Xu Zhimo (1897.1.15 ~1931.19) is a modern poet and essayist. Shi Xia Town, Haining City, Zhejiang Province. The printed name, the word Zhimo, and the small word Youshen. Used pen names: Nanhu, Shi Zhecun, Gu,,, Xianhe, Delete Me, Xinshou, Huanggou, Huan, etc.
Xu Zhimo is a representative poet of Crescent School and a member of Crescent Poetry Society. 19 15 graduated from Hangzhou No.1 Middle School and studied in Shanghai Hujiang University, Tianjin Beiyang University and Peking University successively. 19 18 went to the United States to study banking. 192 1, went to study in Britain, joined Cambridge University as a special student, and studied political economy. My two years in Cambridge were deeply influenced by western education and romantic and aesthetic poets in Europe and America.
192 1 Start writing new poems.
1922 After returning to China, he published a lot of poems in newspapers and periodicals.
1923, participated in the establishment of crescent society and joined the literature research society.
1924 founded Modern Poetry Review with Hu Shi and Chen Xiying, and was hired as Professor Peking University. Translated by Tagore, a great Indian poet, when he visited China.
From 65438 to 0925, he went to Europe and traveled to the Soviet Union, Germany, Italy, France and other countries.
From 65438 to 0926, he was the editor-in-chief of the supplement of Morning News Poetry Magazine, and started the metrical movement of new poetry with Wen Yiduo and Zhu Xiang, which influenced the development of new poetry art. In the same year, he moved to Shanghai and served as a professor at Guanghua University, Daxia University and Nanjing Central University.
1927 participated in the establishment of Crescent Bookstore. The following year, he served as editor-in-chief after the publication of New Moon. And travel abroad to Britain, the United States, Japan, India and other countries.
65438-0930 Member of China Cultural Fund Committee, elected as a member of British Poetry Society. In the winter of the same year, he taught in Peking University and Peking Women's University.
193 1 At the beginning of the year, he founded Poetry Quarterly with Chen and Fang, and was elected as the director of China Branch of Pen Club. In June of the same year165438+1October 19, I flew from Nanjing to Peiping. Because I hit a mountain near Jinan in the fog, my plane crashed and I was killed. Coincidentally, the crashed plane was called "Jinan". Cai Yuanpei wrote elegiac couplet for him:
Conversation is poetry, action is poetry, life is poetry, the meaning of poetry has penetrated, and it has its own paradise; You can die by boat, by car, lying in a cubicle, and you don't have to be afraid of the road if you die accidentally.
[Edit this paragraph] Achievements of works
His poetry collections are: Poems of Zhi Mo, Cold Night, Tiger, Wandering in the Clouds.
Prose collections include: Farewell to Cambridge, Fallen Leaves, Paris Balance, Autopsy, Autumn and Roulette;
Novel: The Scar of Spring
Plot: Bian Kungang (co-written with Lu Xiaoman)
Diary: Aimei and Zhimo Diary;
Translate Mansfield's novels, etc.
His works have been edited and published as Collected Works of Xu Zhimo.
Xu Shi's poems are fresh, harmonious in rhythm, novel in metaphor, rich in imagination, beautiful in artistic conception, elegant in thought and full of changes. He pursues neatness and splendor in artistic form and has a distinct artistic personality. He is a representative poet of the Crescent School. His prose is unique and has achieved no less achievements than poetry. Among them, Self-Anatomy, Want to Fly, Cambridge as I Know It and Chatting in Yushan Residence are all masterpieces handed down from generation to generation.
[Edit this paragraph] Family background
During the Ming Dynasty, Xu Songting was in business and lived in the ancestor of Xu Zhi. Xu Zhimo is one of his people.
1897 65438+1October 15. Xu Zhimo was born in Shixia Town, Haining County, Zhejiang Province. According to genealogy records, his name is Xu, and the word Jiusen. Because the father is a monkey and the son is also a monkey, I took the fine print. The pen names are Nanhu, Shizhecun, Gu, Xianhe, Jian, Xinshou, Huanggou and Huan. Zhimo was given another name by his father when he went to study in the United States in 19 18. It is said that when I was a child, a monk named Wisdom rubbed his head and predicted that "this man will become a great man in the future". His father was so anxious to make his son successful that he changed his name for him.
Xu Zhimo, the only son of Xu's eldest grandson, lived a comfortable and rich life since childhood.
[Edit this paragraph] Learning history
I studied at home when I was a child. At the age of eleven, I entered Shi Xia Qizhi School and studied under Zhang Shusen. I laid the foundation of ancient Chinese, and my grades have always been the first in my class.
19 10 years, Xu zhimo was fourteen years old and left his hometown for [3] Hangzhou. On the recommendation of my uncle Shen Junru, I was admitted to the High School Attached to Hangzhou (19 13 was renamed as Zhejiang No.1 Middle School, now Hangzhou Senior High School in Zhejiang Province), and I was in the same class as Yu Dafu. He loves literature, and published a paper "On the Relationship between Fiction and Society" in the first issue of the school magazine "Friends", thinking that novels are beneficial to society and "should be promoted as much as possible", which is the first work in his life. At the same time, he is interested in science. And published articles such as Radium Ingot and the History of the Earth.
19 15 In the summer, Xu Zhimo graduated from Zhejiang No.1 Middle School and later entered Shanghai Baptist College and Theological Seminary (predecessor of Hujiang University, now Shanghai University of Technology). In the same year 10, he was arranged by his family to marry Zhang Youyi, the daughter of Zhang Runzhi, the richest man in Luodian County.
Xu Zhimo, who is active by nature, did not finish the course of Baptist College with peace of mind. 19 16 autumn, left Shanghai to study law in Tianjin Beiyang University Preparatory School. The following year, the law department of Beiyang University was merged into Peking University, and Xu Zhimo was transferred to Peking University. During his two years in the north, he added new contents to his life and injected new factors into his thoughts. In this institution of higher learning, he not only studied law, but also studied Japanese, French and political science, dabbled in Chinese and foreign literature, and ignited his interest in literature. During this period, he made many friends and met many celebrities. Introduced by Zhang Junmai and Zhang Gongquan, he worshipped Liang Qichao as his teacher. He also held a grand ceremony to learn from the teacher. Liang Qichao had a great influence on Xu Zhimo's life and played an important role in Xu Zhimo's mind. Although Liang Xu is a close master-apprentice relationship, there are still ideological differences between them. Xu Zhimo, who accepted the bourgeois idea of democracy and freedom, put down his body desperately to pursue his ideal life and strive for the freedom of marriage and love.
When he was a university student in the north, he personally experienced the scene of warlord scuffle and witnessed the slaughter of innocent people. He hates this society, "smearing the purple sky at dusk in the western hills, and also smearing the shame of this man becoming a beast" (Xu Zhimo: the second battle song of "Man Becomes a Beast"). He made up his mind to study abroad, seek a prescription to change the reality of China and carry out his "ideal revolution".
Xu Zhimo left Peking University (19 14, August 2008, Xu Zhimo's "A Record of Going to America") with patriotic enthusiasm of "applying what he has learned to serve the country", and in June 2008, 19 14 left Shanghai to study in the United States. In the first year of studying abroad, I entered Hearst Clark University in the United States. He entered the history department and took sociology, economics, history and other courses in order to be a Hamilton of China in the future. Ten months after I entered school, I graduated with a bachelor's degree and a first-class honor award. However, he is not satisfied with this. That year, he transferred to the Graduate School of Columbia University in new york and entered the Department of Economics. Xu Zhimo has gained extensive knowledge of philosophy and politics. That year, the wave of the May 4th Revolution also spread to China students studying in the United States. Driven by patriotism, Xu Zhimo took part in patriotic activities organized by local students and often read magazines such as New Youth and Trendy. At the same time, his interest in learning gradually shifted from politics to literature, so he got a master's degree in literature.
Xu Zhimo stayed in the United States for two years, but he was tired of the madness, greed and material desire of the bourgeoisie in American capitalist society. He was attracted by the British philosopher Russell, and finally "got rid of the temptation of Columbia University's doctorate and bought a boat to cross the Atlantic. Unexpectedly, the unexpected changes in Russell's personal life prevented him from realizing his long-cherished wish to learn from Russell. As a result, he "stayed at the London School of Economics and Political Science for half a year" and was bored and wanted to change his way. Thanks to Dickinson's introduction and recommendation, Xu Zhimo entered the Royal College of Cambridge University as a special student.
Xu Zhimo also lived in England for two years. His life in England, especially in Cambridge, had an important influence on his life's thought and was a turning point in the development of his thought. In Cambridge, he deeply felt that "the beauty and tranquility of nature, harmony unexpectedly drowned your soul in the tacit understanding of starlight and waves" (Xu Zhimo: Cambridge as I know it). Xu Zhimo is obsessed with Cambridge and nature because he thinks that the real society is ugly, life is painful and only nature is pure and beautiful. The best way to cure this society and people, as well as the embarrassment of current life, is to leave the degraded civilization and return to the simplicity of nature. Only by approaching nature can we restore human childlike innocence and alleviate social symptoms.
He received a bourgeois aristocratic education and a "smoking culture" in Cambridge. He worships England very much and likes Oxford and Cambridge very much. He likes to associate with British celebrities. He has extensively dabbled in all kinds of world famous works, and has also been exposed to various schools of thought. During this period, his political ideas and social ideals were cultivated, and his self-consciousness-idealism was born. He wants to be an "uneducated individualist" himself. The environment in Cambridge not only contributed to and formed his social outlook and outlook on life, but also aroused his thirst for knowledge and triggered his creative ideas. He began to translate literary works. He translated several short stories by British writer Mansfield, the novel The Swirl Boy by German Fogo, the stories of Wu Jiarang and Ni Alan in medieval France, the Dead City by Italian writer Danon Wu Xue, and the Gandhi by Voltaire. At the same time, he was full of poetry and wrote many poems. His "The fury of spiritual revolution washes on both sides of your charming river" and "Xu Zhimo: Goodbye to Cambridge"). His idols are no longer Hamilton in America, but Shelley and Byron in England. He changed his face and joined the ranks of poets. )
[Edit this paragraph] Literary career
Cambridge moonlight
Xu Zhimo and his poems have no family background or personal hobbies. However, during his study in Cambridge University, England, he was uncharacteristically writing more than once, which led to the outbreak of his poetry creation. Although he wrote so many poems during this period, only twenty or thirty poems are scattered in some newspapers and magazines, and most of them have been lost. However, from the limited poems we can still see, we can also get a glimpse of Xu Zhimo's early poems and his thoughts.
At this time, why did Xu Zhimo write poems like he was possessed? How did he write poetry in generate?
First of all, it has something to do with his living environment at that time. It was the Cambridge environment in which he lived that aroused his interest in poetry and ignited his desire for creation. He said, "I'm really happy in Cambridge. I'm afraid I'll never get such a sweet baptism again in my life." Smoking and culture. So during this period, he created such works as Summer and Summer Field. Secondly, at this time, his personal life "shines with strange moonlight".
In the autumn of 192 1, he met the forest of "beautiful women" and "talented women". Xu Zhimo had a close relationship with her, and then talked about love and marriage. Therefore, Xu Zhimo filed for divorce with Zhang Youyi in March 1922, arguing that the two should not continue their married life without love and freedom. Free divorce, stopping suffering and foretelling happiness are Xu Zhimo's simple idealism. He is pursuing an ideal life. He feels that life seems to be "shocked by great power", he wants to express, he wants to sing. Therefore, love and love are represented as Love Dead, Listening to the Piano on a Moonlit Night, Miscellaneous Notes on Youth and Spring Breeze Breaking the Dream of Spring. In addition, he tends to write in different languages, because he is exposed to a lot of English literature and art, and the works of Byron, Shelley, Keats and Hardy fascinate him. He blew this "strange wind"-the European wind, and he followed their path, so with the help of poetry, his thoughts and feelings were "strange".
Therefore, Xu Zhimo especially misses this period of life in Cambridge, England. He is full of excitement and excitement. He wrote many poems, and his poetic situation is reflected in his long poem Dew on the Grass. This is his earliest poem that we have seen so far. This poem not only expresses his ambition and interest at that time, but also vividly conveys the turbulent state of his poetry. He opened the fountain of creation and sang with his throat. Therefore, he will become a poet. On the whole, these early poems are fresh in tone and lofty in artistic conception, which embodies "the call of youth and the bright hope" (Xu Zhimo: spring). At the same time, we began to explore the form of new poetry from many aspects. Poetry has various forms, but it has not yet been finalized. There are free poems, new metrical poems, western poems and even poems without punctuation. However, they emphasize the symmetry and neatness of rhyme, rhythm and format, and demand "smooth and pleasant tone and light and soft form", which is the consistent pursuit of Xu Zhimo's poems.
Although he was fascinated by life in Cambridge, England, his homesickness and homesickness haunted him, so he left Europe on August 1922 and set off for home. On the way home, I stopped in Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan for two months, and arrived in Shanghai on June 65438+1October 65438+May.
After returning to China, Xu Zhimo started another life. The disturbance of the real society disturbs his inner balance, and sometimes he feels mentally bored and anxious. So he told his feelings and experiences and started his literary career.
Zhimo's poems
1922 After Xu Zhimo returned to China in the autumn, his poems continued to be written and published in various magazines. Poems of Zhimo is the first book of poems compiled by Xu Zhimo himself, most of which are works from 1922 to 1924. The publication of this collection of poems made him famous. In this collection of poems, we can see Xu Zhimo's life and thoughts in the early days of returning to China, as well as his "feelings beyond words". Roughly: expressing ideals and expressing love; Expose social darkness and express sympathy for working people; Explore the philosophy of life; And lyricism about the scenery.
He is full of Cambridge-style life ideals in England and hopes to realize his idealism in China. The Happiness of Snowflakes is the first collection of poems by Xu Zhimo, which can be regarded as one of the representative works of Xu Zhimo's early poems. The author described the beautiful image of snowflake, and vividly wrote the happiness of snowflake with handsome writing. This poem has a brisk rhythm, clear tone and beautiful artistic conception.
Others are looking for stars, this is a cowardly world, I have love, baby, thank you! My heart fluttered again, and other articles, like the happiness of snowflakes, expressed the author's pursuit of ideals. They are not only lyric poems, but also love poems, which show the longing for freedom of life and love. Demanding freedom of life and love is the content of his idealism, so the two are often inseparable. However, there is a distance and irreconcilable contradiction between his idealism and China's social reality. His love with Lin was shattered, and his ideal life and ideal society could not be realized, which made him depressed and demoralized. Therefore, these poems are also shrouded in a sad atmosphere to varying degrees and become "a torrent of irrelevant depression and anger" (Mao Dun: on Xu Zhimo). This negative and pessimistic mood is more obvious in those short poems, such as News, A Weak Star, Ask Who and so on.
1924 In April, the Indian poet Tagore came to China, which had a certain influence on Xu Zhimo's life and creation. He established a friendship with Tagore, who named him Susima. At the end of May, Tagore left Shanghai for Japan, and Xu Zhimo went with him. The poem "Poem Nala on the Shore" in the Collection of Shima Poems was written by him during his stay in Japan. Xu Zhimo is good at lyric poetry and likes to write philosophical poems like Tagore.
Some of Zhimo's poems describe the disparity between the rich and the poor and the miserable life of the poor. Although the number of such poems is small, their contents are relatively substantial, which reflects a certain aspect of social real life and has certain social significance. There are also some lyric poems about scenery in Zhimo's poems, such as cars in Shanghai and Hangzhou.
Generally speaking, this book of poems is not life-oriented, its content is not profound enough, and its thoughts and feelings are not all so positive and healthy. However, judging from its performance skills, "almost all of them are systematic inputs and experiments" (Chen Xiying: Ten Works Since the New Literature Movement). There are various forms of poetry, including long poems, short sentences, free poems and prose poems, and more of them are experiments with western poetic styles. This period is the experimental period of Xu Zhimo's poetic style and the tempering period of his poetic skills. Through exploration and experiment, he showed the poet's talent and unique poetic style.
Xu Zhimo pays great attention to artistic conception when writing poems. Most of his poems in the Collection of Poems of Zhimo have formed their own artistic realm, such as Happiness of Snowflakes. The author combines the subjective feeling of pursuing ideal with the objective natural scenery, thus turning the real scenery into virtual scenery and creating a beautiful artistic realm.
In addition, his poems are vivid and emotional, which is due to his rich imagination. His imagination and figurative power are not only unique, but also can turn seemingly abstract things into vivid, tangible and visible concrete images, such as Poison, White Flag and Baby, three prose poems containing philosophy. He also used his artistic imagination to describe things through this special sensibility.