Melodies of the Dust Land Chapter 9

Zhao, northern Shaanxi dialect, namely Kan, Mizhi, the name of a county in northern Shaanxi.

② Unable to support, that is, unable to support.

A city in Mizhi shines in the distance,

There is no Ximen in Mizhi in the recent photo.

There are nine dragons under the West Tower.

The mouse digs it out, the fox son digs it,

Out came Li Zicheng, the king of intruders,

Return to Henan for the third time to attack Beijing!

(First work: Kick Henan and punch Beijing)

The people of northern Shaanxi were proud of the birth of this hero in northern Shaanxi. They compared him to the birth of a dragon, and compared the feudal ruling class to mice and foxes: they bullied the people and dug holes everywhere like the sons of mice and foxes. Unexpectedly, they released Li Zicheng, the divine dragon suppressing the underground, rebelled against them! (The appearance of this wine song is related to a local folklore.) It is really "bold" to praise Li Zicheng as the pride of the Mizhi people and to dare to stand up to the ruling class. It expresses yearning and resistance to heroes, making this song immortal for hundreds of years and still shining brightly to this day.

Resistance comes in many forms. Northern Shaanxi folk songs express the rebellious mood of the working people under certain social conditions, which is a symbol of its progress. 

When the agrarian revolutionary struggle emerged in northern Shaanxi, the people of northern Shaanxi were no longer the tragic figures. They took up guns and fired fiercely at the ruling class. Their courage was like "coiling dragons and crouching tigers" : "The firepower of the Red Army is so strong that the White Army can't stand it" ②, "Don't let him come forward, don't let him come behind, close the door so that you can beat the dog", "Thousands of miles of thunder dodge, Our revolutionary power has developed greatly", "box guns, mortars, hit the enemy until the enemy has no place to hide, shout to the enemy to hand over the gun quickly", etc. 

Their high fighting spirit, swallowing up mountains and rivers, are completely different from the farmers before the Agrarian Revolution. Two people.

This is the contemporary nature of folk songs in northern Shaanxi. Timeliness is an important feature of realism and the essence of the typical environment provided by the work. The distinct characteristics of the era of northern Shaanxi folk songs are the embodiment of its strict realism.

Songs of complaint occupy a certain number of folk songs in northern Shaanxi. This is an ocean of tears. The "sad sound" of folk songs that people often refer to probably mainly refers to this type of song, right? "Walking to the West Exit" should be regarded as one of the best. It tells the story of a young doctor named Cai Changsheng who cured a girl named Iris. The two fell in love and got married. 

Not long after their marriage, due to a famine and lack of food and clothing, Cai Changsheng walked to the west entrance to make a living. The couple parted in tears. This song is very emotional and sincere. It is a rare ballad. Now there are more than 60 singing methods mastered. "Selling Dolls" tells the story of a man who escaped from famine and sold his two children during the great famine in northern Shaanxi in the 17th year of the Republic of China. Selling a child is not to make some money, but to find a way for the child to survive. 

The scene described in the song is very miserable: "It's really pitiful. I have no money. I measured two buckets of bran fried noodles, and a gust of wind blew them up to the sky." When selling the child, the father "drafted a five-year-old girl by the hand and held a three-year-old boy in his arms." , leaving this one and hugging that one, it’s so hard to call me! "It’s really miserable. These songs represent the tragedy of the lives of working people in feudal society.

Among the songs of complaint, the most common ones are those that describe the love and marriage experiences of working women. Such as "The Widow Has No End", "The Partner", "Lingwa and Chengwa", "Fifteen Birds", etc. Love is a natural reflection of human nature, but in a class society, this kind of human nature is often influenced by class relations and class consciousness. Therefore, the class relations and consciousness of society can often be seen through it. The situations described in some of the songs are very touching. 

For example, "Lingwa and Chengwa" tells the story of a pair of young people who fell in love, but because Chengwa had no money and the two families had different social status, it was difficult for the lovers to get married. Later, the girl Lingwa became pregnant, and Chengwa traveled hundreds of miles. 

I went to get abortion pills. On the way back, I heard the news that Lingwa had given birth. "The baby was born in a donkey pen, and the old sow took her to a pawn yard." Why did she go to the donkey pen to give birth? Afraid of being known. In the past, it was a big hurdle for a woman to give birth to a child. Regardless of the risk to her life, she went to the donkey pen to give birth, and the child she gave birth to was dragged into the yard by the pigs... It was a piece of the mother's body. Meat, when Lingwa sees her child become something for the old sow to tear up and play with, what kind of emotion will the mother feel? She no longer even has the right to care for her own flesh and blood!

If "Selling Dolls" reflects a certain state of social life, "Selling Wife" makes this state of life more in-depth. Gezi wrote about a poor farmer who had no land to farm and no farm tools, so he had to "rent two oxen and plant two autumn fields." However, the harvest in one year was only "two bushels of buckwheat". 

Not to mention supporting a family, even rent money is not enough. Life is hard to live, and the wife is worried and complains about her husband endlessly all day long. The husband was anxious, and because his wife kept nagging him, he became angry, "I'm going to sell you!" "I'll live without a wife for three lifetimes, and I won't regret it for five lifetimes." In this way, my wife was sold to someone else, and my two children were also taken away. The husband felt regretful and depressed. He squandered all the money he had earned and missed his relatives, but he "could no longer touch them."

It is undoubtedly the husband's fault that he treats his wife as a commodity and sells it so casually. This is not just a matter of temper and personality, but that he has long been poisoned by the feudal "husband's power" mentality. But the problem is not that simple. Being unable to pay the rent and having no plan for life are the root causes of the tragedy. Although this is different in form from Yang Bailao selling his daughter in "The White-Haired Girl", it is the same in that the tragedy ended due to exploitation and oppression.

Under the feudal system, working women suffered the most. Therefore, in the "ocean of tears" of northern Shaanxi folk songs, women shed more tears than men. 

The difference is that women's tears in life are often shed for themselves, but when reflected in literary and artistic works, they often become the tears of many people. This is of course also related to the development and spread of folk songs. Such as "Prostitute Complaint". Prostitutes, after all, are a minority in life and are "special people". This song shows the general through this special.

Gezi's nomination was a complaint, but she narrated the tragic experience of this prostitute in the first person; she was sold to a brothel at the age of thirteen. As a thirteen-year-old child, this was so devastating to her body and mind. Not only did she receive customers, but she also did hard work. "It's all about making money. 

If you can't make money, you're beaten." This kind of slavery caused her to quickly contract the disease. No one cared about her, and she lay in bed for seven days, and finally "went to the Wangxiang Tower". And what about after death? The old madam found two "stealers"①, wrapped her up in a reed mat, threw her into the moat, and buried her hastily. "The upper part of the body shows green silk hair, and the lower part of the body shows golden lotus." The work concludes by saying: