在我寫我的英文版自傳小說“Father Son & Violin”《父子琴》的過程中，碰到許多具有新中國特色的詞彙我想知道準確的意思和譯法，比如“反右”、“四舊”、“鬥私批修”等等。等這次回國，我到上海書城翻遍所有的中文字典詞典，卻都沒找到以上詞彙的痕跡。這使得我百思不得其解。想想5、7年打了200萬右派，文革初期“破四舊”毀壞了無數的家庭，文革中“鬥私批修”整傷整死多少人……而這些我們新中國兩代人親身經歷過的事情，這些銘刻在我們心中血淋淋的字跡，在中國的字典詞典上卻沒有它們存在的一席之地；我這次回國做生意正好碰上文革“5、16通知”四十周年紀念日，而祖國的媒體、廣播電視報刊雜誌沒發一個音節沒出一個文字。還有許多類似令人啼笑皆非的現象，比如在祖國的任何論壇上發個帖子，“文革”這兩個字就變成了“**”，“文化大革命”就變成了“*****”。據說還有許多被打成******的中國詞彙，比如 “某某功”什麼的。好像這樣做，過去的那些荒唐和慘劇就會沒有發生過，現在正在發生的事情就會自行消失。更有甚者，在毛澤東締造的新中國的今天，居然我所到過的任何書店都買不到毛主席語錄（那本中國歷史上曾經最最暢銷的書籍），惟獨在上海外文書店找到一本英文版“毛澤東語錄”，一看價格嚇我一跳，那半個巴掌大一個巴掌厚的小紅本本標價居然是75人民幣（在機場是95人民幣）。一問才知道那是外國人出版外國人印刷，中國人僅僅是為了經濟效益才作為貨物進口的。

這一切讓我意外和驚訝，使我震撼，令我毛骨悚然，不由又想起不少往事，比如懷疑起文革中看到的油畫“井岡山林彪會師毛澤東” 、“毛主席去安源”里的那些事情歷史上是否真的發生過？還有國家主席劉少奇，為建立和建設新中國辛苦了一輩子，到死卻連同自己的名字一起被燒成灰的權利都被剝奪！此外我還試着問了問現在的青年人有關“文化大革命”，即使那些知道一點點的，也“只聽說好像是四人幫搞的。” 連我們新中國這兩代人自己親身經歷過來的事情，都如此地被捏造、歪曲、隱瞞、無視，讓我們如何能不質疑我們小時候所受的一切正面教育，比如台灣人民是如何地生活在水深火熱之中；帝國主義是如何地黑暗腐朽；我們又是如何地朋友遍天下；有着三大發明的中華民族是如何地優秀……

無論是過去有意對歷史的捏造和歪曲，還是今天選擇對歷史的隱瞞和無視，都說明“真實”對我們的民族來說，是多麼地可怕。

我也害怕，害怕無論我如何努力寫作，以及我的作品達到如何的質量，只要有關鍵人物不喜歡就會像中國發生過的所有事情一樣被屏蔽，被無視和忘卻。我真實的故事，也和所有中國真實的歷史一樣，興許只能用外國人的語言被保留在外國人的data庫里。

我猛然想起天安門那水晶玻璃里的存在，悟出那是個何等英明的舉動。因為若不那樣，不定什麼時候將有人懷疑“那‘四個偉大’的主人以及他的時代是否真的存在過”？

我用英文寫作的理由，除了別的，也為忘卻的紀念。

成丹 九哥

無奈有感於祖國

http://www.danielviolins.com/jg/

（請海外的朋友幫忙把下面的英文版貼到各英文論壇上去，謝謝）

For the Memory of Effacement

Since I started to translate my autobiography “Father Son & Violin” from Chinese into English I encountered quite some New China characterized terms such as “anti-right wings” “breaking the four olds” “anti-individualism and animadverting revisionism” that I would like to double check the accurate meaning and the proper English translation.

For this purpose I exploited a business excuse visiting my motherland where I devoted much of my time to the Shanghai Foreign Language Book Store, which is supposed to be one of the biggest in the vast country. However, to my astonishment and amazement, after my fingers gone through all the Chinese dictionaries that I could find in the bookstore no such terms listed above existed.

That still remains perplexed despite of much thought. Let’s flash back to the year 1957, around 2,000,000 Chinese, with the majority of intellectuals were persecuted both politically and physically during the “anti-right movement”; the same is true that at the beginning of the Chinese Cultural Revolution in 1966, numerous families were ruined by the “break four olds” movement; moreover countless Chinese suffered enormously, many even lost their lives in the most miserable and inhuman ways during the 10-year Cultural Revolution chaos under the slogan “anti-individualism and animadverting revisionism”. The tragedies that we two Chinese generations personally experienced with our soul and flesh, those words carved in our hearts with blood, yet found no room for their existence in any of our modern Chinese dictionaries.

The longer I stayed in my motherland the more awkward things seemed to emerge to me, for instance when I tried to read something on the web, many words such as the “Cultural Revolution” appear on the screen to be “*****”. As if by doing so the “Cultural Revolution” could have not taken place. The oddest thing above all, was in any bookstores I visited in China I found no Mao’s little red bible for sale, which was once the best seller in the Chinese book market history, except, at an international airport I happened to see a hand thick and a half hand sized English version “Mao Zedong’s Quotations” at the price 10 times higher than a normal Chinese book of the same volume. It became quite understandable when the sales girl told me, “It is published and printed in a foreign country, and we imported it only for the need of the market.” I knew she meant “for the need of money.”

There is something furthermore made me more terrified than surprised, or shocked. That was after I heard when the ????er Chinese state-chairman Liu Shaoqi passed away he was cremated under somebody else’s name. We all know Liu devoted all his life to the establishment and construction of the New China, and during Mao’s Cultural Revolution he was politically and physically persecuted for years until his last breath. What a world it would be when people couldn’t even die with one’s own name!

I tested some teenagers about the awareness of the “Cultural Revolution”, to those who know a little remarked, “The gang of four was to blame”, or “Why ask? That part of the history should be forgotten”.

Think that even the iron facts that we two generations experienced personally being so much falsely made up, distorted, or covered up, how could we not to doubt the whole education that we were crammed during our childhood, teaches such as how awful life the people in Taiwan were suffering; how dark and rotten the imperialistic countries were; how our friends were all over the world; and with the three great inventions in the history how outstanding our Chinese nation was among the others…

Suddenly the Mao’s remains in the crystal coffin at Tiananmen square stroke me hard, made me realize how wise and astute the action was chosen, for if the remains had not remained, someday someone might ask whether Mao as a living human had ever actually existed?

Regardless past’s intention of the history being distorted or falsely made up, or today’s choosing of the actualities being covered up or effaced, all tell one and single fact: to our nation, “truth” is a fearful monster.

I am scared too, scared to the result that regardless how much effort I put on my writing, and no matter how high level my humble works might reach, as long as disliked by some key persons in China, like all unpleasant occurrences in the Chinese history, would be shielded, censored, eliminated, and vanished before they given a chance to show their faces. My true stories, also like all the other Chinese true history, perhaps could only be written in a foreign language reserved in a foreign database.

I start to write in Ch-english, besides other reasons, also for the memory of effacement.

Daniel Chenglish

(A Chinese Norwegian writer living in Japan, with Chinese pen name known as Nine Brother)

Written with helpless feeling in Japan

PS: A native English writing partner wanted

http://www.danielviolins.com/jg
jiuge99999@hotmail.com