This is a collection of miscellany. I lean toward calling it fiction, though some friends think it’s prose.
If you’re interested, take a look. If not, then don’t.
Please don’t try to match the people or events in these stories to real ones. Don’t ask whether this part is about this person or that part is about someone else. It isn’t! And if you think Fan Lin is the author writing about himself, you’re reading too much into it. How can any account of the past be completely factual? Even documentary literature and biographies involve some embellishment. If you know me, please don’t try to identify specific people.
Everything here is something I’ve seen or heard, and some of it is entirely made up. I simply want to use these words to show, from an observer’s perspective, a few small events in the lives of young people in the countryside of eastern Sichuan over the decades following the 1990s. It’s a big era, but these are little people. You won’t find grand upheavals, undying vows, or love lasting until the end of time. What major events could happen to ordinary people?
Some things mentioned here, such as the agricultural tax and the pig-slaughter tax, really existed. They have nothing to do with taking a political position, so please don’t read too much into them.
There are no good people, bad people, or enemies here. There are only characters.
People I’ve already written about, such as “Yang Tuozizi,” “Wang Tuozizi,” and “Yang Yunhua,” all have the right and the desire to pursue their own lives. I don’t want to write about death. People like “Lan Biaoniang” are all fighting to stay alive. I hope she can live her life again, and at least make it a little better than this time around.
