismissed and disrespected in regard to their medical and health needs (ie: women are 32% more likely to die in surgery under the care of a male surgeon). This Incident was just a simple, everyday, classic example of not taking a woman at her word.
Furthermore, by his own admittance, the misanthropic man does not fully take this incident into consideration. Yes, it is an incident that has stayed with him, but what he actually says is that even years later, it only makes him TRY to think about himself. From my reading, the man admits that he can't forget the incident, but there is no evidence that he has made any change in his thinking and behavior. Perhaps therein lies the power of the story; if a reader recognizes the misanthrope's shortcomings, then he/she/they have the opportunity to look at their thoughts, words, and actions and do the work. To end on a positive note, I did like that in the conclusion the narrator brought up the classics of his childhood, which he claims not to remember, but which surely warned him against becoming a misanthropic old man.
There is this Buddhist sutra I love...its a sort of Marvel superhero story of intergalactic wisdom and compassion filled with some funny scenes where stodgy old monks are having their minds blown, by this one charming dharma scallawag and his wacky friends. It’s called the Vimalakirti Sutra and at one time it probably would have been the most popular Buddhist text in China (my impression...not an expert.) Dunno if it would have fallen out of favor by the 20s.
Anyway, there is this repeated motif in there of average people transforming to become big and also being small at the same time. After one of these transformations, our hero Vimalakirti explains to one of the historic Buddha’s disciples what that monk, Shariputra, is missing:
Vimalakirti said, "Ah, Shariputra, the Buddhas and bodhisattvas have an emancipation that is called Beyond Comprehension. When a bodhisattva dwells in this emancipation, he can take something as tall and broad as Mount Sumeru and put it inside a mustard seed without enlarging one or shrinking the other, and Mount Sumeru, king of mountains, will still have its original shape. Moreover, the Four Heavenly Kings and the gods of the Trayastrimsha heaven [who live on Mount Sumeru] will not even know or realize where they have gone to. Only those destined for enlightenment will be able to see that Sumeru has been put inside a mustard seed. This is called dwelling in the doctrine of the emancipation Beyond Comprehension.
That’s what I thought about when the driver walked away from the rickshaw.
Ah, to be emancipated from oneself! (Interesting that the mustard seed has parallels east and west.) The driver's focus shifted to the most important task. And it affected not only himself and the old woman, but also our narrator, as well as every reader of this story.
So much of the action of the story is driven by the changes in the wind. First, the heavy wind clears the loose dust off the roadway. Then the wind lets up a little. The combination of high wind (clears away dust) and low wind (less resistance on the road) allows the rickshaw to speed up, and hit the woman. It's implied that the rickshaw might not have hit her at all if not for her loose ragged clothing, "fluttering in the wind" and becoming entangled on the shaft.
The wind is "responsible" for much of what happens in the story, rising and falling in an almost pernicious way to create the circumstances for "the incident."
I wondered about that - if the rickshaw was actually going fast, because the narrator's version is full of slippery get-outs and denials. If so - then the rickshaw driver despite his blameworthiness just stepping in and doing the right thing is somehow even more amazing.
The narrator tells us from the start that "so-called affairs of state' led him to think badly about humanity thus hardening his heart. He then tells us of this incident that "woke" him up.
What "woke" him up had nothing to do with "affairs of state." Quite the contrary. It was the state of human grace demonstrated by a person far below consideration in military and political affairs. In that act the rickshaw driver became the powerful one. The one who could make a difference in the life of another person.
This made him feel little, insignificant, drained of self-importance. Impotent. When approached by the police officer, the only thing he had that could restore his sense of worth was money. He was disquieted by this insignificant act.
And he continued to be distressed as he relives this incident. His involvement in affairs of state, his education, his wealth touched no one but himself. Yet it gives him "fresh courage and hope." To do what? To change. To learn to open his heart. Again... and again... and again....
I love this read. And I like the story more for its sense that the narrator didn't simply 'become a good person'. The story honors the difficulty of changing, especially for the privileged, with their (I mean our) (maybe I mean my) self importance.
That the narrator returns to the story many times and takes both shame and courage/hope from it makes it so much more powerful than the Disney version: "I was bad.I saw kindness. Now I'm good."
Doug, your words "especially for the privileged" surprised me. I suppose because I can't imagine change being easy for anyone regardless of their circumstances or sense of self.
I like your idea that the "story honors the difficulty of changing." Looking at it that way, I would also say that it honors the difficult position 'upwardly mobile' people find themselves in as they strive to 'make it' in a setting that does not honor our humanity.
Yes, I think that's right - such a good observation. You'd think if we felt shame we'd do better but we don't necessarily do we? The possibility is there both to lapse into old ways and to do better - the memory continuing to disturb him causes shame and offers him an opportunity to do better. Thank you for this insight.
I’ve re-read An Incident several times, dissected it, puzzled over it. I've little to add to all the insightful comments and I'm anxious to hear what George has to say. That said, I woke up this morning and it triggered a memory of mine, one that is associated with strong waves of emotion.
The story got me thinking about my dear sister. Beautiful, creative, sensitive, anorexic, alcoholic, homeless, then dead. My feelings seeing her (and remembering seeing her, years later) in her element, the street, from my elevated perch. The mix of feelings any of us feel when encountering a homeless person, maybe inebriated, unavoidably dirty, perhaps threatening. Their wounds seem self inflected, and any help provided will likely be turned into mind-numbing drugs or alcohol. On the other hand, they are a living breathing person, it could be a relative, it could be you in their position, there but for chance. You feel waves of empathy and waves of disgust. Fleeting, competing feelings. Which feeling dominates? Well, I suppose it depends.
You are right. I gave money to a homeless man yesterday and felt angry and so sad about his plight and yet, and yet, he scared me, he frightened me; I wanted to be away from him.
Holding my take on the story, but FWIW thought I'd share this John Steinbeck quote, which just popped up in my Twitter feed (via Jon Winokur):
"If there is a magic in story writing, and I am convinced there is, no one has ever been able to reduce it to a recipe that can be passed from one person to another. The formula seems to lie solely in the aching urge of the writer to convey something he feels important to the reader. If the writer has that urge, he may sometimes, but by no means always, find the way to do it. You must perceive the excellence that makes a good story good or the errors that make a bad story. For a bad story is only an ineffective story."
It's time to reread East of Eden. My daughter just turned me on to Journal of a Novel--The East of Eden Letters. Can I just spend the rest of my days reading?
Haven't read that since college, probably, around the time "An Incident" was written. Loved it then, though I remember thinking the movie improved on the ending. (Also: James Dean.) Wish I could give you permission. (I know you're not really asking.) Ever see that Twilight Zone episode with Burgess Meredith, who wants to spend the rest of his days reading?
East of Eden is somewhat akin to “An Incident,” though slightly longer. Again a story of possible redemption or transformation: is Cal going to be all right? My favorite novel for quite a few years.
I feel that “aching urge” from Lu Xun very clearly in this story. (Both Lu Xun (what I’m used to) and Lu Hsün/Hsun are fine. Both are attempts to put Chinese sounds into an alphabet. Different linguists tried different ways of romanization. Lu Xun is the romanization that China ended up adopting, so Lu Xun is how he is known, while Lu Hsün was how he was known. Both are much easier than trying to pronounce 鲁迅 or 魯迅!)
The first time I read this story, i read it in my usual way, which is to just read through, fairly quickly, getting the gist of the plot and leaving it at that. With this story, I did the same, but since George asked that we focus on what we were feeling, I was aware of feeling a kind of hurt, a pain. I was worried from the start—I think I’m worried at the start of every story. And then my worry increased because an old woman had fallen and now the kind rickshaw man is going to perhaps get in trouble for helping her. Those were my main emotions. When the story ended with a note of hope, I felt a bit cheated. It seemed a quick kind of ending, without enough explanation.
Then I read the story again, only this time I did as George had taught us to do with Cat in the Rain. I read each sentence, thought about what it was doing there, and then read the next sentence and thought about how the writer had purposely written it to follow the previous one. I thought about how every word in the story had been chosen for a reason. And I found myself paying close, close attention to every single nuance. It was amazing how the story opened up to me. A story that had meant almost nothing to me on first reading, was suddenly a beautiful thing, overflowing with compassion and wonder and beauty and hope and—at the same time—hopelessness. I found so much meaning in this ‘incident,’ which was both the inciting incident of the story as well as the inciting incident of the main character’s life.
George has asked for specifics. I will offer one here, though I wrote down many. For much of the story, the main character has thoughts. He has no problem thinking. He’s got opinions and we hear them. But then—suddenly, he cannot think. Even at the end of the story, long after the incident, he can’t really think, though he tries to think about himself. And this is such an amazing aspect of the story. The incident haunts him, even more than the politics of his era. He can’t quite grasp it, but he recognizes within the rickshaw driver’s actions something buried deep inside of himself—so deep, that he reaches for coins without knowing why. Somewhere deep inside his humanity lurks, but he can’t access that. His life has been too tamped down by the situation where he lives. The politics of his time and place. A people who are not allowed to think for themselves.
I’ll probably write more later, but all I’ve got is my iPad at the moment without ability to switch between screens.
When I was five, we went to a garage sale in Birmingham, Alabama, and there, between a duct taped La-Z-Boy and a lidless blender, was a rickshaw. It stood out like some exotic gem and was for sale for thirty dollars. My parents agreed (to our surprise) to buy it for us kids. It was bright yellow with red scrollwork, and one of the two wheels was off-kilter, like an old grocery cart.
Whenever I read about rickshaws, in my head they're all yellow with red scrollwork and wobble a bit. In this story, I pictured everything as black, white, and gray, except for the bright yellow rickshaw, colored by my memory. The narrator mentions that the memory he recounted is "more vivid than in actual life", as I suspect that of my rickshaw may be. We broke the rickshaw in under a week, to my parents' dismay. That had been a lot of money for them. Are regret and guilt such strong emotions that they produce some of our most vivid memories?
This is probably not what you're looking for, but it is all I can think about after reading the story twice. And I mean ALL I can think about is that damn yellow rickshaw, looming large like the retreating driver. I just emailed my dad to retroactively thank him for buying it for us.
I spent my day between readings thinking less about the story and more about the various "rickshaws" in my own life. Am so delighted to find that someone else had a similar experience from the reading, but with a memory of an actual rickshaw! Thank you so much for sharing this story :)
No rush to comment on the story - take your time with this one.
48 hours later, 388 Comments😀
Let’s face it, I’m a real authority figure. 😉
🤣🤣
George, curious about your follow up post and all your thoughts, but especially curious about your thoughts about that final line.
I admired how the writer uses minimal means to tell his story - setting the scene in the third paragraph, outlining the character of the old woman in the following one, revealing the extreme arrogance, selfishness and lack of agency of the narrator in the following two paragraphs (his derogatory comments about the "officiousness" of the rickshaw man, how " he will have to find his way out on his own" etc., introducing a supernatural element with the appearance of the old woman - and the hallucinatory, humbling impression of the rickshaw man rising above him as the power balance shifts and the worker becomes a hero.
I'm slightly irritated, however, by the nearly caricatured selfishness of the narrator, the heroization of the rickshawman, and the didactic conclusion in the last paragraph, the promise to "reform" and be a better person, which I suspect has a political background. Without this 'tag-on', I think the story would have been even more satisfying. But that's just my feeling.
I see that ending of courage and hope arising out of the incident, as a true change in the narrator's character. He had been concerned only with his own well-being of arriving at the government office to take care of important affairs. But now, six years later, the care shown by the driver at his own expense of being detained is the stronger memory that is recalled often, and how this incident has changed the narrator.
I actually loved that didactic conclusion, because it feels like looking into the brain of a mid-level manager writing in their journal, exhorting himself to be a better human in vague, trite ways because he hasn't really learned the lesson from that experience.
I felt like the moralising in the final paragraph was, perhaps, linked to Daoism and confuscianism and their traditional, moralistic stories. Confuscianism strongly emphasises our own conduct and the need to conduct ourselves in a moral way, although confuscianism might also be allied here with the 'officiousness' he mentions? i don't know for sure, just a hunch i have about it.
You're probably right Justine, I know too little about Confucianism, and being an atheistic Swede I'm sadly a bit removed from discussions of morale. But it's good to be reminded that it can be a genuine goal in life, framfrom the cynical 21st century life style.
In case you want more reminder, different corners of the modern world are apparently different: over here, I seem to be surrounded by people for whom morality is a major genuine goal in life, and so was pretty surprised to read this comment! (The Effective Altruism community in particular seems to be full of sincere attempts at morality, and to be fairly short on cynicism).
Wow, what a bizarre but nice surprise/coincidence running into your comment here Katja-- I'm also involved in EA and I actually read your blog!
It took me this long and I had to finally post because I saw your next post and wanted to keep up with the class.
I read the story in Chinese (http://www.millionbook.com/mj/l/luxun/lh/001.htm).
What first hit me was the contrast between "big" and "small".
The story's title (一件小事) could be translated as "a small matter". It is contrasted with (所谓国家大事) "the so-called great affairs of state".
Then there is the north wind, which is alternately described as "great" and "small" as it waxes and wanes.
Finally, there is the way the rickshaw man grows in stature and the description of the "small" -- the word is in quotes in the Chinese -- being squeezed out of the narrator.
On closer reading, I became aware of how the narrator's mental states. The great matters, over which he had little control, caused him aggravation. The small matter, which was in his own hands, gave him cause for hope.
While Lu Xu's vision is typically dark, the narrator's willingness to learn from his shame is a welcome spark.
Great idea, Mark, thank you. So valuable.
Mark, can I ask another thing about the translation? On my first read, one line alerted my
internal translator critic. It was this: 'someone crossing the road was entangled with our rickshaw'. One my second reading I tried to analyse why that sounded like a bad translation. First of all, if feels like the wrong tense. In the context of the previous lines shouldn't it be: 'someone crossing the road became entangled...' ? But secondly, both 'someone' and 'entangled' are unspecific. I wondered whether the original conveyed more precisely the level of chance/carelessness /accident/intention blame which the narrator initially assumes. Or was the sentence in the original equally ambiguous? Is the point that the narrator is distrait?
The following paragraph clarifies all these points about the reason the accident happened and the blame the narrator ascribes to the woman. But his judgement then struck me as suspect, because he had initially recounted the incident in such a vague way. I'm interested to know whether this was the author's intention.
The Chinese text also goes vague to specific. The only difference is that the active voice is used: 刚近S门，忽而车把上带着一个人，慢慢地倒了。"As we got close to S's gate, the rickshaw's handlebar caught someone, who slowly tumbled down."
Thanks Mark! That translation reads much better to me. I wasn't even sure whether 'was entangled' was meant to be passive voice. ('Was caught by our rickshaw' would have been clearer.) But active voice at that point does change the way I see the narrator. Passive is so often a way of avoiding responsibility. Now it's clear that the handlebar caught someone and then the narrator goes on to argue to himself that it was that person's fault and that she wasn't really that badly hurt etc.
Agreed! Thank you, Rachel and Mark. I had the same question, Rachel, and now with your translation, Mark, I can picture what I wasn't quite grasping before. Thank you :-)
Thank you for the translation, that is so much clearer. When I first read the story I thought "the shaft" was referring to the axle between the wheels.
This line reads so much better. Someone getting entangled in the rickshaw made the accident sound really bad, whereas the narrator was going out of his way to point out that it was no big deal. Thank you for the translation.
From what I have seen, a rickshaw (especially ~100+ years ago) was a relatively simple device with two 'handles' sticking straight forwards in the direction of travel, the 'driver' stood between these to pull the two-wheeled cart immediately behind him. It would seem that getting tangled in this layout would be somewhat difficult: maybe flowing robes, windy day, unsteady pedestrian (old woman), bad driver ... In the end, translation between two extremely different symbolic systems, one pictographic, one alphabetic: much wiggle room for the translator and therefore, substantial amplitude range on meanings, from the individual word to the cumulative story. Not to mention the socio-cultural differences!
I like the ambiguity, as if the 'entanglement' was both physical and as something that links all three lives together.
I liked that effect of the word 'entanglement' too. It was the wonky grammar that made me question the translation. I suppose if we wanted to keep that word and the vagueness, but convey a meaning closer to Mark's version, then something like: 'As we got close to S's gate, the rickshaw handlebar became entangled in someone's garment.' ??
Oh that's a great point about "entanglement." I hadn't thought of that.
Very helpful. Any help from the original please on these three reflexive formulations near the story’s close:
but I was almost afraid to turn my thoughts on myself.
I could not answer myself.
makes me try to think about myself.
I like it anyway that they are in translation: turning round on yourself feels like a new language in the protagonist
The repetition of "myself" (自己) is definitely there in the original:
"... Almost afraid to dare think about myself"
几乎怕敢想到自己。
"... I couldn't answer myself."
我不能回答自己。
"... Diligently must think about myself."
努力的要想到我自己。
Thank you for taking the time to translate for us! So helpful to get a glimpse into the original text.
‘A small matter’ seems a superior title to me.
I like A Small Matter better as a title.
Thank you for these thoughtful clues on how to better understand this story in translation. Small and large - definitely at play throughout - and I hadn't noticed that.
I did wonder from the first reading whether translation could be misleading me. I felt like some word choices could have a big impact. For example, "She must be pretending, which was disgusting." I think of disgust as a powerful word and it makes me side strongly against the narrator who up to this point has been formal and cranky and officious.
I also struggled with the phrase, "Someone crossing the road was entangled in our rickshaw and slowly fell." I had great trouble imagining the action. The passive voice doesn't help but also the idea of slowly fell. Knowing the original language might have helped. I took it at face value though as a person wanting to take all agency out of the encounter. The sentence literally turns its back to the action.
I'm curious, Mark, about the lines, "It's all right," I said. "Go on." Followed by the driver's question to the woman, "Are you all right?" In the Chinese is there this repetition of "character usage"? I found it startling. The "It's" from the narrator and the "you" from the driver being the tell-all difference.
The narrator says, "it's nothing. Go on your way." (“没有什么的。走你的罢！”).
The rickshaw driver asks, "Are you OK." (“你怎么啦？”).
The repetition of "all right" in the English text is an artifact of the translation and not intended repetition.
I must say, having no knowledge of Chinese, it's marvellous having fine distinctions of meaning explained by revealing the pictograms. (Is that the right word?) Thanks Mark!
Hi Rachel, it turns out that only a few of the oldest Chinese charactersars actually pictographs.
It's best to think of the individual characters as "meaning bits" that are combined with other "meaning bits" to come up with a vast array of complex meanings.
Take for example the English meaning bit "geo" as in geography, geometry and geology.
In Chinese a similar character would be 地 which means land or earth. It occurs in 地方 (place), 地址 (address), and 地毯 (carpet -- "earth blanket").
So, a Chinese speaker will readily recognize their language's "meaning bits" while English speakers must learn Latin, Greek and German to get a silimiar insight into their language.
Cool, eh?
Very cool indeed! That feels like using quite different pathways to get from the image on the page to the image in my mind. A more creative way of putting "meaning bits" together, perhaps? Also, doesn't it open up a more flexible space between literal and metaphorical than we have in English? Because "meaning bits" for concrete images could be combined with "meaning bits" for abstract concepts even if the two had never been put together before and without requiring the simile/metaphor formulae that we use? (Sorry, I'm straying rather far from Lu Hsun's story, but I'm intrigued!)
Hi Rachel, I think every language allows us to weave some magic. We just need to master it's warp and woof. I guess that why we are taking this course!
Earth blanket is just so beautiful! And yes, totally cool.
That is so cool—the etymology is right there in the construction! I am enjoying this discussion of how the Chinese language works immensely.
“It’s nothing” sounds more authentic to the character; thank you.
Thank you!
I'm new around these parts, so first off, apologies for jumping into an ongoing conversation. The art of Chinese translation has advanced a LOT over the past 40 years, along with the advances in the Chinese economy. As I'm sure Mark knows, the original translation, most likely, was done by a Chinese person (very few foreigners* had good enough Chinese to be translating literary works until well into the 90s). But now, with so many Chinese having come to the US or Europe for their undergraduate and graduate education, and so many foreigners* having put in a lot of time in the best Chinese universities, there are now many excellent translators who really understand the language and the culture. A quick and dirty internet search suggests that "Selected Stories of Lu Hsun" volume was published by a US company in 1978. I'd be really curious about the background of the translator.
Anyway, more to the point, Penguin published a "Complete Fiction of Lu Xun" ("Hsun" is, roughly, the Taiwanese way to transliterate the author's name, while "Xun" is, roughly, the mainland way to do so) in 2010, translated by a western scholar of Chinese, Julia Lovell. (Lovell's title for the story, by the way, is "A Minor Incident".)
Just as an example of the difference in the translation, here is the 1978 version: "We were just approaching S—— Gate when someone crossing the road was entangled in our rickshaw and slowly fell."
And here is Lovell: "Just as we were nearing my destination, someone caught on the handlebar of the rickshaw, and toppled slowly to the ground."
Quite a difference eh?
As a small example of another difference, Lovell adds a little footnote/parenthetical to this sentence: "It was the winter of 1917 - the sixth year of our new Republic - the north wind scouring the city in great, fierce gusts." (The 1978 translation: "It happened during the winter of 1917. A bitter north wind was blowing...")
Personally, I read the story as commenting on and expressing Lu Xun's well-known belief that the Chinese character "needed" to change for the modern world to arrive; that the change in people's character was more important than broad political changes.
Footnote: I'm using the word "foreigners" to refer to non-Chinese people who study the culture or language, as in Chinese itself this distinction is made very clearly and carries a lot of importance, in my opinion.
Okay, sorry, now I see that it's listed in this very post that the original translation is from 1960! So that translator(s), whoever they are, are truly from a different era.
Hi Paul, the translators, Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys Yang, are a Sino-Foreign couple, who are well-known for their work during the era:https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yang_Xianyi, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gladys_Yang
Fascinating, thanks so much for the links to the translators! He translated The Odyssey from ancient Greek into Chinese prose? What?! How amazing! I learn so much because of you, Mark!
Aha, very interesting, thanks.
Hi Paul, I recently read this essay on translation. I found it fascinating: https://lithub.com/the-order-of-things-jennifer-croft-on-translating-olga-tokarczuk/
Mark, if I may I ask another translation-related question regarding the "so-called affairs of state" making the narrator "more and more misanthropic."
The word misanthropic, almost an end-stop to the first paragraph, grabbed me both as a listener and as a reader. It's such a powerful word (though in English perhaps an antiquated word) and in only that one word - misanthropic - we learn a great deal about the narrator who is contemptuous of humans - a contempt that runs like a thread through the events that occur until the rickshaw driver's humane response to the old woman teaches the narrator shame, motivates him to reform, but most importantly gives him "fresh courage and hope." I read those last four words to mean to have hope in humanity, in the individual who has the courage to act and in doing so becomes more human "the larger he loomed, until I had to look up to him." All of which is to ask, "misanthropic" might translate as?
Hi Michele,
The Chinese is: ... 便是教我一天比一天的看不起人。It could be translated as " ...(the great affairs of state) taught me, day-by-day, to think less of people."
I think you are right. While the "great" affairs make him "misanthropic", the small matter of human kindness restores his faith in humanity.
I often wonder about translated works because it provides this intermediary step of interpretation (so readers in other languages end up interpreting an interpretation). I'm curious about the use of the term "make a living" early in the story. When I read the term it gives me the impression that the narrator nominally middle class (not struggling, but not thriving), which is an interesting juxtaposition with some other aspects of the story (his disdain for the poor old woman, his fur lined clothes, etc.). I'm curious if the original Chinese phrase has those similar connotations. Did you notice the phrase in the Chinese reading?
The term in Chinese is "生计关系". "To make a living" is a good translation. One could see a parallel with the rickshaw puller, who is also out making a living on that cold morning.
Thanks Mark. I had also thought about that connection between the two of them.
This is where being polyglot would come in handy.
Thank you for this perspective! I was hooking onto specific words so much in going back over this, and was thinking about what power the translator wields in affecting interpretation.
Love the link to the Chinese, and love your Substack, China by Numbers, Mark!
Mark, thank you so much for translating the nuance based on your reading of the original! I had a question about the word "officiousness" (" I did not think the old woman was hurt, and there had been no witnesses to what had happened, so I resented this officiousness which might land him in trouble and hold me up.") It seemed like the wrong word, since the driver is not being officious in any way. I figured it was just mis-translated--how does this sentence read in Chinese? (also, is it Mandarin?)
The term in Chinese is "多事" which means being meddlesome or not minding one's own business.
Thanks. I just looked up "officious" to be sure I was defining it correctly. The first definition "assertive of authority in an annoyingly domineering way, especially with regard to petty or trivial matters," would absolutely be a mistranslation. However, I was unaware of the second definition, "intrusively enthusiastic in offering help or advice; interfering". It's a stretch, but I could see that being what the translator was trying to get at.
Spelling Bee has me looking up definitions every day!
I was hung up on “officious” as well. Glad I wasn’t the only one, and happy to see so much discussion of translation.
This is great, I was especially curious over the direct translation of the title. I suspect that if a similar incident happened again to the narrator, it'll be called "The Accident," or something with bigger significance; as opposed to being called "Another Small Incident."
Thank you so much! I was curious as to how this reads in the original language.
I really appreciate this choice for this story because it strikes a personal chord with me as a Chinese American writer currently studying/reflecting on classical/foundational texts from both East and West. For me, I am immediately brought back to a political consciousness of the high stakes of any literary endeavor in China, where a court system reliant on a divine emperor (and run by a powerful censorship machine) ruled much of the imagination even in Lu Xun’s days. There’s something about the voice in the beginning that waxes an aloof lament of all things to do with the state, and it’s a powerful contrast for him to say that out of all of the affairs of the state/court (which are famously ripe with corruption) this one minor incident sticks out to him. Though he is aware of himself as being a person of status/power, it is rendered utterly impotent when he cannot compel the rickshaw man to ignore the woman and go on with his day. I feel a bit of that glimpse of humanity in the way the rickshaw man grows larger in the distance, signifying that he realizes he’s been egotistical and petty. I’m reminded of a different scene just for counterpoint’s sake, in Dicken’s “A Tale of Two Cities” when the heartless Marquis in a huff runs over a boy in his carriage and just tosses a few gold coins (and the bloody revolution follows!). In my mind I see two authors from opposing sides of the world yet writing to such similar themes.
I loved the Charles Dickens comparison you brought in, Victor!
I also loved how the rickshaw man got bigger
"rendered impotent". Well said. Very interesting. It's like the three of them ran into a little compassion zone where the wary, distrustful passenger doesn't know how anything works and a want of compassion buys you nothing.
Thanks, Victor, for sharing your insight. Can West meet East? You proved it can.
I really like your reading of this Victor. You see the MC with way more compassion than I did.
I listened to the audio and read along the first time. The second time around, several hours later (last night), I read the story aloud. I had no idea what was going on in China in 1920 nor did I know what was happening in 1917 so there was a lot of Googling. This was easy and convenient because I am either working at my laptop or with my phone. I typed notes on a Google Doc for the same reason.
My Google searches from yesterday:
Republic of China
What was happening in China 1920s
China 1920s rickshaw
China 1917 winter
I learned about the May Fourth Movement, I learned about how China was the epicenter of the 1918 flu pandemic and “The Surprisingly Important Role China Played in WWI.” I was thinking about symbolism and communism and student protests and “Is that George Saunders reading the audio?” and “the narrator has a fur gown” and “is my visualization of a rickshaw accurate?” and “how old was Lu Xun when he wrote this?”
Many years ago, my grandma had a bad fall. She fell in the middle of the street on her way back from the grocery store. Her face was bleeding and I don’t know whether anyone helped her up or she got up herself. When the older woman falls and the rickshaw driver helps her–that is when I feel the most emotion. It’s the image of her falling–and the thought of someone helping her. I suppose it’s because I miss my grandma and know that she never owned any fur-lined gowns. She never owned a car and had to walk to Big Ben Market to buy bananitos and lemon drops. She walked to Saint Mary. She walked to Chan Dong Supermarket. The circulation in her legs got so bad that eventually both of her legs were amputated and she never walked again.
She lived through these times, a couple thousand miles south of Beijing. She survived the Spanish flu and the world wars. She was five years old when Lu Xun wrote An Incident.
What started as a lesson in Chinese history turned into a 42-year-old woman thinking of her Nanay, wishing she had held her hand more when they crossed the street together.
I’m not crying, George! You are!
April, when I read your response, I remembered another fall. And so I am grateful for what you wrote.
I had a childhood friend and later lover that I had not been in touch with for a long time. He lived in another state. Then I heard he was not well. I called him. We would talk.
He had cancer and was very weak and no longer able to keep up with his gardening-landscaping business. One rainy day on the way to pick up a newspaper, he fell in the street in front of some shops in town, and he lay there for a long time in the rain before someone helped him.
Shortly after this, he was not able to talk much on the phone. His cancer escalated and when I traveled south to see him, he was already on pain-killers. I continue to regret very much those months before the fall -- that I didn't call him more often -- to talk more, to talk longer.
For me, the narrator in "The Incident" was someone who saw clearly the dark side of the world he lived in, and his move to the city intensified that vision. I see him not pessimistic as a child growing up in the country. Something changed him there. And the incident was a reminder of another way to be in the world that he admired once, but left behind. So regret and loss.
This is definitely an amazing response. If we were to have an award, after last week, it would be a Mary. This merits a Mary.
It is wonderful to think back, on a kindness, on love, on beauty. I think now of your Grandma as do you. There is a story there and you should write it.
Thank you, Ciaran. Funny that you should suggest this because part of the book I'm writing is inspired by parts of my grandmother's life, so that's what I did today. I revised the grandma part. This assignment completely–and surprisingly–intersected with and inspired my own writing.
I am at the early stages of research about me Great Great Grand Mother, I never met her, my sister did and was afraid of her as she was dressed in black. Yet she was a strong woman. We think she was about six years old when the potato(e) Famine hit Ireland.
Good luck with your book.
This sounds like a very interesting story, Ciaran. Now I want to read about her.
An Incident cuts deep. Lu Hsun has deployed his pen as a surgeon’s scalpel and conducted a swift, forensic autopsy of a sick society. Seeing the body politic splayed on his slab, its classist, corrupt malignancy exposed, satisfied me greatly. But Lu Hsun wasn’t done. He wrote on to a powerful finale: Hope. It felled me, stirred in me the mix of shame and gratitude a sinner feels when being forgiven. Ashamed of my smug reactions when the story’s narrator was made small, when his bribery failed to assuage his guilt, my outlook which had favored the lowly rickshaw man and the old woman shifted to him. I saw myself, like him, in need of reforming, and felt grateful for the optimism Lu Hsun leaves him. Maybe there is hope for me, too?
How did his story work on me the way it did? With wind. The agency of wind propels his story.
In the Chinese tradition, wind is associated with sickness. A wise man avoids wind. But both the narrator of some rank and the rickshaw man must work. Work forces them out into the wind. An ill wind in the Chinese tradition and, like Hemingway’s rain in Cat in Rain, striking everyone irrespective of his rank. No one escapes the wind. It causes the incident. An accident easily foreseen. As Chinese classics admonish: What did you expect, going out in the wind?
The rickshaw man responds to the incident with action, aiding the wind’s victim without regard for himself. His selfless act of goodwill—at odds with classists, the corrupt state, and the self-serving narrator—sets the wind in a modern context. A new iteration of the wind appears. Fantastic and transformational.
No longer a malevolent force, the wind becomes an agent of reform causing the narrator to see the rickshaw man inflated and himself small, deflated. He senses his failings, though he cannot face up to them. Thus, his reform begins but remains incomplete. The incident stays with him. From time to time its wind returns to revive his sense of something wrong within him, which he remains unable to face. Yet, the reoccurring wind conveys courage and hope for self-reform.
A hundred years have slipped by since Lu Hsun chose to end his story with hope. Now, ill winds abound. Yet, his powerful word continues to blow off the page and provoke a new reader. A day later, An Incident returns to her mind and she feels hopeful. Thank you, Master Lu Hsun.
I appreciate the insight relative to the commentary on society that is embedded in the story that also functions on a personal level. On either level I am trying to understand the perspective (and meaning) that it is all self report, all in his head, untouched, even in his self report, of relaying commentary from someone else's sense of him then and/or "now". So I see him as potentially worse than his initial self description of "more and more misanthropic" and that for him it serves as a blanket excuse in the "I am just that way" without really examining his life - even with distance from when the incident took place. In the end, that he can still feel shame to learn from, as well as courage and hope, the incident has the power to provide him a lifeline to a sense of connection with humanity beyond himself. But given the context of only his perspective sparsely laid out, it is unclear if the hope and courage is just a feeling that he experiences sitting in his chair at home that might be acted upon some day, or if it is the basis for action in his life? Has he connected more or is it just hope?
Stepping back from that and in light of all of the comments, I am fascinated by the depth and breadth of experiences provided by deeply reading so few words written long ago, that to your point, reaches to us now in the midst of our own ill winds. Here's to hope and courage.
Yes, Lu Hsun provides a scan of the self-serving brain. The narrator knows he is wrong yet resists change. Change is inconvenient. Change alters one's privileges and identity. Change is hard work. Yet, the wind of change keeps blowing. He cannot stop it, but how long can he resist it? This is a question Lu Hsun leaves the reader, indeed, asks of the reader, suggesting an optimistic outcome. I think it is more than a cautionary tale, it is like a pep-talk. Come on, reader, you can do it! Reform yourself.
Thank you, Colleen! Your analysis is excellent and helpful. I so agree.
I started reading the comments after I did my own and posted it. For me, the wind was the key metaphor too, the central acting force. Am so grateful for your knowledgeable analysis. So interesting what you write that in Chinese tradition, wind is associated with sickness.
Colleen, I love your idea of the wind as sculptor of the soul. And the parallels between 1920 and 2022. My first reading of this story ended with happiness, feeling like the narrator had a chance to be different. I did not realize right away that this possibility of grace extended out from the story to everyone else in the world.
Wind sculpting. Marvellous~~
I love your thoughts about the wind. I have been thinking about its purpose and was confused by its changeability. The fact that in China, it is associated with sickness, is fascinating. Thank you for helping me understand its role in the story.
Wonderful analysis! Thanks Colleen
Colleen, thank you! So beautifully insightful and expressed. I did not know that wind is equated with ‘sickness’ in Chinese tradition ~ and I had not equated that ‘wind’ caused the incident! The old woman’s tattered and fluttering jacket becoming entangled - now I understand how she became entangled! Again, thank you so much, you shed great light on this story for me.
This is a terrific analysis. Thank you
love this!
Twenty years ago, I was running an errand for my boss in midtown, NYC. As I came out from dropping off the package, I noticed actor Christian Slater leaning against the building. As I waited at the corner for the light to change, I took another look over my shoulder to take him in. Just then, a taxi turning a tight left ran over my foot and knocked me down. The other people waiting to cross pounded on the side of the car and it stopped. The taxi driver told me to get in. There was a businessman inside already, reading a newspaper. He looked up, annoyed, but didn't say anything. As we drove away, I checked for Christian Slater but he was gone.
The taxi driver dropped off the businessman and then brought me to my workplace. I tied my sneaker tighter because it seemed to help the pain and went on with my work day. About a week later, I got a phone call from the taxi driver, checking to make sure I was okay.
Reading this story, I wonder now if that businessman ever thinks about that day? Does Christian Slater?
Wow, life imitates art!? But I love how the rickshaw driver and the NYC taxi driver are the heroes !!! I grinned at your last sentence!
wow! What a parallel! Hope your foot is okay now :-)
Yes, this is so interesting! And one of those stories we love about NYers and the random acts of kindness from strangers. And your observations about the businessman and Slater are compelling. I'm also glad to hear your foot was not badly hurt.
Great story. What a rickshaw/taxi driver.
I find it very interesting that so far maybe half of the commenters think that the narrator experienced a change of heart; the other half do not. Possibly one mark of good writing is that the story can be experienced in opposing manners. And possibly both takes are not only valid, but true.
I think the narrator *thinks* he had a change of heart. But I don't totally believe him. And as you suggest, maybe that dark irony -- like a Frost poem -- is the real beauty of this story.
I'm team "change of heart," too. I had a hard time distancing myself from this story because it made me think about my own way of lamenting my past—the times I’ve hurt someone, or said the wrong thing, or made the wrong choice . . . the memories I’ve chewed on, over and over, making them more and more significant and with time, “more vivid than in actual life.” The one consoling thought in reliving all the things that make me cringe: these memories haunt me because I am aware. Aware of my missteps, and aware that I can be better. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t think about these things at all. Trying to find my own hope and courage from the shame. So it's probably for my own sake, but I *have* to believe that the memory of the incident changed the narrator.
A spiritual awakening can have a real visual impact for some people, which would account for the narrator's nearly hallucinatory vision of the rickshaw puller becoming larger and larger. In the aftermath of realization, the vision clears somewhat -- but the person (if they're lucky) never fully recovers. Just my two cents. I love this story.
Thank you for that, Manami. The more I comments I read, and the more I think about it, the more I see that part of the dichotomy is because awareness is the easier part, and to change one’s outlook and especially behavior is extremely difficult; in fact it seems to require a high degree of resolve, not to mention commitment.
I agree! Change of behavior is the tricky part, and the narrator never states that he is a changed person in that sense, just that the incident has changed the way he tries to think about himself/aroused him from his "ill temper." I think to myself, well there's a start.
Awareness of a problem is the first step. Sometimes it's the only one, but that's still better than remaining unaware. I've walked that path.
Yes, great point. I am team "change of heart," but I had a brief moment where I thought, "did the narrator actually change?" I then map out his slow and gradually change of heart in a "timeline" by whom he blamed for the incident...the woman, the rickshaw man, the woman again, the politics of the time, and finally himself.
Yes, well analysed arc of change and blame. So real life., multifactorial.
I am also team "change of heart" but not full-on "change of heart." My impression is that based on Hsun's subtle rendering throughout, the main character is only "human," therefore forever flawed. In the beginning of the story, he seemed blind to his flaws. But later, the fact that he learns "shame," seems to point to a change of heart.
I like that you call this out. Thanks. I’m not sure about full change of heart but am sure that the man ended up on a different journey than he expected. His simple trip from A to B became a journey of awakening to his arrogance and to the rickshaw driver’s dignity. How much he changes from this unexpected journey is perhaps left to us to ponder, but I think he’s definitely been shown a different path.
My feeling was that he momentarily was jolted out of his auto-pilot, self-centered way of thinking into a kinder, more fulfilling state of conscience. I do not think this change was permanent. As the years pass he periodically reflects back on "The Incident" in a similar fashion, to snap himself out of himself, as a reminder to be better.
Yes, but I also like that each of us feels strongly enough about our own readings to feel protective of them. I want to abide the "change of heart" interpretation just enough to keep a debate going.
To me that is the central "moral"of the story: it is imperative to question oneself. I don't think it is clear at all that the narrator has a change of heart or believes he has. But he is spinning, questioning, kind of lost in himself since the incident, except for his questioning.
The questioning brought him from an automaton state back to the verge of being human.
I thought so too. Upon first reading the final paragraph did not register at all. The second time I read it I realized why: it seems redundant to me. Maybe it is the passage of time, or the invisibility of moral lessons in my own life, but it feels like a much stronger story, ending with the next-to-last paragraph and “I could not answer myself".
Very interesting. When I read the story, I got the sense that the urge to 'reform' was not internal, but rather imposed upon the narrator - like a guilty child, scolded by his parents. As though the rickshaw man, growing in size, became an authority telling him to 'behave'. The fact that he still mulls over the incident seams revelatory: he still doesn't know what to make of it, and hasn't made up his mind as to how this 'life lesson' impacts his own path. However, he knows very well what he ought to do.
Just heard (!) on the radio a host relating a George Saunders quote (!) which is this:
"What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness."
The very theme of An incident by Lu Hsun, seems to me.
Amen.
I don’t read this as the narrator having a real change of heart. Instead, the story strikes me as a subtle skewering of the way comfortable people can self-romanticize. And of how the narrator spins a pious arc of personal reform, while remaining oblivious to "actual life."
The narrator's self-involvement is constant throughout the entire story, starting with the wind being described in terms of how it makes it hard to get a rickshaw. As the driver walks the woman away, the narrator doesn't think of what the driver or the woman are actually feeling or doing. All his emotion and intense imagery is spent on his own reactions. Even when he hands coins to the policeman, the narrator doesn’t think about how the driver is doing, and whether he's been arrested, or what exactly has happened to him. Instead, he obsesses over his own actions in giving the coins.
His mention, at the beginning and the end, of “affairs of state,” or “military and political affairs” seems important. I wonder if these references are there as a way of drawing attention to the narrator’s narcissism. In the beginning, he describes the affairs of state only in terms of the impression they make on HIM. Not on the effects they have on the populace at large. At the end, again, these public matters are dismissed as unimportant, irrelevant to him. Is the story leading us to consider the situation of a man who views the vulnerability, suffering, compassion, self-sacrifice of other people -- of a whole nation, even -- only in terms of how those "incidents" play into his own private drama?
Another thing occurs twice in this very short story: “I was almost afraid to turn my thoughts on myself.” But his thoughts have been on himself the whole entire time. And “makes me try to think about myself.” Again, that’s all he’s been doing! The juxtaposition of his self-thoughts in the final paragraph with his continued disinterest in the larger affairs of society seems important. His self-satisfaction ends the story. He sees himself as having nobly -- even humbly -- passed through shame, and now being on an upward trajectory of reform, newly endowed with courage. His own personal drama is “more vivid” than what he sort of dismisses as “actual life.” Which the actual people around him are actually living.
I like how you highlight the narrator’s hubris. I’m wondering if it’s really necessary for him to totally transform in order for us to give him a break. Could it be enough that his unconscious and self centered journey was interrupted, the he was forced to see the value of compassion? The incident opened his eyes. He might not see everything we want him to, but he’s looking now. Doubt has been sown.
I agree with you. For me it was enough. It was a shattering of his emotional shell. His life until then had deadened him.
I agree with Kurt and Min. For me, two words stood out - "shame" and the fact that he is "taught" shame. Not to be tricky, but some H - U - M words come to mind. Humiliation, which hurts his ego and which he needs. Humility, which is the letting go of pride. And humbleness, which he begins to feel, or at least a little.
I agree Kurt and Min. We get quite a lot of information in the course of the story to show that the incident has made a significant impression. Before the incident he was 'misanthropic' but the incident 'aroused him from his ill-temper' so that 'even now I cannot forget it'. With time it 'remains fresh in my memory' and has grown 'more vivid' and causes 'distress', 'teaching me shame' and 'urging me to reform'. I was left with the impression that the narrator has been moved enough by the incident to return to the memory of it often enough to remind himself to be better.
the fate of good intentions is often to wither in the everyday, we lapse, and then that conscience pricking moment arises again and reminds us , if he had succeeded in reforming completely it would be the end of the movie (Groundhog day)
Kurt, yes, I like how you put it: "He might not see everything we want him to, but he's looking now." Or at least, he was looking for as long as he could. And there's something very human in his responses, even if they're not fully conscious.
This was basically my take— pretty cynical. I didn’t feel like the narrator really experienced a true change. The self awareness felt fairly shallow to me. I appreciated Min’s take above because it is more generous than mine. I find it fascinating how we bring much of ourselves to these readings which truly changes the very nature of the story and it’s impact. There is no correct reading… so much is based on perspective.
“We bring much of ourselves to these readings…” That must be the end result of great writing, to create the kind of mirror in a story in which everyone can see themselves, despite our vast differences in experience and outlook.
Betsy, my reading is like yours. The POV, beginning to end, is grounded in the man's self-regard; all events are all about *him*; he struggles, feels "distress" whenever they are not. He feels no further concern about the old woman's condition; in fact, she is incidental to the narrator's interests, although she is central to the meaning of the story, the event. He extrapolates or creates meaning that serves himself only. However, I agree with those who have commented on his nascent sense of empathy, but, because the language couldn't be plainer---"giving *ME* fresh courage and hope"--- his limited Point of View is emphasized and makes/carries the meaning, which could perhaps be the compassionate Chekhovian awareness of the limitations of self, the impossibility (difficulty?) of true and sustained empathy. The author intends us to shift our attention to the old woman rather than remain in the narrator's concerns, in part by the symbolism and detail of her tattered jacket contrasted with the zoom-in detail of the narrator's fur-lined gown, and as reflected also in the language, in the word "attention" and the POV-changing awareness that the rickshaw man was paying no attention to him, and instead "gently helped the old woman to get up" (graph 7). We now must follow what the narrator is experiencing, seeing, hearing, the events outside himself, his new awareness culminating in the phrase, "he helped her" (graph 11). His new awareness is short-lived; he hasn't the inner stuff (the soul) to sustain it or to adequately respond, thinking only of money---which was, after all, the thing that brought them all together, the need to earn a living, and so he tries to compensate the working man. Whose experience/POV matters? How are we shocked out of our locked-in self-absorption and self-interest? Takes a rickshaw wreck... A wise older friend once calmly replied to my frantic reporting of a bicycle crash I'd just witnessed on 17th Street, Union Square, by saying, "They found each other." Finally, I loved all the Chinese expertise above; thank you for all that translation, reference to Buddhist consciousness and symbolism. Beautiful help.
Rhonda, yes, thank you for your clear articulation. I agree, there's clearly more going on here than just a person romanticizing their own reactions. As you write, "the impossibility (difficulty?) of sustained empathy." There is indeed something that happens in the narrator's universe. And even if he can't fully sustain the new awareness, we see him react to it. And perhaps we as readers can find some empathy in ourselves for the narrator's imperfect moral journey.
Yes. Thank you Betsy and Rhonda for this, which may be the biggest of all the big points in this story, empathy for everyone’s struggles.
“‘They found each other.’” That is so pertinent and beautiful.
I have just discovered this wonderful Story Club, and I feel inclined to join the conversation, albeit late. I appreciated the discussion on translation and all of the cultural context and insight. It is in regards to whether or not the misanthropic man did in fact grow that I too would like to weigh in.
In my first reading, I was sympathetic to the main character, as I tend to be, but upon a second reading, and with the instruction to take notes as I went along, the misanthropic man made me angry. At every turn, he was dismissive and disrespectful to the woman. Knowing what we now know about the ways that women are dismissed and disrespected in regard to their medical and health needs (ie: women are 32% more likely to die in surgery under the care of a male surgeon). This Incident was just a simple, everyday, classic example of not taking a woman at her word.
Furthermore, by his own admittance, the misanthropic man does not fully take this incident into consideration. Yes, it is an incident that has stayed with him, but what he actually says is that even years later, it only makes him TRY to think about himself. From my reading, the man admits that he can't forget the incident, but there is no evidence that he has made any change in his thinking and behavior. Perhaps therein lies the power of the story; if a reader recognizes the misanthrope's shortcomings, then he/she/they have the opportunity to look at their thoughts, words, and actions and do the work. To end on a positive note, I did like that in the conclusion the narrator brought up the classics of his childhood, which he claims not to remember, but which surely warned him against becoming a misanthropic old man.
And the fact he gives the guy money is an automatism, a problem solving technique. Feeling so good about himself.
I really like your breakdown of the story. Thank you for articulating what I didn't realize I thought.
This is just about the same as my reading also.
There is this Buddhist sutra I love...its a sort of Marvel superhero story of intergalactic wisdom and compassion filled with some funny scenes where stodgy old monks are having their minds blown, by this one charming dharma scallawag and his wacky friends. It’s called the Vimalakirti Sutra and at one time it probably would have been the most popular Buddhist text in China (my impression...not an expert.) Dunno if it would have fallen out of favor by the 20s.
Anyway, there is this repeated motif in there of average people transforming to become big and also being small at the same time. After one of these transformations, our hero Vimalakirti explains to one of the historic Buddha’s disciples what that monk, Shariputra, is missing:
Vimalakirti said, "Ah, Shariputra, the Buddhas and bodhisattvas have an emancipation that is called Beyond Comprehension. When a bodhisattva dwells in this emancipation, he can take something as tall and broad as Mount Sumeru and put it inside a mustard seed without enlarging one or shrinking the other, and Mount Sumeru, king of mountains, will still have its original shape. Moreover, the Four Heavenly Kings and the gods of the Trayastrimsha heaven [who live on Mount Sumeru] will not even know or realize where they have gone to. Only those destined for enlightenment will be able to see that Sumeru has been put inside a mustard seed. This is called dwelling in the doctrine of the emancipation Beyond Comprehension.
That’s what I thought about when the driver walked away from the rickshaw.
I saw a lot of Buddhism in this story: wind blowing away dust, roads and paths, blank mind, small self, motionless sitting! It’s all there!
Ah, to be emancipated from oneself! (Interesting that the mustard seed has parallels east and west.) The driver's focus shifted to the most important task. And it affected not only himself and the old woman, but also our narrator, as well as every reader of this story.
So much of the action of the story is driven by the changes in the wind. First, the heavy wind clears the loose dust off the roadway. Then the wind lets up a little. The combination of high wind (clears away dust) and low wind (less resistance on the road) allows the rickshaw to speed up, and hit the woman. It's implied that the rickshaw might not have hit her at all if not for her loose ragged clothing, "fluttering in the wind" and becoming entangled on the shaft.
The wind is "responsible" for much of what happens in the story, rising and falling in an almost pernicious way to create the circumstances for "the incident."
Very cool observation. Maybe the old woman is the wind, or another manifestation of it. The circumstances that are beyond the narrator’s control.
Beautiful, the wind is a side actor, an echo of the state of mind of the narrator.
That's an interesting insight. I had noticed the wind but did not make that connection to the unfolding of the story.
I wondered about that - if the rickshaw was actually going fast, because the narrator's version is full of slippery get-outs and denials. If so - then the rickshaw driver despite his blameworthiness just stepping in and doing the right thing is somehow even more amazing.
The narrator tells us from the start that "so-called affairs of state' led him to think badly about humanity thus hardening his heart. He then tells us of this incident that "woke" him up.
What "woke" him up had nothing to do with "affairs of state." Quite the contrary. It was the state of human grace demonstrated by a person far below consideration in military and political affairs. In that act the rickshaw driver became the powerful one. The one who could make a difference in the life of another person.
This made him feel little, insignificant, drained of self-importance. Impotent. When approached by the police officer, the only thing he had that could restore his sense of worth was money. He was disquieted by this insignificant act.
And he continued to be distressed as he relives this incident. His involvement in affairs of state, his education, his wealth touched no one but himself. Yet it gives him "fresh courage and hope." To do what? To change. To learn to open his heart. Again... and again... and again....
I love this read. And I like the story more for its sense that the narrator didn't simply 'become a good person'. The story honors the difficulty of changing, especially for the privileged, with their (I mean our) (maybe I mean my) self importance.
That the narrator returns to the story many times and takes both shame and courage/hope from it makes it so much more powerful than the Disney version: "I was bad.I saw kindness. Now I'm good."
Doug, your words "especially for the privileged" surprised me. I suppose because I can't imagine change being easy for anyone regardless of their circumstances or sense of self.
I like your idea that the "story honors the difficulty of changing." Looking at it that way, I would also say that it honors the difficult position 'upwardly mobile' people find themselves in as they strive to 'make it' in a setting that does not honor our humanity.
Yes, I think that's right - such a good observation. You'd think if we felt shame we'd do better but we don't necessarily do we? The possibility is there both to lapse into old ways and to do better - the memory continuing to disturb him causes shame and offers him an opportunity to do better. Thank you for this insight.
Great take. I think this gets at the heart of things. Thank you.
Yes.
Lovely read of the story. I think I need to view the MC with more compassion.
I’ve re-read An Incident several times, dissected it, puzzled over it. I've little to add to all the insightful comments and I'm anxious to hear what George has to say. That said, I woke up this morning and it triggered a memory of mine, one that is associated with strong waves of emotion.
The story got me thinking about my dear sister. Beautiful, creative, sensitive, anorexic, alcoholic, homeless, then dead. My feelings seeing her (and remembering seeing her, years later) in her element, the street, from my elevated perch. The mix of feelings any of us feel when encountering a homeless person, maybe inebriated, unavoidably dirty, perhaps threatening. Their wounds seem self inflected, and any help provided will likely be turned into mind-numbing drugs or alcohol. On the other hand, they are a living breathing person, it could be a relative, it could be you in their position, there but for chance. You feel waves of empathy and waves of disgust. Fleeting, competing feelings. Which feeling dominates? Well, I suppose it depends.
You are right. I gave money to a homeless man yesterday and felt angry and so sad about his plight and yet, and yet, he scared me, he frightened me; I wanted to be away from him.
James. So sorry for this loss.
Thank you for sharing these raw, conflicting feelings. This resonates on deep levels. I like that you say, “It could be you…”
Holding my take on the story, but FWIW thought I'd share this John Steinbeck quote, which just popped up in my Twitter feed (via Jon Winokur):
"If there is a magic in story writing, and I am convinced there is, no one has ever been able to reduce it to a recipe that can be passed from one person to another. The formula seems to lie solely in the aching urge of the writer to convey something he feels important to the reader. If the writer has that urge, he may sometimes, but by no means always, find the way to do it. You must perceive the excellence that makes a good story good or the errors that make a bad story. For a bad story is only an ineffective story."
It's time to reread East of Eden. My daughter just turned me on to Journal of a Novel--The East of Eden Letters. Can I just spend the rest of my days reading?
Haven't read that since college, probably, around the time "An Incident" was written. Loved it then, though I remember thinking the movie improved on the ending. (Also: James Dean.) Wish I could give you permission. (I know you're not really asking.) Ever see that Twilight Zone episode with Burgess Meredith, who wants to spend the rest of his days reading?
Oh my, yes. That was brilliant.
Love Burgess Meredith!!
East of Eden is somewhat akin to “An Incident,” though slightly longer. Again a story of possible redemption or transformation: is Cal going to be all right? My favorite novel for quite a few years.
Thanks for that true, beautiful quotation, Barry!
I feel that “aching urge” from Lu Xun very clearly in this story. (Both Lu Xun (what I’m used to) and Lu Hsün/Hsun are fine. Both are attempts to put Chinese sounds into an alphabet. Different linguists tried different ways of romanization. Lu Xun is the romanization that China ended up adopting, so Lu Xun is how he is known, while Lu Hsün was how he was known. Both are much easier than trying to pronounce 鲁迅 or 魯迅!)
The first time I read this story, i read it in my usual way, which is to just read through, fairly quickly, getting the gist of the plot and leaving it at that. With this story, I did the same, but since George asked that we focus on what we were feeling, I was aware of feeling a kind of hurt, a pain. I was worried from the start—I think I’m worried at the start of every story. And then my worry increased because an old woman had fallen and now the kind rickshaw man is going to perhaps get in trouble for helping her. Those were my main emotions. When the story ended with a note of hope, I felt a bit cheated. It seemed a quick kind of ending, without enough explanation.
Then I read the story again, only this time I did as George had taught us to do with Cat in the Rain. I read each sentence, thought about what it was doing there, and then read the next sentence and thought about how the writer had purposely written it to follow the previous one. I thought about how every word in the story had been chosen for a reason. And I found myself paying close, close attention to every single nuance. It was amazing how the story opened up to me. A story that had meant almost nothing to me on first reading, was suddenly a beautiful thing, overflowing with compassion and wonder and beauty and hope and—at the same time—hopelessness. I found so much meaning in this ‘incident,’ which was both the inciting incident of the story as well as the inciting incident of the main character’s life.
George has asked for specifics. I will offer one here, though I wrote down many. For much of the story, the main character has thoughts. He has no problem thinking. He’s got opinions and we hear them. But then—suddenly, he cannot think. Even at the end of the story, long after the incident, he can’t really think, though he tries to think about himself. And this is such an amazing aspect of the story. The incident haunts him, even more than the politics of his era. He can’t quite grasp it, but he recognizes within the rickshaw driver’s actions something buried deep inside of himself—so deep, that he reaches for coins without knowing why. Somewhere deep inside his humanity lurks, but he can’t access that. His life has been too tamped down by the situation where he lives. The politics of his time and place. A people who are not allowed to think for themselves.
I’ll probably write more later, but all I’ve got is my iPad at the moment without ability to switch between screens.
When I was five, we went to a garage sale in Birmingham, Alabama, and there, between a duct taped La-Z-Boy and a lidless blender, was a rickshaw. It stood out like some exotic gem and was for sale for thirty dollars. My parents agreed (to our surprise) to buy it for us kids. It was bright yellow with red scrollwork, and one of the two wheels was off-kilter, like an old grocery cart.
Whenever I read about rickshaws, in my head they're all yellow with red scrollwork and wobble a bit. In this story, I pictured everything as black, white, and gray, except for the bright yellow rickshaw, colored by my memory. The narrator mentions that the memory he recounted is "more vivid than in actual life", as I suspect that of my rickshaw may be. We broke the rickshaw in under a week, to my parents' dismay. That had been a lot of money for them. Are regret and guilt such strong emotions that they produce some of our most vivid memories?
This is probably not what you're looking for, but it is all I can think about after reading the story twice. And I mean ALL I can think about is that damn yellow rickshaw, looming large like the retreating driver. I just emailed my dad to retroactively thank him for buying it for us.
I spent my day between readings thinking less about the story and more about the various "rickshaws" in my own life. Am so delighted to find that someone else had a similar experience from the reading, but with a memory of an actual rickshaw! Thank you so much for sharing this story :)