Heroes of the Greenwood

A Republican-era Northern School wuxia novel. If a story about blades and guns has no killing or hacking, readers say it is too tame. If there is too much slaughter, they say it is chaotic. Those with sharp tongues also have a quip or two: “He doesn't mind writing it, but does he ever think about whether the people fighting can take it?” Add a little magic and monsters, and they say it promotes superstition. Write about men and women now and then, and they say it offends public decency. Yet The Biography of the Immortals and Records of Strange Tales are full of absurdities, but no one has ever banned them. Dream of the Red Chamber and The Plum in the Golden Vase are not merely suggestive, they are downright lurid, yet they are called works by literary geniuses and assigned as textbooks. How are we supposed to explain that? As I see it, whatever its academic merit, fiction should at the very least help make up for what the state and society lack in criminal justice, governance, education, and law, and give people some sense of caution about what to embrace and what to reject. However clumsy the writing, its purpose should not stray from that. But reading is like watching a play: some people only pay attention to the seduction scene in Ma Siyuan, then curse the playwright for ruining the fun when the hero rides a donkey through the streets. That is simply their base nature. You could wrap them in the Book of Morality every day, and they would still kill, rob, and abduct men and women. They will never change until they feel the executioner's blade. Though I write wuxia, my aim is still to satirize and admonish society, and to promote loyalty, filial piety, and the principle that good is rewarded and evil punished. I also hope to encourage a little martial spirit. Whether it works is impossible to prove, and I dare not pass judgment. I can only borrow two sayings from the pharmacy: “No one sees the medicine being prepared,” and “Heaven knows the heart behind it.” That will have to do as my excuse.