Post from 27/10/12 - Mo Yan, the Priz(c)e of Silence
Mo Yan, the Priz(c)e of
Silence
October 27th, 2012
No sooner had the laureate of the
Nobel Literature Prize been announced earlier this month that a controversy
started. While an immediate and universal consensus was reached as to the winner’s
nationality, Chinese, what became less certain was whether or not he was the
First Chinese to receive the Prize. It
went on about discussions about the legitimacy of, not only, a so-called
‘non-activist’ sentitlement to such a Prize, but also about the Nobel
Committee. Finally, it provided a
perfect platform for airing nationalist feelings in China, Taiwan and
Japan.
Mo Yan is not new to the
international literary scene. He is a prolific author, father of many novels,
short stories and essays on various topics. He has been translated into many languages and
has even made it to the big screen with “Red Sorghum”, his novel most famous in
the West. His stories usually depict
life in rural China, a place he knows best, as he was born Gaomi, a farming
community in the Shandong province, in 1955, where he still lives. An autodidact – he only had 5 years of
schooling -, he spent many years in the
Army, where he was able to graduate: “The Army was the place any youngster of
my generation wanted to be: it meant warm clothes, regular meals and the
possibility of going to University”[1].
His style has been depicted as “epic,
visceral and bawdy”[2],
“heavy with a sense of the surreal, laced with scenes of great violence
tempered by moments of intense beauty”[3]. The Nobel Prize committee praised his work as
“hallucinatory realism, a mixture of fantasy and reality, historical and social
perspectives”[4], in
the vein of William Faulkner and Gabriel García Márquez. A paradox for, while
Mo Yan admits to admiring and being inspired by both, in an interview he gave
to the Corriere Della Serra in 2006, he criticizes contemporary Chinese authors
for “aping South American literature” and proudly declares that he “never moved
away from the “tradition of China” and managed “to promote the great heritage
of rural culture, traditions and values”[5].
However, Mr. Shut Up’s winning has
not been to the delight of all. Born Guan Moye, he took the pen name Mo Yan, ‘Shut
up!’, as a ‘souvenir’ from harder days during Mao’s time, when as a young boy, his
father would remind him every day not to speak outside the house, as it could
be fatal. Mr. Shut-Up, is precisely what he has been accused of by fellow
Chinese since the announcement of his winning the Prize. The most vocal of all, being none other than
Ai Weiwei, China’s famous artist and activist,
who depicted it an “insult to humanity and literature”. To Weiwei and to
many other activists, Mo Yan is too close to the regime. A long-time member of
the Communist Party, Mo Yan is now the Vice-Chairman of the official China
Writers’ Association, attached to the Ministry of Culture, from where he draws
his salary. To add insult to injury, Mo
Yan’s participation at an official commemoration of Mao with the Communist
Party, earlier this year, did not make him dearer in the eyes of his critiques,
neither did his reading of one of Mao’s passage or his comment defending his
participation: “Some of Mao’s remarks on art are reasonable”[6].
Other writers and activists have
denounced the Prize as a “woeful example of the West’s fuzzy morals”[7]
and Mo Yan, a man “who has no principles”[8],
while Cui Weiping, Professor and Social critique tweeted that “To those
imprisoned writers and those who are being persecuted by censorship as we
speak, this is a huge blow”[9].
The ire of the artists and activists
is easy to understand with china’s poor record on artistic freedom. At about the same time as Mo was receiving
his award, IFEX was publishing “Article 19”, the latest report on China,
reporting the lack of freedom of artistic expression existent in the country: China has “failed to create an environment
conducive for diverse cultural expressions. […] China does not protect cultural
expressions at risk on its territory. It
actually further endangers them by implementing a policy of cultural
homogeneity”[10] –
the Full
Report.
The attacked author first defended
himself by saying that his award was a literary victory, not a political
one. His views on his subversiveness, or
not, seem to be slightly more nuanced: "A writer should express criticism
and indignation at the dark side of society and the ugliness of human nature,
but we should not use one uniform expression. Some may want to shout on the
street, but we should tolerate those who hide in their rooms and use literature
to voice their opinion". Sabina
Knight, Professor of Literature at Smith College, concurs: "Mo is a brave
an unflinching writer ... who chronicles many of the horrors of twentieth
century China, including Mao's Cultural Revolution. But rather than depict it
directly he sets many of his works during WWII when the Japanese
brutally invaded China"[11]
thereby sidestepping censorship and sensitivities.
Ultimately, it would seem that the criticism that
has been aimed at the author have reached their goal for barely two days after
the storm started, Mo Yan has publicly wishing imprisoned Nobel Laureate, Liu
Xiabo “can achieve his freedom as soon as possible”, he also added that Liu had
the right to research his politics and social system[12].
While his proclamation may
have pleased Ai and his fellow activists, in fact it so pleased Ai that he
proclaimed Mo was admitted back in the club of humanity, "If this sort of
courage is the result, I hope more Chinese will be given the Nobel prizes"[13],
it did not at all please the authorities with whom Mo had been coupled until
then.
In order to make their point, they issued a
warning to all government and press agencies with more than clear guidelines as
to how to treat and talk about the case:
State Council Information Office: To all websites nationwide: In light of Mo Yan winning theNobel prize for literature, monitoring of microblogs, forums, blogs and similar key
points must be strengthened. Be firm in removing all comments which disgrace
the Party and the government, defame cultural work, mention Nobel
laureates Liu
Xiaobo and Gao
Xingjianand
associated harmful material. Without exception, block users from posting for
ten days if their writing contains malicious details. Reinforce on-duty staff
during the weekend and prioritize this management task. (October
12, 2012)
Which brings us to the big question:
is Mo the first or the second Chinese to have won the Nobel Literary Prize? According
to the Chinese authorities, he is the first and only Chinese to have won the
Prize. Even though China could have attributed itself the Honour more than a
decade ago, it has steadfastly refused to do so, just as it raised total hell,
when two years ago the Prize was attributed to Liu Xiabo. While it is true that
Gao accepted the award as a French citizen, making him France's 14th Laureate (
J.M.G. le Clézio added another Literature Nobel to France in 2008), Gao is also
the only French author who won a Prize and was praised for his work ... in
Chinese - all other recipients wrote in their national language. As a
matter of fact he is the only author to ever have won a Prize in a language
that is not the official language of the country he represents. Moreover,
his writing, both in content and style, is as Chinese as can be. The argument
did not limit itself to China, it crossed all borders and boundaries, reaching
as far as the ... blogosphere.
While no one seems to reach a
consensus, Wolfgang Kubin, Professor of Sinology at Bonn University, simply finds
Mo Yan ‘boring to death’: “He doesn’t have his own thoughts; he illustrates; he
was avant-garde in the … 80’s. Now that
China is ruled by the market, people have understood what sells in China and in
the West. … There are many other better writers”[14].
This last remark found an echo in
Taiwan, where, apart from being of the opinion that Mo Yan is the second
Chinese to have won the prize, Taiwan blames Stockholm for making the wrong
choices for the wrong political reasons but mainly, it accuses the Nobel
Committee not having enough personnel who can read Chinese, and therefore, no
Taiwanese writer has ever been chosen even though authors in Taiwan have
written much more than their Chinese counterparts[15]. Lee Min-yung, poet and political commentator,
deplored the fact that Taiwan was not regarded as a country “in and of
itself. The people who live on this land
have their own history and hardships to tell. … This country has something to
say, but the world is not listening. … Those who have recommended Mo Yan … seem
to be trapped within a masochistic historical view and are biased”[16].
Last but not least Japan, with whom
China is in the middle of a heated dispute over five uninhabited islands that
threatens to spin out of control, another storm was averted on the literary scene
when Japan’s contestant, Haruki Murakami, lost to Mo Yan. Whereas Chinese
readers declared the love for Murakami intact, despite the political
background, Japanese readers were very disappointed when the news reached them
that they had lost. Comfort came from
the fact that at least the Laureate was from Asia.
Finally, I think it might be the
safest to agree that Mo Yan is the first Chinese “living inside China and
outside jail” to have won the Prize and that, as regards his political
activism, the story he told at the Frankfurt Book fair in 2009, might be the
clearest way to shed some light:
Goethe
and Beethoven were walking side by side when they were met by a royal
entourage. Goethe took his hat off and
stood to the side in deference, while Beethoven refused. “When I was young, I thought that what
Beethoven did was great. As I have
matured over the years, I realized that it could be easier to do what Beethoven
did, and it might take even more courage to do what Goethe did”[17].
[3] Aw
T. “nobel Prize: was Mo yan the Communist Party’s Choice” – The Telegraph –
16/10/12 - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/9611769/Nobel-Prize-was-Mo-Yan-the-Communist-Partys-choice.html
[4]
Rojas C. “China’s Literary Complex is defused” - The New Republic -11/10/12 http://www.tnr.com/blog/plank/108492/china%E2%80%99s-literary-nobel-complex-defused#
[6] Tsai
V. “Chinese Nobel Prize Writer Condemned for his Murky political Stance” - International
Business Times, 25/10/12 http://www.ibtimes.com/chinese-nobel-prize-writer-condemned-his-murky-political-stance-845929
[7] Carlson
B. “China Scrambles to Censor Novelist Mo Yan’s Nobel Prize” - Global Post,
16/10/12 - http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/china/121016/chinas-scramble-censor-novelist-mo-yans-nobel-prize
[9] ibid
[10]
IFEX – “Report on Freedom of Artistic expression in China”- Article 19,
23/10/12 http://www.ifex.org/china/2012/10/23/artistic_expression/
[11]
Wasserstrom J. “China’s Latest Laureate: Chinese Lit Scholar Answers Questions
About Mo Yan” – LA Review of Books, 12/10/12 http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?type=&id=1003&fulltext=1&media=
[12] Wei
W. “Mo Yan’s Nobel win celebrated – and panned – in China” – NBC News, 12/10/12
http://behindthewall.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/10/12/14391375-mo-yans-nobel-win-celebrated-and-panned-in-china?lite
[13]
Carlson B. “China scrambles to Censor Noovelist Mo Yan’s Nobel Prize” –
GlobalPost, 16/10/12 http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/china/121016/chinas-scramble-censor-novelist-mo-yans-nobel-prize
[14] Von
Hein M. “Interview: Mo Yan bores me to death” – Deutsche Welle, 12/10/12 http://www.dw.de/interview-mo-yan-bores-me-to-death/a-16301782
[15]
Hung J. “Mo Yan, the Nobel and Translation” – China Post, 15/10/12 http://www.chinapost.com.tw/commentary/the-china-post/joe-hung/2012/10/15/357715/p2/Mo-Yan.htm
[16]
Min-yung L. “Mo, Writer and Winner without the Credentials” – Taipei Times,
16/10/12 - http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2012/10/16/2003545292/2
[17]
Tsai V. “Chinese Nobel Prize writer Condemned for his Murky Political Stance”
International Business Times, 13/10/12 http://www.ibtimes.com/chinese-nobel-prize-writer-condemned-his-murky-political-stance-845929
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