Many years ago, I picked up a book at a stall called The Secret Diary of Pushkin. It opened with his duel against Dantès, but by the end it said the duel was set for tomorrow. The book recorded his state of mind before the duel, and it was also packed with details about Pushkin’s private life. It was messy, absurd, and essentially a sexual history of Pushkin.
I was thoroughly stunned. The Pushkin in my mind was the poet who wrote If Life Deceives You. I simply could not imagine him writing all that in such complete and explicit detail. Some years later, I learned that the book was basically a forgery, and I sold it as scrap.
That memory came back to me just now, after I finished Ji Xianlin’s Tsinghua Garden Diary. This book has none of the steady, proper tone of other publications. Instead, it is full of complaints, confusion, emptiness, anger, anxiety, and effort.
Here are several entries from 1934:
1 January
The day before yesterday I heard that Ta Kung Pao had written to Wu Mi saying that the Literature Supplement would be discontinued next year. Absolutely outrageous. Even though I was part of the supplement, I always thought it was no good. But still, even if I think it is no good, the newspaper office should not act like this. This is pure merchant behavior.
6 January
Almost all the well-known figures in Beiping’s literary world showed up. Some looked like barbers, some like thugs, some like politicians, some like convicts. Some called out to everyone and tried to recognize people; some stared upward and ignored everyone. They gathered in groups of two or three and talked enthusiastically.
26 January
The grades are almost all out, and I am really angry. For several courses I could never have imagined getting such poor marks. These professors are simply bastards, acting arbitrarily.
13 March
Did nothing meaningful today — damn it, these bastard professors not only discourage themselves, they also test us all day long. If it is not you testing me, it is me testing you. What the hell are they testing?
25 March
It is to be expected that people like Ba Jin look down on us. But when did we ever look up to them?
23 April
Classes started. And as soon as classes start, as usual, here they come again: paper, reading report, test... damn it, a whole pile, a whole string of them. Did I come here to study?
17 May
I have no other hope in this life than to sleep with more women and come into contact with women from different places.
30 May
Now I know what friends are! What kind of thing is this? I do not want a single damn friend anymore. Why am I not looked up to by others?
This book is one hundred percent genuine. It is said that the editor at the time suggested cutting some of the blunt passages that would damage his image, but the old gentleman insisted that not a word be changed. So we are lucky enough to see some of the ‘negative energy’ and the lines we find hard to say out loud, and to see the raw mentality and moods of a young university student. The old gentleman’s courage should make people like me, who keep ourselves wrapped in protective cases all the time, ashamed. Perhaps that is what it means to have no desires and therefore no weakness.