Read Online Dream of Ding Village by Yan Lianke - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Yan Lianke
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appointment with the higher-ups to ask for a food subsidy. Just say the word and I’ll get you anything you need. And if you don’t think I’m working hard enough on your behalf, you can go to my sons’ houses and poison their pigs, their chickens, and any children they have left.’
‘I might as well tell you the truth,’ Grandpa continued. ‘The higher-ups never said there were any new medicines that could cure the fever. What they told me is that the fever is really AIDS, and that it’s a contagious disease, like the plague. Even the government doesn’t have a cure. It’s a new disease, and once you get infected, it’s fatal. If you’re not afraid of passing it on to your families, you can stay at home with them. But if you’re worried about infecting them, you are welcome to come and live at the school, and leave your families at home where they will be safe.’
Grandpa paused for a moment and scanned the crowd of villagers. Just as he was about to continue his speech, there was a thudding sound behind him, like a wooden pillar crashing on stage. Grandpa turned around to see that Ma Xianglin had toppled from his stool, his neck twisted at an unnatural angle, his face as white as a funeral scroll. His fiddle lay on the ground beside him, its strings still vibrating from the fall.
When Grandpa had announced that there weren’t any new medicines, Ma Xianglin had collapsed. Tiny streams of blood trickled from his mouth and nostrils.
The schoolyard filled with the stench of blood. Ma Xianglin was gone. He had died on the only stage where he had sung.
3
Grandpa helped Ma Xianglin’s wife make the burial arrangements. He even commissioned an out-of-town artist to paint a portrait of the musician. The artist, of course, knew nothing about the fever that had hit Ding Village, and Grandpa didn’t bother to tell him. The funeral portrait was a scroll painting showing Ma Xianglin with his eyes closed, immersed in his music, giving the performance of a lifetime to an enormous audience. Thousands of people watched in fascination, listened in rapture as Ma Xianglin sang his songs and played his fiddle. The portrait was crowded with faces. Peopleperched on the wall of the schoolyard or high up in the branches of trees. It was quite a crowd, a sea of humanity. It resembled a temple fair, with vendors plying the crowds, selling sweet potatoes and candied apples on sticks. The portrait looked like a fun place to be.
At the funeral, they rolled up the scroll and placed it in Ma Xianglin’s coffin, alongside his beloved fiddle.
That was how they buried Ma Xianglin, with his favourite instrument and his finest moment.
Then they nailed down the coffin and put him in the ground.
VOLUME 3
CHAPTER ONE
1
After Ma Xianglin’s funeral, the sick began flocking to the village school. Some came just for their meals; others moved in for good.
Winter came, and with it the cold, and the first snowstorm. It fell with a fury, as thick as goose down, carpeting everything in white. The world turned white almost overnight. The plain became a sheet of crisp white paper upon which the villages were sketched, with people and animals dotting the landscape.
As the weather grew colder, sick villagers with nowhere else to go were only too glad to move into the village school. What had once been an elementary school and before that, a temple dedicated to Guan Yu, the Chinese god of good fortune, now became a hospice for people with the fever. The coal, firewood and kindling formerly used to heat classrooms now warmed makeshift dormitories, drawing even more sick villagers to the school.
One day, during a visit to the school, Li Sanren, the former village mayor, whose fever had become quite serious, decided he didn’t want to go home. Li Sanren had been living at home with his wife. Although she cooked his meals, made his bed, washed his clothes and boiled his medicinal herbs, he found her standard of care lacking.
‘Professor Ding,’
‘I might as well tell you the truth,’ Grandpa continued. ‘The higher-ups never said there were any new medicines that could cure the fever. What they told me is that the fever is really AIDS, and that it’s a contagious disease, like the plague. Even the government doesn’t have a cure. It’s a new disease, and once you get infected, it’s fatal. If you’re not afraid of passing it on to your families, you can stay at home with them. But if you’re worried about infecting them, you are welcome to come and live at the school, and leave your families at home where they will be safe.’
Grandpa paused for a moment and scanned the crowd of villagers. Just as he was about to continue his speech, there was a thudding sound behind him, like a wooden pillar crashing on stage. Grandpa turned around to see that Ma Xianglin had toppled from his stool, his neck twisted at an unnatural angle, his face as white as a funeral scroll. His fiddle lay on the ground beside him, its strings still vibrating from the fall.
When Grandpa had announced that there weren’t any new medicines, Ma Xianglin had collapsed. Tiny streams of blood trickled from his mouth and nostrils.
The schoolyard filled with the stench of blood. Ma Xianglin was gone. He had died on the only stage where he had sung.
3
Grandpa helped Ma Xianglin’s wife make the burial arrangements. He even commissioned an out-of-town artist to paint a portrait of the musician. The artist, of course, knew nothing about the fever that had hit Ding Village, and Grandpa didn’t bother to tell him. The funeral portrait was a scroll painting showing Ma Xianglin with his eyes closed, immersed in his music, giving the performance of a lifetime to an enormous audience. Thousands of people watched in fascination, listened in rapture as Ma Xianglin sang his songs and played his fiddle. The portrait was crowded with faces. Peopleperched on the wall of the schoolyard or high up in the branches of trees. It was quite a crowd, a sea of humanity. It resembled a temple fair, with vendors plying the crowds, selling sweet potatoes and candied apples on sticks. The portrait looked like a fun place to be.
At the funeral, they rolled up the scroll and placed it in Ma Xianglin’s coffin, alongside his beloved fiddle.
That was how they buried Ma Xianglin, with his favourite instrument and his finest moment.
Then they nailed down the coffin and put him in the ground.
VOLUME 3
CHAPTER ONE
1
After Ma Xianglin’s funeral, the sick began flocking to the village school. Some came just for their meals; others moved in for good.
Winter came, and with it the cold, and the first snowstorm. It fell with a fury, as thick as goose down, carpeting everything in white. The world turned white almost overnight. The plain became a sheet of crisp white paper upon which the villages were sketched, with people and animals dotting the landscape.
As the weather grew colder, sick villagers with nowhere else to go were only too glad to move into the village school. What had once been an elementary school and before that, a temple dedicated to Guan Yu, the Chinese god of good fortune, now became a hospice for people with the fever. The coal, firewood and kindling formerly used to heat classrooms now warmed makeshift dormitories, drawing even more sick villagers to the school.
One day, during a visit to the school, Li Sanren, the former village mayor, whose fever had become quite serious, decided he didn’t want to go home. Li Sanren had been living at home with his wife. Although she cooked his meals, made his bed, washed his clothes and boiled his medicinal herbs, he found her standard of care lacking.
‘Professor Ding,’
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