“The Man Who Achieved Nothing”:
During the May Day holiday, I went back to my rural hometown to help my father handle the sale of our homestead.
Our neighbor, Zhang Lian, had died. He wasn’t even forty.
I’d admired him as a child. He was gentle and knew a lot, and he was the first person in the village to get into a prestigious university. But he suffered a mental breakdown and was expelled less than six months after enrolling. From then on, his life went downhill.
He often had episodes. He might smash things, or sit completely motionless. Even his new bride called off the wedding on the day itself when he had an episode. My childhood admiration gradually turned into a little fear.
“The Village Opera Stage”:
The story takes place long ago. There was an opera troupe on North Street. When they were busy, they worked in the fields; when they had free time, they traveled from village to village performing.
On West Street lived a brother and sister. The sister was called Jinghua, and the younger brother Jingdong. Their parents had died early, and everyone who knew them couldn’t help but feel sorry for them.
Jinghua joined the troupe and learned to sing opera from childhood. She went from performing as a backdrop extra to taking small supporting roles, then grew into a one-of-a-kind leading lady.
Even as she shone brightly herself, the person who shone brightest in her eyes was still the young man who, on a moonlit night in those days, stood beside a candle and read aloud in a gentle voice.
“Yongli and Yongli”:
Fourteen-year-old Peng Yongli didn’t care about dressing up. She wore her hair in a low ponytail every day. Her mother had run away, and her father had remarried and gone to the city to make a living, leaving her in the countryside to be raised by her grandfather.
One day, a woman from out of town came to stay with the family. She was strange, with no clear background or known name, and seemed able to read minds. She knew all sorts of things about Yongli.
The woman could play badminton, knew that Yongli was writing a novel, and even offered advice on where the story should go.
