编者按：为了更好地进行中国文学海外传播工作，让中国作品在海外被发现（Discover）、被理解（Understand）、被传播（Express），中国文化译研网（CCTSS）邀请国内资深文学主编及文学评论家，精选出近两百部短中长篇小说，形成第一期《中国当代文学作品指南》（简称“指南”），从更具权威性、价值性的角度出发，更好地向世界展示中国当代文学精品，传播中国书香。

夏读书，日正长，打开书，喜洋洋。现将“指南”中的精品文学作品以一日一推的方式向读者呈现，让我们不负一夏好时光。

毕飞宇丨《哺乳期的女人》

推荐理由

这篇小说的艺术魅力不在于情节，而在于对琐碎生活的真切描摹，人性化的细节，譬如惠嫂给孩子喂奶时的动作、神态，旺旺的眼睛，刻画出一个精神受到伤害的孩子，对母爱既渴望亲近，又忧惧哀伤的复杂心理。表现出母爱匮乏的现实，对母爱的企盼。惠嫂看到孩子的受伤，表现出圣洁的情怀。这个故事，属于一种无事的悲剧，一种心灵的悲剧，弥漫着古典的伤感色彩。

《哺乳期的女人》主题源于作者多年前在浙江一个小镇的见闻，及与一位刚生孩子的同事拥抱的感受，实构与虚构兼有。

1995年5月，作者傍晚到达一个小镇，找旅馆的过程中，发现青壮年都到城里打工去了，只剩老人和小孩，且都不会说普通话。作者在一家装修不错的房子前见到一位老太太，老太太其它的话作者都没听懂，只听懂了一句话，她说自己有5个儿子，说这话时表情自豪。作者那一刻感到这种自豪背后的空洞，她那么多儿子，没一个在她身边。后来作者在《南京日报》的同事生完孩子回来，见面时发现同事身体变形了。拥抱一下，闻到母乳的香味。

作者经常想起那次奇特的拥抱，想到老太太说她有5个儿子那一幕，联想到中国空心化的小镇、中国社会形态出的问题。这个理性判断和洋溢着乳香味的拥抱记忆，还原了一个巨大的空洞。

构思就这么完成。作者拿起圆珠笔，两天内用时8个小时完成了这篇小说。

小说获首届鲁迅文学奖短篇小说奖。

Reviews

The appeal of this short story lies not in its plot, but rather in its faithful depiction of trivialities in life. Details emanating humanity are given, such as Wangwang’s eyes and the gestures and expressions sister-in-law Hui made when breastfeeding her baby, presenting a picture of a child who was psychologically traumatized and who was utterly desperate to have maternal love. It portrays a reality that is at once in dire paucity of motherly love and the yearning for it. In other words, it points up the sacredness of love.        

This story is a tragedy of nothingness and of the mind, fused with the classical hues of melancholy.    

The subject matter covered in the short story has its origins both in a situation the author experienced in a small town in the southeastern coastal province Zhejiang, and in his rather fresh experience of embracing his colleague who had just given birth to a baby. In other words, the story is both fictional and real.     

Back in May 1995 when the author got to a small town looking for a hotel to put up for the night, he found that the young and the middle-aged people had nearly all migrated to cities to do odd jobs. This resulted in leaving the old and the children behind and alone. Moreover, none of them could speak standard Chinese. The author saw an elderly woman in front of a decently decorated house. He could only understand one sentence she said, with full pride, which was that she had five sons. Behind her pride the author, however, sensed a sort of great vacuum at that moment. Although she had that many sons, none of them stayed around to take care of her. Later on, when the author met one of her female colleagues at Nanjing Daily who had just had a baby, he discovered that her body was bloated. When embracing her, he smelt the scent of this new mother’s milk. From then on, every now and then he recalled that unusual embrace, and the scene of the elderly mother mentioning her five sons. He associated them with the hollowed townships in China and with the issues concerning the social forms and structures in China. His rational judgment and the memory of the embrace brimming with the smell of milk finally filled up a gaping hole in his mind. He finished up the conception of this short story and immediately picked up a pen and brought the story to completion only with 8 hours in two days.

The story won him the first Lu Xun Literature Prize for Short Stories.        

作家简介

Author Profile

毕飞宇，男，1964年生于江苏兴化，1987年毕业于扬州大学文学院（原扬州师范学院中文系），获文学学士学位。作家，南京大学特聘教授，江苏省作家协会副主席。1980年代中期开始小说创作，2013年推出首部非虚构文学作品《苏北少年“堂吉诃德”》，2013年12月他的《大雨如注》获得人民文学奖短篇小说奖。《杨澜访谈录》将毕飞宇誉为“文字推拿师”，推拿时代的疼痛。

代表作品有《推拿》《哺乳期的女人》《青衣》《平原》《玉米》等，作品曾被译成多种文字在国外出版。

Bi Feiyu, writer and Professor of creative writing at Nanjing University, is currently serving as vice chairperson of the Jiangsu Writers Association. He was born in Xinghua County in 1964 and graduated from the Chinese Department of Yangzhou Normal College (which is now developed into and renamed as College of Literature, Yangzhou University) in 1987, where he obtained his BA degree. Since the mid-1980s he has been writing diligently and publishing in large amount. His first non-fictional work A Quixotic Youngster from Northern Jiangsu came out in 2013. The same year in December he published his short story The Downpour, which later came to win The Short Story Award conferred by the journal People’s Literature. In A Documentary of Yang Lan’s Interviews, Yang Lan being a nationally renowned anchorwoman, Bei Feiyu is lauded as “Masseur of Literature” who precisely pins down, and greatly alleviates, the pain of his era.

His representative works include Massage, The Woman in Lactation, The Moon Opera, The Plain, and Three Sisters (Yumi), etc. Quite a few of his works have been translated into foreign languages and published widely abroad.   

中文概要

Synopsis

旺旺出院后人瘦下去一圈。眼睛大了，眼皮也双了。嘎样子少了一些，都有点文静了。惠嫂说：“旺旺都病得好看了。”旺旺回家后再也不坐石门槛了，惠嫂猜得出是旺爷定下的新规矩，然而惠嫂知道旺旺躲在门缝的背后看自己喂奶，他的黑眼睛总是在某一个圆洞或木板的缝隙里忧伤地闪烁。旺爷不让旺旺和惠嫂有任何靠近，这让惠嫂有一种说不出的难受。旺旺因此而越发鬼祟，越发像幽灵一样无声游荡了。惠嫂有一回抱着孩子给旺旺送几块水果糖过来，惠嫂替他的儿子奶声奶气地说：“旺旺哥呢?我们请旺旺哥吃糖糖。”旺旺一见到惠嫂便藏到楼梯的背后去了。爷爷把惠嫂拦住说：“不能这样没规矩。”惠嫂被拦在门外，脸上有些挂不住，都忘了学儿子说话了，说：“就几块糖嘛。”旺爷虎着脸说：“不能这样没规矩。”惠嫂临走前回头看一眼旺旺，旺旺的眼神让所有当妈妈的女人看了都心酸，惠嫂说：“旺旺，过来。”爷爷说：“旺旺!”惠嫂说：“旺爷你这是干什么嘛!”但旺旺在偷看，这个无声的秘密只有旺旺和惠嫂两个人明白。这样下去旺旺会疯掉的，要不就是惠嫂疯掉。许多中午的阳光下面狭长的石巷两边悄然存放着这样的秘密。瘦长的阳光带横在青石路面上，这边是阴凉，那边也是阴凉。阳光显得有些过分了，把傍山依水的断桥镇十分锐利地劈成了两半，一边傍山，一边依水。一边忧伤，另一边还是忧伤。　　

　　旺爷在午睡的时候也会打呼噜的。旺爷刚打上呼噜旺旺就逃到楼下来了。趴在木板上打量对面，旺旺就是在这天让惠嫂抓住的。惠嫂抓住他的腕弯，旺旺的脸给吓得脱去了颜色。惠嫂悄声说：“别怕，跟我过来。”旺旺被惠嫂拖到杂货铺的后院。后院外面就是山坡，金色的阳光正照在坡面上，坡面是大片大片的绿，又茂盛又肥沃，油油的全是太阳的绿色反光。旺旺喘着粗气，有些怕，被那阵奶香裹住了。惠嫂蹲下身子，撩起上衣，巨大浑圆的乳房明白无误地呈现在旺旺的面前。旺旺被那股气味弄得心碎，那是气味的母亲，气味的至高无上。惠嫂摸着旺旺的头，轻声说：“吃吧，吃。”旺旺不敢动。那只让他牵魂的母亲和他近在咫尺，就在鼻尖底下，伸手可及。旺旺抬起头来，一抬头就汪了满眼泪，脸上又羞愧又惶恐。惠嫂说：“是我，你吃我，吃。别咬，衔住了，慢慢吸。”旺旺把头靠过来，两只小手慢慢抬起来了，抱向了惠嫂的右乳。但旺旺的双手在最后的关头却停住了。旺旺万分委屈地说：“我不。”　　

　　惠嫂说：“傻孩子，弟弟吃不完的。”　　

　　旺旺流出泪，他的泪在阳光底下发出六角形的光芒，有一种烁人的模样。旺旺盯住惠嫂的乳房拖着哭腔说：“我不。不是我妈妈!”旺旺丢下这句没头没脑的话回头就跑掉了。

When Wangwang left the hospital, he looked a bit more wasted than before. His eyes were wider with his eyelids double in size. His former state of perversity had lessened so much that he appeared tranquil and civil.  Hui the neighbor, who according to local customs was called “sister-in-law” by Wangwang, said, “Wangwang is getting a better look now after the recovery”. Wangwang, after coming back home, would no longer sit on the stone threshold of his house. This must be one of the new rules set by Wangwang’s grandfather, so Sister-in-law Hui believed. But she was also clear that Wangwang was hiding himself behind the opening of the door, peeping at her breastfeeding her baby. His dark eyes twinkling sorrowfully somewhere in a round hole or in a crevice of a wooden plank. That Wangwang’s grandfather kept him at bay from sister-in-law Hui upset her very much. Wangwang, in turn, behaved all the more surreptitiously, like a ghost drifting silently. Once carrying her baby in her arms, sister-in-law Hui came over to give several sweets to Wangwang. While mocking her baby’s tone saying, “Where is our elder brother Wangwang? We are now asking our brother Wangwang to eat sweets”. W angwang had hardly seen her when he hid himself behind the stairs of the house. Grandfather Wang stood in her way, saying sullenly and solemnly, “We cannot afford to have no rules for him”. Being kept outside of the door, she felt her face somewhat lost. She said, “Not a big deal, but a couple of candies”. She obviously had lost track of the fact that she had just before spoken in the vein of her own baby.                   

Before she went away, sister-in-law Hui cast a look at Wangwang who returned her look with his eyes that pained all mothers in the world. So sister-in-law Hui said, “Come over, Wangwang”. Grandfather, however, also said resolutely, “Wangwang!” Sister-in-law Hui retorted, “Look, grandfather Wang. What on Earth are you doing now?!” Wangwang was watching somewhere on the sly, and this silent secret was tacitly known only to Wangwang and sister-in-law Hui. Should the situation continue like this, either Wangwang or sister-in-law Hui would go crazy. Such secrets were hidden in silence on both sides of the narrow, yet long, stony alley in the sunlight on many a shiny afternoon. A long and lean strip of sunlight was crossing the road paved by dark blue stones; one side of it cool and the other cool too. The sunlight, utterly sharp, cut the Broken Bridge Town into two halves; one lying against the mountain, the other nearing the waters, one doleful, and the other doleful too.    

Grandfather Wang would snore when dozing off at noon. No sooner was he beginning to make the sound when Wangwang fled upstairs. He would lie down belly first on the plank, sizing up the opposite side of the house. It was on this very day that he was caught red-handed by sister-in-law Hui. Captured by the wrist, Wangwang was held motionless in awe and his face lost its color. “Don’t get scared! Follow me.” Hui said in a whisper. Wangwang was thus pulled up to the backyard of a grocery. Outside of it was a hill slope. On its surface the golden rays were spreading themselves everywhere. Large patches of greenery that were luxuriant, fertile, and very oily, were merely a full verdant reflection of the sun. Gasping hard, Wangwang, feeling a bit fearful, was wrapped up by Hui’s breast milk scent. Hui stopped and rolled up the clothes on the upper part of her body. Now before Wangwang’s eyes dangled her two huge and round breasts. Wangwang’s heart was broken into pieces by the milk scent, the mother of all scents as well as the noblest. Feeling Wangwang on the head, Hui murmured softly, “Eat. Eat.” Wangwang, however, dared not to. Now his spellbound mother seemed to be nearby, just under his nose, and available within his reach. Wangwang raised his head and immediately his eyes welled up with tears. His face was full of shame, confusion, and dread. Hui continued to press on, “It’s me. You eat mine. Eat. But do not bite. Hold it in your mouth. Eat slowly.” Wangwang tilted his head closer and slowly his two little hands raised and cupped the right breast. But the two hands halted at the last critical moment. “No, I can’t.” Wangwang said as if tremendously wronged.

Sister-in-law Hui said, “Little fool! Your younger brother can’t eat up all of mine.”  

Tears ran from of his eyes, giving off a six-angled light in the sun, and somewhat glistened brightly. Wangwang gazed at Hui’s breasts and said in a wailing tone, “I can’t. You are not my Mummy.” With such confusing words, he ran off swiftly.