余秀華：從普通農婦到著名詩人

據《紐約時報》中文網8月21日報道，在中國，她已經成為讀者最多的詩人之一——甚至被稱為中國的艾米麗·迪金森(Emily Dickinson)——她41年生命的大部分時間都住在一棟磚房農舍里，門前有樹，周圍是麥田。

大多數日子，她會一腳深一腳淺地走過一條土路，到一個池塘去餵魚。她用一把不太順手的鐮刀割草，喂她的兔子。在房子旁的陰影里，她在一張低矮的桌子上寫作，努力控制她顫抖的身體——自從降生在中部省份湖北的這個村莊，她就一直忍受著腦癱的折磨。

然後，在2014年，她的生活改變了。

「大半個中國，什麼都在發生：火山在噴，河流在枯，一些不被關心的政治犯和流民，一路在槍口的麋鹿和丹頂鶴。

我是穿過槍林彈雨去睡你，我是把無數的黑夜摁進一個黎明去睡你。」

那一年，余秀華在她的博客上發布了這首《穿過大半個中國去睡你》，引發了轟動。她的詩歌被中國著名的文學雜誌《詩刊》的編輯劉年發現。劉年寫了關於她的文章，並轉載了她的作品，到2015年2月，她已經出版了兩本詩集：《搖搖晃晃的人間》和《月光落在左手上》，後者成為了30年來最暢銷的中國詩集。

一大批記者蜂擁到她的農舍，想要親眼見見這位把情慾熱望寫得如此生動的殘疾農婦。她被任命為附近鍾祥市的文聯副主席。劉年邀請她到北京的中國人民大學參加一個讀詩會，在那裡，她接受了《人民日報》、央視等國家新聞媒體的採訪。

去年，電影導演范儉拍了一部關於她的紀錄片《搖搖晃晃的人間》，她的另一部詩集《我們愛過又忘記》也出版了。今年，她第一次離開中國，出現在史丹佛和其他美國大學的電影放映會和研討會上。

「我覺得余秀華是中國的艾米麗·狄金森，出奇的想像，語言的打擊力量，」亞特蘭大莫斯洛特-加龍省學院(Morehouse College)的教授、專門從事中國文學和女性主義研究的沈睿在《月光落在左手上》的序言中寫道。

余秀華說她並不喜歡別人將自己和狄金森做比較，她從未讀過狄金森的作品。近日的一天下午，她在橫店的家中說，她對世界文學的了解有限。

余秀華在近30歲的時候開始寫詩，她說，在那之前，「我很少讀文學。2006年以後，我才開始在手機上看到更多的名著，但是在讀它們之前，我就知道如何寫作了。」

「我喜歡寫詩，因為它們簡單，沒有多少字，」她嘴巴抽搐著，斷斷續續地說道。「這適合我，因為我很懶。」

她現在和父親住在一棟新建的兩層樓房子，距離他們的舊農舍幾步之遙。最近一次村裡進行翻修的時候，大部分的老房子都被推平了，居民們搬到了新居，但出於對當地名人的尊重，她家老宅被保留下來。

她作為一個作家，通常會被貼上這樣的標籤：女性、農民、殘疾人，但她對自己的名聲和這些標籤並不在意。她還說自己對讀者的反應沒感覺。

「最重要的是，寫詩意味著面對我自己，並不是面對別人。」她說：「這是在表達我自己。無論他們響應我的詩與否，那是其他人的事。跟我無關。」

讀者的確做出了響應。在《穿過大半個中國去睡你》中，她寫道:

「睡你和被你睡是差不多的，無非是

兩具肉體碰撞的力，無非是這力催開的花朵。」

這首詩在網上引起了廣泛的討論，一些人譴責它淫穢，其他一些人卻稱讚它表達了一個主動「睡」別人的女性的女權主義聲音。

「她的詩，放在中國女詩人的詩歌中，就像把殺人犯放在一群大家閨秀里一樣醒目，」《詩刊》編輯劉年寫道。「別人穿戴整齊，塗著脂粉，噴著香水，白紙黑字，聞不出一點汗味，唯獨她煙熏火燎，泥沙俱下，字與字之間，還有明顯的血污。」

余秀華1976年出生於橫店，沒上完高中。19歲那年，她在父母的安排下，和一個年長她12歲的建築工人結婚。父母擔心她永遠都無法照顧自己。27歲那年，她開始寫詩。

「我需要做點事情來提神，」她說。「每天，我寫一兩首詩，就會有成就感。」

她的很多作品都是關於她的農村生活的。在一首有關她父親種的小麥的詩中，她寫道：「你的幸福是一層褐色的麥子皮，痛苦是純白的麥子心。」

她也經常以愛情和它帶來的混亂為主題寫詩。在《唯獨我，不是》中，她寫道：

「我相信他和別人的都是愛情。唯獨我，不是。」

前述電影導演范儉說：「你能在她的詩里讀出她不得不壓抑自己的慾望。她渴望愛情，但又感到害怕。她其實從來沒有經歷過真正的愛情。」

余秀華承認自己的婚姻不成功。「我當時太年輕了，不懂，」她說。「我不愛他。他也不愛我。我們的性格一點都不和。」

多年裡，她一直想離婚，但她丈夫不願意。她說，一個原因是經常去離家很遠的地方打工的丈夫回來後沒有其他地方可去。

去年，在收到大約九萬美元（約合60萬元人民幣）的版稅後，余秀華給他買了一處房屋，兩人離婚。他們的兒子在湖北省會武漢的一所大學上學。

「我母親一開始不高興，但後來就好了，因為她看到我真的很快樂，」余秀華說。不久後，她母親因癌症去世。

談到離婚後的生活時，余秀華說：「這是我最美好的時光。感覺很好。」但她對自己依然持否定態度。

「我真的長得難看，」她說。「所以找不到男朋友。」

暫時，她還有詩。

「詩歌是什麼呢，」她在《月光》的後記中寫道。「我不知道，也說不上來，不過是情緒在跳躍，或沉潛，不過是當心靈發出呼喚的時候，它以赤子的姿勢到來，不過是一個人搖搖晃晃地在搖搖晃晃的人間走動的時候，它充當了一根拐杖。於我而言，只有在寫詩歌的時候，我才是完整的，安靜的，快樂的。」

余秀華（GillesSabrié 攝）

English Version：

A Chinese Poet』s Unusual Path From Isolated Farm Life to Celebrity

HENGDIAN, China — The woman who has become one of China』s most-read poets — even hailed as its Emily Dickinson — spent most of her 41 years in a brick farmhouse tucked away behind trees and surrounded by wheat fields.

Most days she would limp down a dirt lane to a pond to feed the fish. She cut grass, grasping a sickle with hands that did not always obey her, to feed her rabbits. In the shade near the house she wrote at a low table, struggling to control her shaking body — a symptom of the cerebral palsy that she has lived with since she was born in this village in the central province of Hubei.

Then, in 2014, her life changed.

「Across China, everything is happening: volcanoes erupting, rivers running dry, prisoners and exiles are abandoned, elk and red-crowned cranes are under fire.

I brave a hail of bullets to sleep with you. I compress countless dark nights into one dawn to sleep with you.」

That year, Yu Xiuhua posted these lines from her poem 「Crossing More Than Half of China to Sleep With You」 on her blog and created a sensation. Her poems were discovered by Liu Nian, an editor at Poetry, a leading Chinese literary journal. Mr. Liu wrote about her and reprinted some of her works, and by February 2015 two volumes of her poetry had been published: 「In Such a Staggering World」 and 「Moonlight Drops on My Left Hand.」 The latter became the best-selling book of poetry in China in 30 years.

Swarms of journalists descended on her farmhouse, eager to see for themselves the disabled peasant woman who wrote of erotic longing with such startling vividness. She was appointed deputy chairwoman of the Federation of Literary and Art Circles in the nearby city of Zhongxiang. Mr. Liu invited Ms. Yu to a poetry reading at Renmin University of China in Beijing, where she was interviewed by People』s Daily, CCTV and other national news outlets.

Last year saw the release of a documentary about her, 「Still Tomorrow,」 by the filmmaker Fan Jian, and the publication of another volume of poetry, 「We Forget That We Loved.」 This year she left China for the first time, appearing at Stanford and other American universities for film showings and seminars.

Before she began writing poetry in her late 20s, she said, 「I rarely read literature. I only started to read more famous works on my mobile phone after 2006. But I knew how to write before I read.」

「I like writing poems, because they』re simple and don』t have many words,」 she said, speaking haltingly as her mouth twitched. 「This suits me because I』m lazy.」

She now lives with her father in a newly built two-story house, a short walk from their old farmhouse. A recent village renovation razed most of the old buildings and moved residents into new housing, but her family home has been preserved as a tribute to a local celebrity.

She shrugs off the fame and the labels usually applied to her as a writer: female, peasant, disabled. She claims to be indifferent to readers』 reactions.

「Writing poems means facing myself, first and foremost, not facing others,」 she said. 「It』s to express myself. It』s other people』s business whether they respond to my poems. It has nothing to do with me.」

And they have responded. In her 「Crossing More Than Half of China to Sleep With You,」 she goes on to say:

「There is little difference between me sleeping with you, and you sleeping with me.

It』s no more than a collision of two bodies, composing a force under which the flowers blossom.」

The poem was widely discussed online, with some condemning it as lewd, while others praised it for channeling the feminist voice of a woman taking the initiative to 「sleep with」 others.

「Her poems, among contemporary Chinese poems, are like putting a murderer among a group of respectable ladies,」 wrote Mr. Liu, the Poetry editor.

「Everybody else wears fancy clothes, puts on makeup and perfume and readers can』t see a single bead of sweat. But hers are full of smoke and fire — and mud and landslides. Her words are stained with blood.」

Born in 1976 in Hengdian, Ms. Yu never finished high school. At 19 she married a construction worker 12 years older, in a wedding arranged by her parents, who were concerned that she would never be able to care for herself. At 27, she began writing poetry.

poem 「I Am Not Alone」:

「I believe what he has with others is love. It』s only with me that it』s not.」

Mr. Fan, the filmmaker, said: 「You can read in her poems that she has to suppress her desires. She longs for it, but she』s afraid. She』s never really experienced true love.」

Ms. Yu concedes her marriage was not successful. 「I was too young and didn』t understand it,」 she said. 「I didn』t love him. He didn』t love me. Our characters weren』t at all compatible.」

For years, she wanted a divorce, but her husband refused. One factor, she said, was that her husband, who often lived far from home as a migrant worker, had nowhere else to return to.

Last year, after Ms. Yu received about $90,000 in royalties from her books, she bought a house for him, and the two divorced. Their son attends a university in Wuhan, Hubei』s capital.

「My mother wasn』t happy at first, but she was all right later, because she saw I was really happy,」 Ms. Yu said. Not long afterward, her mother died of cancer.

Ms. Yu said of life after her divorce: 「This is my best time. I feel great.」 She is still scathingly self-critical, though.

「I』m really ugly,」 she said, 「so I can』t find a boyfriend.」

For the moment, she has her poems.

「What is poetry?」 she wrote in an epilogue to 「Moonlight.」 「I don』t know and can』t tell. It』s when my heart roars, it emerges like a newborn. It』s like a crutch when one walks unsteadily in this unsteady world. Only when I write poetry do I feel complete, at peace and content.」

Correction: August 21, 2017

An earlier version of this article misstated the location of Wuhan. It is in Hubei Province, not Hebei.

國際文藝范兒塵雪（Wenyifanerchenxue）

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