vista of glazed beauty. I was the first villager to learn that the rally was to be held there. One day I was ice fishing beneath a floodgate bridge over the basin when I heard loud voices above me. One of them was Xiao Shangchun. I could have picked his voice out of ten thousand. Damn, he said, what a great setting. We’ll hold the rally here. We can put the stage here on the bridge.
A floodgate had been built above the Jiao River Dam to protect the lower reaches. Every year, when summer turned to autumn, the Jiao River crested and the floodgate was opened, transforming marshland into a lake. Northeast Township residents were unhappy with what was done, since marshland was still land, and the only crop that could be planted in the marsh was sorghum. But who were we to take issue with the needs of the nation? This was one of my favourite hangouts when I skipped school, a place where I could sit and watch water rushing through twelve sluice holes. After the water was let out, the former marshland became a lake some ten square li in size, where fish and shrimp were plentiful enough to bring hordes of fishermen and, increasingly, fishmongers. They tried setting up their stalls on the bridge, and when that didn’t work, they moved to the eastern bank, under a row of willows. During the busy season, a line of stalls would stretch at least two li. Once they formed a market, the local marketplace moved from the commune to the eastern bank of the river. The vegetable peddlers came, the egg sellers came, the oil cruller peddlers came, and with them came other marketplace denizens: thieves, hooligans and beggars. Members of the commune’s armed militia turned out several times to clear the area, and their arrival sent undesirables scurrying; the militiamen’s departure witnessed a probing return of the same people. A combination of legal and illegal commerce thus came into being. I loved looking at fish: carp, silver carp, crucian carp, catfish, snakehead fish, eel, and, while I was at it, crabs, loaches and clams. The biggest fish I ever saw there weighed a hundred jin and had a white belly; it looked a little like a pregnant woman. The old fishmonger stood cowering behind the fish, as if he were in possession of a deity. By then I was palling around with those sharp-eyed, keen-eared fishmongers. Why sharp-eyed and keen-eared? Because agents from the tax bureau often came to confiscate their fish, not to mention the idlers in the commune who pretended to be from the tax bureau to trick them out of their wares. That huge fish was nearly taken away by two men in blue uniforms, cigarettes dangling from their lips, and black satchels in their hands. If the fishmonger’s daughter hadn’t come running up crying and making a fuss, and if Qin He hadn’t exposed the two men’s real identities, they’d have carried that fish off with them.
Qin He wore his hair with a side part and dressed in a blue gabardine student’s uniform, with a Doctoral brand fountain pen and a New China two-colour ballpoint pen clipped to his breast pocket; he looked like a college student reduced to begging during the May Fourth period. His face was deathly pale, his expression gloomy, his eyes moist, as if he were forever on the verge of tears. Yet he was an eloquent speaker of standard Mandarin, his every utterance stage-play quality. He exerted considerable influence on my later decision to try my hand at being a playwright. He was never without his enamel mug, emblazoned with a five-pointed red star and the word ‘Prize’. Standing in front of the fishmongers, he’d say emotionally: Comrades, I’m a man who’s lost the ability to work. And you might say: You’re too young to be a man who’s lost the ability to work. Well, I tell you, comrades, what you cannot see is that I have a serious heart condition, caused by a stabbing. Any physical exertion could cause my damaged heart to rupture, and I’d bleed to death. Won’t you give me one of those
A floodgate had been built above the Jiao River Dam to protect the lower reaches. Every year, when summer turned to autumn, the Jiao River crested and the floodgate was opened, transforming marshland into a lake. Northeast Township residents were unhappy with what was done, since marshland was still land, and the only crop that could be planted in the marsh was sorghum. But who were we to take issue with the needs of the nation? This was one of my favourite hangouts when I skipped school, a place where I could sit and watch water rushing through twelve sluice holes. After the water was let out, the former marshland became a lake some ten square li in size, where fish and shrimp were plentiful enough to bring hordes of fishermen and, increasingly, fishmongers. They tried setting up their stalls on the bridge, and when that didn’t work, they moved to the eastern bank, under a row of willows. During the busy season, a line of stalls would stretch at least two li. Once they formed a market, the local marketplace moved from the commune to the eastern bank of the river. The vegetable peddlers came, the egg sellers came, the oil cruller peddlers came, and with them came other marketplace denizens: thieves, hooligans and beggars. Members of the commune’s armed militia turned out several times to clear the area, and their arrival sent undesirables scurrying; the militiamen’s departure witnessed a probing return of the same people. A combination of legal and illegal commerce thus came into being. I loved looking at fish: carp, silver carp, crucian carp, catfish, snakehead fish, eel, and, while I was at it, crabs, loaches and clams. The biggest fish I ever saw there weighed a hundred jin and had a white belly; it looked a little like a pregnant woman. The old fishmonger stood cowering behind the fish, as if he were in possession of a deity. By then I was palling around with those sharp-eyed, keen-eared fishmongers. Why sharp-eyed and keen-eared? Because agents from the tax bureau often came to confiscate their fish, not to mention the idlers in the commune who pretended to be from the tax bureau to trick them out of their wares. That huge fish was nearly taken away by two men in blue uniforms, cigarettes dangling from their lips, and black satchels in their hands. If the fishmonger’s daughter hadn’t come running up crying and making a fuss, and if Qin He hadn’t exposed the two men’s real identities, they’d have carried that fish off with them.
Qin He wore his hair with a side part and dressed in a blue gabardine student’s uniform, with a Doctoral brand fountain pen and a New China two-colour ballpoint pen clipped to his breast pocket; he looked like a college student reduced to begging during the May Fourth period. His face was deathly pale, his expression gloomy, his eyes moist, as if he were forever on the verge of tears. Yet he was an eloquent speaker of standard Mandarin, his every utterance stage-play quality. He exerted considerable influence on my later decision to try my hand at being a playwright. He was never without his enamel mug, emblazoned with a five-pointed red star and the word ‘Prize’. Standing in front of the fishmongers, he’d say emotionally: Comrades, I’m a man who’s lost the ability to work. And you might say: You’re too young to be a man who’s lost the ability to work. Well, I tell you, comrades, what you cannot see is that I have a serious heart condition, caused by a stabbing. Any physical exertion could cause my damaged heart to rupture, and I’d bleed to death. Won’t you give me one of those
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