周涛:文学既是我的生命也是我的信仰

来源:CCTSS

作者:罗雨静

2018-11-29

  编者按


  近年来,中国文化“走出去”的影响力不断扩大,在全球文化多元化发展日益兴盛的背景下,中国文化译研网(CCTSS)联合中国作家协会《小说选刊》杂志社,启动“新世纪中国当代作家、作品海外传播数据库”项目,将100位中国当代优秀作家的简介、代表作品以及展示作家风采的短视频翻译为10种语言,集结成1000张中国作家名片向全球推介。千张“作家名片”将鲜明地向世界宣告:我是中国作家,我在进行中国创作。


  此种形式和规模是中国故事走向世界的一大创新,会让世界更加全面、客观、公正地了解中国优秀作家作品,同时也是打通中国文化走向世界的“最后一公里”。


  周涛,男,曾用名周小涛。1946年3月15日出生于山西省潞城县马场村。现为中国作协名誉委员、新疆文联和作协名誉主席。十四岁时,周涛曾入选省乒乓球专业队为专业运动员,一年后主动要求退役。1969年,周涛毕业于新疆大学中语系(学习维吾尔语言文学); 1979年开始从事专业文学创作,1986年以诗集《神山》获全国第二届新诗(诗集)奖;1990年代后,周涛开始转为散文写作,出版《稀世之鸟》《游牧长城》《一个人和新疆》等多部散文集;1996年,其散文集《中华散文珍藏本·周涛卷》获全国首届“鲁迅文学奖·散文奖”。


  周涛是一个远离当代文化中心的孤本,他的散文多取材于西北边疆生活,开掘、张扬在极度艰难中谋求生存和发展的生命韧性,传达了一种真正的西部精神,格调雄壮冷峻,气势沉雄,意蕴深远,笔力雄健,给中国当代散文注入新鲜活力,拓展了广阔空间,因而曾被人们誉为 “南余(余秋雨)北周(周涛)”散文两大家。作家朱苏进评价周涛的写作,“写诗转向散文,是河流的水过于汹涌冲出了河道,变成湖泊”。


  周涛的长诗《山岳山岳,丛林丛林》是以中越边境自卫反击战为题材,被誉为“具有文学史意义的作品”。十三万字的长篇散文《游牧长城》,是解读中国两千年农耕民族与游牧民族斗争、融合的钥匙,被冯牧先生称为“一部奇书”。骏马、长城、河流等自然万物在周涛的散文中只是一个发端,借此表现的是作家对自然万物的感受和理解,以及作家对生命的体悟。可以说,“自我”是周涛散文中最刻意张扬的东西。在表达对生命的参悟时,周涛的视野相当开阔,由物及人,由人及民族,由民族及历史,由表及里的把这种思考提升至文化的层面,显现出作家在探索生命意义时所达到的深度。


  写了二十多年诗,周涛转身散文写作;写了三十年散文,在散文取得更高影响后,年过七十的他又一次转身,写起了长篇小说。《当代》杂志2018年第2期以头题推出了他的第一部长篇小说《西行记》,以自传的形式讲述了大学生姬书藤进入边疆生存生活的经历,有命运的变迁,也有心灵的成长。作品情感充沛,文字练达,细节丰富,描绘了一幅别具一格的边疆图景和人生轨迹。


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  周涛


  Zhou Tao


  Zhou Tao, who used to go by the name Zhou Xiaotao, was born on March 15, 1946 in Machang Village, Lucheng County, Shanxi Province. He is currently an honorary member of the China Writers Association, and an honorary chairman of the Xinjiang Federation of Literary and Art Circles. At the age of 14, Zhou Tao was selected to become a professional athlete in the provincial table tennis team but decided to retire one year later. In 1969, Zhou Tao graduated from the Chinese Language Department of Xinjiang University (reading Uyghur language and literature); and in 1979, he began to engage in professional literary creation. In 1986, he won the second national new poetry (collection) award with the poetry collection Shenshan; in the 1990s, he began to turn towards writing prose, publishing Rare Birds, Nomadic Great Wall, One Man and Xinjiang and many others; in 1996, his essay collection Chinese Prose Collection: Zhou Tao won the first “Lu Xun Literature Award for Prose”.


  Zhou Tao is far away from the center of contemporary culture. His essays are mostly based on life in the northwestern frontier. They dig up and publicize the resilience for life people have in extremely difficult conditions as they seek to survive and develop. The essays convey a true western spirit, and the style is magnificent, sober and grave, with profound meaning and strong pen power; it has injected fresh vitality into contemporary Chinese prose and expanded its vast frontiers. Therefore, a saying has arisen for two great prose writers “Yu (Yu Qiuyu) of the South and Zhou (Zhou Tao) of the North”. Writer Zhu Sujin evaluates Zhou Tao’s writing thusly: “When poetry turns to prose, it is the water of the river that rushes out of the river and becomes a lake.”


  Zhou Tao’s epic poem Mountain Mountain, Jungle Jungle is based on the Sino-Vietnamese border counterattack defensive war, and is known as “a work with literary history significance.” The 130,000-word essay The Great Wall of the Nomads is the key to interpreting the 2,000-year struggle and integration of China’s farming and nomadic people. It was called “a miraculous book” by Mr. Feng Mu. Natural things such as horses, the Great Wall, rivers and all things in nature are just the beginnings in Zhou Tao’s prose. This shows the writer’s feelings and understanding of nature and understanding of life. It can be said that the concept of the “self” is the most deliberately publicized thing in Zhou Tao’s prose. In expressing his understanding of life, Zhou Tao’s vision is quite broad. From the objects and the people, from the people to the nation, from the nation to the history, he takes this thinking from the inside and the outside to the cultural level. This shows the depths the writer reaches through exploring the meaning of life.


  After writing more than 20 years of poetry, Zhou Tao turned to prose writing; after writing 30 years of prose, after his essays reached a higher level of influence, he made another transformation after he reached the age of 70 and wrote a novel. In the second issue of Contemporary magazine in 2018, he published his first novel with the title Western Journey, telling the story of the student Ji Shuteng’s experience of living by the frontier in the form of an autobiography, writing about his changes of fate and the growth of his soul. The work is full of emotions and textual skill; it is rich in details, and depicts a unique frontier landscape and path of life. 

责任编辑:王爽