"A Madman's Diary" by Lu Xun

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

Although I've been wanting to be a writer for a long time, I've always found myself constantly feeling....uneasy about my writing. I want to write, I have ideas, and I even attempt them....but something always seems off. Maybe a little 'dishonest', like I'm actively trying to write for just the audience instead of both the audience and myself.

Then I read this.

This is the famous short story by Chinese author Lu Xun that basically kick-started all of modern Chinese literature. It was written in the Chinese vernacular, in a simple style, so that anyone with basic literacy could read it. This tale kick-started the New Culture Movement, which would lead to the May Fourth Movement, the founding of the Communist Party of China, and eventually the civil war and founding of the PRC, who would enshrine him as the perfect model of a Marxist-Leninist author (although Lu Xun was never a party member).

I had an epiphany after reading this story. For one thing, I learned that one can write simply, and still have layers of complexity in their work. One can write a single sentence and have it have the meaning of five sentences. One can take a single metaphor, and give it the meaning of many metaphors.

I also learned that subtlety can be overrated. The metaphor of cannibalism and exploitation is nothing if not blindingly obvious. The fact that he had to put it into the mouth of a madman only makes the metaphor that much more obvious.