As of February 20, 2019, Mo Yan's award-winning works are as follows:
1. Name of the work: "The Frogs"
Award: Nobel Prize for Literature
Awarded: 2012?
Summary of the work:
The Frogs is a full-length novel written by contemporary Chinese writer Mo Yan. The novel is set against the backdrop of nearly 60 years of ups and downs in the rural fertility history of the People's Republic of China (PRC), and truly reflects the difficult process of implementing the state policy of family planning in the northeast township of Gao Mi in the same year.
By telling the life experience of Wan Xin, a rural female doctor who has been engaged in obstetrics and gynecology for more than 50 years, the novel successfully portrays a vivid and touching image of a rural gynecologist while describing the arduous and complicated historical process of implementing the national policy of family planning for the purpose of controlling the drastic growth of the population.
And in conjunction with the complex phenomenon of the family planning process, the book analyzes the humble, embarrassing, entangled, and contradictory spiritual world of the intellectuals represented by the narrator, Tadpole. Consisting of four long letters and a nine-act play, the book adheres to the author's usual style of vernacular literature, with a novel structure, distinctive rhythms, delicate strokes, and plain, meaningful and tense writing.
2. Title: Frogs
Award: 8th Mao Dun Literature Prize
When awarded: 2011
About the work:
Frogs is a full-length novel written by contemporary Chinese writer Mo Yan. The novel is set against the backdrop of nearly 60 years of ups and downs in the rural fertility history of the People's Republic of China (PRC), and truly reflects the difficult process of implementing the state policy of family planning in the northeast township of Gaomi.
By telling the life experience of Wan Xin, a rural female doctor who has been engaged in obstetrics and gynecology for more than 50 years, the novel successfully portrays a vivid and touching image of a rural gynecologist while describing the arduous and complicated historical process of implementing the national policy of family planning for the purpose of controlling the drastic growth of the population.
And in conjunction with the complex phenomenon of the family planning process, the book analyzes the humble, embarrassing, entangled, and contradictory spiritual world of the intellectuals represented by the narrator, Tadpole. Consisting of four long letters and a nine-act play, the book adheres to the author's usual style of vernacular literature, with a novel structure, distinctive rhythms, delicate strokes, and plain, meaningful and tense writing.
3. Title: Fatigue of Life and Death
Award: The Second Dream of the Red Chamber Award
When awarded: 2008
About the work:
Fatigue of Life and Death is one of Mo Yan's masterpieces. The novel recounts the historical development of China's countryside in the 50 years from 1950 to 2000.
Centered on the heavy topic of land, it explains all kinds of relationships between peasants and the land, and through the artistic images of the cycle of life and death, it demonstrates the lives of Chinese peasants and their tenacity, optimism, and resilience since the founding of New China.
4. Title: Fatigue of Life and Death
Award: The First Newman Prize for Chinese Literature in the United States
Time of Award: 2008
Synopsis:
Fatigue of Life and Death is one of the masterpieces of Mo Yan. The novel recounts the historical development of China's countryside in the 50 years from 1950 to 2000.
Centered on the heavy topic of land, it explains all kinds of relationships between peasants and the land, and through the artistic images of the cycle of life and death, it demonstrates the lives of Chinese peasants and their tenacity, optimism, and resilience since the founding of New China.
5. Title: "Moonlight Chopping"
Award: The First Pu Songling Short Story Prize
When awarded: 2005
About the work:
"Moonlight Chopping" is one of Mo Yan's short stories, in which the book tells the story of a deputy secretary of the county party committee who is mischievously "murdered.
"Moonlight Chopping" is a short story by Mo Yan about the murder of a deputy secretary of the county party committee by a prankster, interspersed with two legends about the origin and manufacture of the "Moonlight Chopping".
6. Title: "Moonlight Chopping"
Award: Fifth Moutai Cup - People's Literature Prize
Awarded: 2004
About the Work:
"Moonlight Chopping" is one of Mo Yan's short stories, which tells the story of the mischievous "murder" of a deputy secretary of the county party committee, and the story of the "murder" of a deputy secretary of the county party committee, and the story of the mischievous "murder" of a deputy secretary of the county party committee.
"Moonlight Chopping" is a short story by Mo Yan about the murder of a deputy secretary of the county party committee by a prankster, which is interspersed with two legends about the origin and manufacture of the "Moonlight Chopping".
7. Title: "Sandalwood Execution"
Award: The First Dingjun Biennial Literary Award
When awarded: 2003
About the work:
"Sandalwood Execution" is one of Mo Yan's masterpieces, which was published in 2008, and was a hotly debated topic in the literary world.
The novel takes the construction of the Jiaoji Railway by the Germans in Shandong in 1900, Yuan Shikai's suppression of the Boxer Rebellion in Shandong, the sacking of Beijing by the Eight-Power Allied Forces, and Cixi's hasty flight as the historical background, and tells the story of a campaign of military chaos, a pile of horrifying tortures, and a shocking tale that took place in the "Northeast Township of Gaomi".
8. Title: The State of Wine
Award: Jules Batailleau Prize for Foreign Literature, France
Awarded: 2001
About the work:
The State of Wine is a long satirical novel by Mo Yan, published in 1993. The novel depicts the ecology of China's officialdom through the use of wine and attacks official corruption, and has been hailed by American sinologist Ge Haowen as the most imaginative and complex Chinese novel.
9. Title: The Cow
Award: Eighth Novel Monthly Hundred Flowers Award?
Awarded: 2000
About the work:
The Cow is a middle-grade novel by Mo Yan, a black comedy.It was published in 1998 in Donghai magazine.
The novel tells the story of Luo Han, a mischievous teenager who dropped out of school and stayed at home during the Cultural Revolution to herd cows with the production team's breeder, Master Du. Because of the poverty, he cannot afford to keep more cows, and the production leader, Uncle Ma, invites Comrade Lao Dong from the commune's veterinary station to perform castration surgery on three young bulls, Double Ridge and Big and Small Lusi.
After the operation, Luo Han, Du Daqi and three cows live together day and night, through the suffering, the size of Ruxi finally recovered. But the story of the unruly Double Ridge, who died tragically after days of torture due to intra-operative hemorrhaging and post-operative infection.
10, the name of the work: "Plump Breasts and Fat Hips"
Award: Everyone - Red River Literary Award
When the award was given: 1997
Works:
"Plump Breasts and Fat Hips" is one of the most famous masterpieces of Mo Yan . The novel warmly eulogizes the greatness, simplicity and selflessness of the mother, the original creator of life, and the unparalleled importance of the inheritance of life.
And in this flow chart of life, permeated with the smoke of history and war, true, without any prejudice, reproduces the history of a period of time.
11. Title: "The White Dog Swing Stand"
Award: Taiwan United Daily News Literary Award?
When awarded: 1988
About the work:
The White Dog Swing Stand is a short story published in April 1985 by Mo Yan, a famous contemporary Chinese writer. The novel uses flashbacks to narrate the story of a reader who has been away from his hometown for ten years, Jinghe, who returns to his hometown to be reunited with his former lover Nuan.
12. Title: Red Sorghum
Award: Fourth National Award for Chinese Novels
When awarded: 1987
About the work:
Red Sorghum is a full-length novel by Chinese writer Mo Yan. Set against the backdrop of the Anti-Japanese War and the folk life of the northeastern township of Gaomi in the 1930s and 1940s, Red Sorghum portrays a series of anti-Japanese heroes in the story, but all of them are embodiments of both good and evil.
"Red Sorghum" recreates the era of the Anti-Japanese War for readers from a folkloric point of view, showing a violent desire to rise up and fight for survival.
"Red Sorghum" is a classic work that shows the resilience of the Gaomi people in the war of resistance against Japan and is full of blood and national spirit.
Expanded Information
Author Introduction
Mo Yan, formerly known as Guan Muye, was born on February 17, 1955, in Ping'an Village, Dalan, Northeast Township Cultural Development Area, Gaomi City, Shandong Province, and is the first Chinese-born writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. He is also the first Chinese writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature.
In 1981, he began to publish his work "Spring Nights and Rain", and became famous for "Transparent Carrot" in 1984.
In 1986, he published his novel Red Sorghum Family in People's Literature magazine, causing a great sensation in the literary world, and in 1987 he became the screenwriter of the movie Red Sorghum, which won the Golden Bear at the 38th Berlin International Film Festival.
In 2011 he won the Mao Dun Literature Prize for his novel Frogs, and in 2012 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. The award was given for the fusion of folklore, history and contemporary society through hallucinatory realism.
In 2013, he became the honorary president of the Internet Literature University.In December 2014, he was awarded an honorary doctorate of letters from the Chinese University of Hong Kong.In December 2016, he was elected vice-chairman of the Ninth National Committee of the Chinese Writers' Association.
In November 2017, Mo Yan was awarded an honorary doctorate of letters from Hong Kong Baptist University. In December of the same year, he was awarded the "2017 Wang Zengqi Chinese Fiction Prize" in the short story category for his work "Peace Under Heaven".
Mo Yan has been called a "root-seeking literature" writer because of his series of works on the countryside, which are full of complex emotions of "nostalgia" and "resentment". According to incomplete statistics, Mo Yan's works have been translated into at least 40 languages.
Second, Creative Characteristics
1. Roots Literature
Mo Yan has risen to prominence with a series of folkloric works in the mid-1980s, which are filled with the complex emotions of "nostalgia for the countryside" as well as "resentment for the countryside", and has been categorized as a writer of "roots literature". He has been categorized as a writer of "root-seeking literature".
In March 2000, Mo Yan gave a speech at the University of California, Berkeley, entitled "Uncle Faulkner, How Are You? said, "His Yoknapatawpha County in particular made me realize that a writer, not only can fictionalize characters, fictionalize stories, but also fictionalize geography."
It was Faulkner's revelation that inspired Mo Yan to put "Gaomi Northeast Township" on the manuscript paper, Mo Yan said, "I am also determined to write about my hometown that is as big as a postage stamp."
So from 1985 "White Dog Swing Frame" began, Mo Yan raised the banner of 'Gaomi Northeast Township', like a reckless hero present, creating his own literary kingdom. Just like Thomas Hardy's "Wessex" in the south of England, or Garcia Marquez's portrayal of the South American town of Macondo.
Through the description of the lifestyle and general living conditions in their hometowns, they conveyed a certain universal content of human nature and the human condition, transforming the general description of their hometowns into an understanding and discovery of human "survival".
In this way, Mo Yan's works have transcended the narrowness and limitations of general "vernacular literature" and reached the height of the universal existence of human beings.
2. Western Modernism
In Mo Yan's novels, it is easy to find the influence of Western modernist literature. This influence is multifaceted, with stream-of-consciousness novels of inner monologue, psychoanalysis, sensory impressions, hallucinatory dreams, and inversion of time and space.
There are the metaphors, symbols, prophecies, mysteries, and magic of magical realism; there are also the exaggerations, deformations, and absurdities of absurdist drama; and there are also structuralism, sensationism, symbolism, and so on.
Among Western writers, Mo Yan holds two in the highest esteem, namely William Faulkner and Garcia Marquez.
The most important feature of Mo Yan's novel structure is the constant scene switching and the reversal of time and space, which is clearly characterized by spatial form novels, echoing Faulkner's style. His references to myths and legends, as well as the animal angle of the narrative, are clearly colored by Garcia Marquez's magical realism.
Stream-of-consciousness is an important expressive technique in Mo Yan's works, and this is already evident in his early works.
For example, in his 1985 novel The Dead River, he uses a stream-of-consciousness montage to blend the past with reality, and replaces the narrative with a depiction of a child's "little tiger's" senses, which poeticizes the story and makes it dreamlike.
The imagery and metaphors in Explosion, the slow-motion descriptions in Ball Lightning, and the free associations in Joy are all embodiments of Mo Yan's stream-of-consciousness art, and in the process of applying stream-of-consciousness techniques, he honored his quest for dream-like novels and formed his unique hallucinatory realism.
Mo Yan's reference to Western modernist literature is extensive, not limited to Faulkner and Marquez. In Song of Garlic Shoots in Paradise, the exaggerated portrayal of farmers being taxed in various ways is in the style of black humor; Humor and Fun, which describes people turning into monkeys after entering the city, has the absurdity of Kafka's Metamorphosis.
But Mo Yan was not simply borrowing from Western modernism, which he explored, and of which "Thirteen Steps" is a masterpiece. And his Wine Country, published in 1993, is an unprecedentedly innovative and experimental novel, characterized by postmodernism.
3, the traditional Chinese art of storytelling
Mo Yan, while borrowing from Western modernism, soon realized that he had to escape from the "scorching furnace" of Faulkner, Marquez, and other Western modernist masters, and the result of this escape was to return to his literary hometown. The result was a return to his literary hometown of "Gao Mi Dongbei Township".
He endeavored to draw nourishment from Qilu culture, Pu Songling's "Liaozhai Zhiyi", "Fengshen Yanyi", Yuan miscellaneous dramas, and traditional and folk cultural resources such as folk stories and folk art (including Gaomi ash year paintings, Gaomi clay sculptures, Gaomi paper cuttings, and Maoqiang, etc.).
Liaolai Zhiyi, in particular, has had a great influence on Mo Yan, who once described it as a work that "transforms the corrupt into the miraculous".
Delivering his Nobel Prize for Literature speech, "The Storyteller," in Sweden in 2012, Mo Yan said, "More than two hundred years ago, my hometown produced a great genius of storytelling, Pu Songling, and many people in my village, including me, are his descendants. " Life and Death Fatigue" is the novel that best exemplifies the influence of "Liaozhai Zhiyi" on Mo Yan.
Mo Yan drew his inspiration from the bird fairies, fox fairies, ghosts and gods, and other folk art, legends, and ancient literary texts that favored the play of gods and ghosts, such as Tu Xing Sun in "Romance of the Feuding Gods" and Xifang Ping in "Liaozhai Zhiyi," which are found in abundance in the remnants of the Dongyi culture of his hometown.
And from the richness of real life to obtain fresh sustenance, in the partial or partial simulation of history and reality at the same time, so that their own creations are inserted into the wings of free imagination, and then in the psychological and logical to achieve a high degree of authenticity and artistic creativity in the near-perfect combination.
Thus, on the basis of inheriting modernist masters such as Kawabata Yasunari, Kafka, Faulkner, Marquez and so on, and rooted in the local culture and the earth of literature and art, he realized the leap of literature from "modernism in China" to "modernism Chineseization". The leap from "modernism in China" to "modernism Chineseized" has been realized in literature.
4. Aesthetics of Violence
Mo Yan's works are characterized by a strong sense of violence, and "Red Sorghum," published in 1986, is a primitive text, as if it were a kind of primitive canon of language, which includes such basic violent phrases as fornication, indulgence in alcohol, decapitation, and flaying of the skin.
They are a kind of testimony to verify the existence of the "primitive vitality of the nation".
After that, Mo Yan became a firm writer of cool words, such as the red-roasted babies in Wine Country, the skinning of dogs in Road Building, the skinning of cats in The Herbivorous Family, the gutting of the dead in The Elixir of the Spirit and the stirring up of people with a flower-clearing machine in White Cotton, and so on, in which he used his unique sensory depictions to show the physiological and psychological sensations that violence brings to the human being.
The Sandalwood Torture is the pinnacle of Mo Yan's aesthetics of violence, and he used more than 14,000 words to describe the process of lynching Qian Xiongfei in the novel's ninth chapter, "The Masterpiece," in which he presented a vivid and thrilling torture scene to the readers with his profound linguistic skills and astonishing imagination.
Every cut of the sharp blade and the cry of pain from the tortured person converge into a strange thrill of discourse that flows between the novel's utterances, as if a tragic light from hell.
This is not a somber Kafkaesque punishment, but a carnal orgy mixing extreme sadism and masochism, as if it were the last feast before the fall of an empire. The depiction of such extreme violence polarized readers, with those who disliked it immediately throwing up the book and those who liked it unable to stop.
As Ge Hao Wen, an American sinologist and English translator of Mo Yan's work, put it, "Sandalwood Torture is very brutal, very gruesome, but you still want to read it, and when you see it at the end, you ask yourself why you want to read it?" ?
5. Linguistic Carnival
Looking at Mo Yan's creations, he observes the world through the eyes of carnivalization, takes clowns, fools and other marginal characters who are degraded by the official culture as the protagonists of his novels, and mixes the vulgar language taken from the folk with the monologue-style "elegant" language, in order to try to find out the dirt and dirt of the spiritual carnival in the countryside and folk. The spirit of carnival in the vernacular folklore gave his novels a pioneering color of carnivalized style.
Mo Yan's innate spirit of rebellion and wild imagination led him to explore the form of his texts and innovate his language. For example, the perverse modification of language, which focuses on the modification of logical contradictions.
As in "Red Sorghum" " Gaomi Northeast Township is undoubtedly the most beautiful and ugliest, the most transcendent and secular, the most saintly and nasty, the most heroic and good-hearted and son of a bitch, and the most capable of drinking and loving on earth."
In the novel "Red Locusts," when Moyan depicts a pair of inbred, in-love ancestors being subjected to the family's firebombing and dying kissing and embracing each other in a roaring fire.
He commented: " This sensational tragedy of love, this appalling scandal in family history, a touching feat of inhumanity, inhumanity, bestiality, a great milestone, a dirty shame, a great progress, a stupid regression".
Similar language abounds in his work. It is a language of praise and blame, a language that is the concentrated expression of Mo Yan's carnivalesque thinking and artistic feeling.
Mo Yan's language carnival is also embodied in the hodgepodge of language categories, and the hodgepodge of language also embodies the equality, subversion and popularity of carnivalization.
In addition, Mo Yan's novels are a hodgepodge of slang, colloquialisms, incantations, jingles, folk songs, and official phrases.
These fragments of discourse are embedded in each other and mingle, eliminating the hierarchical interface between the vulgar and the sublime, and are submerged in a reverberating torrent of multiple voices, which form a typical style of carnivalization, both of the senses and of the discourse.
Mo Yan's novels are also characterized by the depiction of carnival days and scenes.
For example, the "Meat Festival" in "Forty-one Guns", the snow festival in "Bountiful Breasts and Fat Hips", the parade of beggars in "Sandalwood Penalty" and the "Chorus of Cats" during the execution of Sandalwood Penalty, etc., all of these novels narrate the social phenomena in an ecstatic way, and establish a fictional discourse under the principle of ecstaticity. The fictional world of discourse established under the principle of carnival is in stark contrast to the institutionalized world of existence.
Baidu Encyclopedia - Mo Yan (China's first Nobel Prize winner in Literature)