Rebirth 2004: A lone figure in the literary world

Chapter 384 Is This Realism?

“This paragraph is so well written!” In the editorial office, the editors were getting better and better at reading “The Last Lesson” and their progress was gradually becoming consistent.

What they discussed most was the performance and mental journey of the protagonist "Zhang Chao" in the last class. In this process, the author Zhang Chao described the characters' experiences and thoughts in great detail, integrating the past, present, reality, and memories into one.

【Chalk dust fell on the edge of the podium like a miniature avalanche. Zhang Chao's index finger joint pressed against the footer of "College Entrance Examination Classical Chinese Essays", and the sound was stuck on the word "guan" in "而世之奇伟、瑰怪、非常之观". More than forty dark heads below did not move. Two boys in the back row folded paper airplanes with test papers and threw them out of the window. As the wings of the paper airplanes passed over the concrete roofs next to the teaching building, they cast shadows like mayflies. The roof of one of the houses looked like it had been snowed heavily. The owner saw it and wanted to make trouble at the school again. The names were written on the test papers, so it was not difficult to check. When the time comes, just ask the class cadres and you will know which teacher did not manage the class well. But what does this have to do with Zhang Chao? He is leaving. Not to mention the two boys folding and throwing airplanes, as long as they don't jump out of the window themselves, everything has nothing to do with him.

He looked at the clock at the back of the classroom. There were still 10 minutes left before the get out of class ended. He opened his mouth to say something to the students, something that was not in the textbook, the exercises, or the test papers. He was a Chinese teacher, and his father was also a Chinese teacher. He had read a lot of exercises and reading questions on test papers since he was a child. Every once in a while, he would see a famous or unknown writer fondly recalling his childhood or teenage teachers, especially Chinese teachers. The Chinese teachers in these reading questions would say something so beautiful that it should be wrapped in gift paper, worthy of being written into their students' essays and then into their works. Zhang Chao's father was written into his work by his own students, although that student was only a member of the county writers' association and had never published an article outside of the internal publication. Zhang Chao's name had never been printed in lead type. Last year, he was ready to grit his teeth and spend 1600 yuan to buy two pages in a journal, but people told him that even if he had a paper, he would not be able to get the title this year.

Zhang Chao opened his mouth, and then heard his own 24-year-old voice seeping out from the pale green wall of the classroom - that year he stood on the podium for the first time, with a fountain pen that his father had personally inserted in the pocket of his white shirt, and every word on the lesson plan was written very thick and hard, like the stubble that had just emerged from his chin. At that time, a girl with a ponytail asked: "Teacher, can the scope of the dictation for the final exam be narrowed down a little?" He replied: "Knowledge is like river water, how can you only scoop a ladle?" The whole class began to applaud enthusiastically, and the girl with a ponytail looked at him with admiration. The starting point of his teaching career was like a match, the moment it was lit was the brightest, and the next sixteen years were a process of extinguishing. He began to think that the words were said by his father, and he was just sitting in the back of the classroom listening to the class, his eyes just above the desk surface, and his toes could not touch the floor of the classroom. If he said it, why didn't he remember the name "Ponytail"...】

Liu Pengtao's mouse wheel moved a little faster, and a colleague immediately protested: "I haven't even seen how many layers of content he wrote here, why are you in such a hurry? This is the "last lesson" in front of us, and the "first lesson" was sixteen years ago, in my father's class when I was a child..."

"And the father was written into the work by the students. I think this can also be regarded as a timeline. Let's see how it will develop later."

"Isn't there also a job title evaluation? This is indeed written a bit like a stream of consciousness, but not completely. Although Zhang Chao's thinking is very jumpy, the trigger point is still very clear. "

"Because he's not in the wandering state of Stephen Dediles (the protagonist of Ulysses), his thoughts are scattered, but he still has a clear focus."

"Okay, okay, hurry up and look - Xiao Liu, ignore them and slide down."

The editors read it attentively again -

【“Actually…” Zhang Chao let go of the textbook, and it fell to the podium with a plop, raising a cloud of chalk dust. “Today’s class is my last time…” Where was the last time he had dinner with Liu Mei? It seemed to be in the school cafeteria; it also seemed to be at home, but he brought the food back from the cafeteria. But it’s a bit too early to say ‘the last time’ now. He believes that Liu Mei will still return to Jiangcheng. There are still many of her things at home, a windbreaker worth thousands of yuan, a down quilt bought from a trip to Yunnan, a Dell laptop, and Zhou Liufu hardware bought when they got married. Do you want to have a ‘farewell dinner’ then? After all, they are husband and wife. It’s just that it’s hard to find a restaurant. Liu Mei doesn’t cook, but she has a chef’s tongue and can’t be fooled.

"Teacher!" Chen Min, the representative of the Chinese class, suddenly raised his hand, "Can we end the get out of class early? We have to do word dictation in the next English class." Zhang Chao didn't know what the relationship was between ending the get out of class early and doing English word dictation. The nice words he prepared were not opened by the students and were directly rejected at the door. "If you don't end the get out of class..." It was Wang Lei, the study committee member, "Just explain two more questions. I don't quite understand the fifteenth question of the second model test. Why '以' should be translated into '倚' here and not '通过'." Zhang Chao subconsciously said: "It depends on the context. '以' in this sentence..." After he finished explaining the questions to the students, it was already 10 o'clock in the evening. There were few lights in the rural school and they were dim. Going back to the teacher's dormitory required walking through a path surrounded by bushes. He was not afraid of the dark, but there were snakes in the bushes and he didn't bring a flashlight. Seeing his embarrassment, the head of the teaching and research group patted him on the shoulder and said: "Xiao Zhang, the most frightening thing about being a teacher is to think of yourself as a boat - you think you are ferrying others, but in fact you have already run aground."】

"It really is 'The Last Lesson'!" an editor exclaimed, "It is indeed a mirror image of Daudet's 'The Last Lesson'." The other editors nodded, and no one objected to this conclusion.

Daudet's "The Last Lesson" is a famous short story in the world - apart from the long and complicated historical entanglement between Alsace-Lorraine and France and Germany, and Daudet's slightly crooked butt - its structure is quite simple, but extremely inflammatory.

After reading this, readers will realize that it doesn’t matter if the people of Alsace-Lorraine speak German, the birds in the sky must speak French!
The image of the protagonist of the novel, Mr. Hamel, is deeply rooted in people's hearts. His affectionate words in class that "French is the most beautiful language in the world" and his tragic words "Long live France" on the blackboard before the end of get out of class have become classics in Daudet's novels.

This novel has been a required passage in Chinese language textbooks for many years, so almost everyone can recite a passage from it.

However, this short story "The Last Lesson" signed by "Zhang Chao" completely subverted the "typical teacher" established by "Hamail", pulled him down from the altar and gave him new flesh and blood.

The protagonist "Zhang Chao" also imagined that he could leave something for his students with his "last lesson", but the students didn't care.

At this moment, the sacredness surrounding the teaching profession has been eliminated, exposing an embarrassed, awkward, helpless, and even ridiculous individual teacher.

An editor laughed and asked, "How much does he dislike being a teacher?"

Another editor said: "Isn't his father a teacher? He probably has some psychological trauma!"

"So he's still studying at Yanshi University?"

“You don’t have to like being a teacher to study at a normal university!”

"Alright, alright, hurry up and read it. I think this novel is very valuable just from the character image. In previous literary works, few people would portray teachers like this!"

"Yes, in the past, teachers were portrayed as dying. They were either in the late stages of cancer but still insisting on teaching, or they died suddenly in class. How dare anyone write about a teacher like this! The leaders of the teaching staff committee would be furious if they saw it."

"If someone else wrote it, they might really get mad; but if Zhang Chao wrote it... I guess they can only bear it." "Yes, Zhang Chao himself is the child of a teacher, and graduated from Yanshi University... This is like exposing his own family's dirty laundry. Speaking of which, the evaluation of professional titles is really a hassle, and I don't know who came up with this dirty trick..."

"Shh..." An editor hushed and pointed to the editor-in-chief's office, meaning not to let the leader hear it.

After all, the evaluation of professional titles is a matter that happens in every public institution, and there are so many tricks involved that it has long been a huge mess. It even directly supports hundreds of half-dead academic journals at all levels, which all rely on page charges to survive.

What the editor didn't know was that Cheng Yongxin didn't care about them at all. He and Bi Feiyu were both immersed in the second half of the story of "The Last Lesson" and were deeply shocked.

The second half of "The Last Lesson" describes Zhang Chao's ups and downs in the ten years after he came to Shenzhen to work as a tutor. The bizarre and wonderful things in the life make both of them feel incredible.

In the novel, China's basic education, especially in big cities, fell into an almost crazy internal competition in the next ten years.

In order to make their children study longer and concentrate more, parents give their children psychiatric drugs, which are called "genius drugs". Ordinary weekend tutoring can no longer meet the needs of parents. They even ask teachers to live in their homes and "accompany" their children 24 hours a day...

Teachers in schools are no longer the job of graduates from normal universities. A large number of local and foreign PhDs have joined the teaching team. The "sea turtles" from Oxford and Cambridge fought tooth and nail for a primary school teacher position, but in the end, it was taken by an airborne Harvard professor...

Large-scale education and training institutions began to directly challenge public middle schools, and even poached their top students at high prices to serve as their signature. Public middle schools even gave up their own teaching and research, and turned to purchasing test papers and exercises from large-scale education and training institutions...

In the novel "The Last Lesson", a very strange but extremely accurate word was even invented to describe this phenomenon - "volume"!
In this environment, teachers are thriving, their incomes are rising rapidly, and earning a million a year is not a problem.

The protagonist "Zhang Chao" gradually shed the ignorance, arrogance and aloofness he had at school, and became mercenary, smooth and despicable.

He would encourage parents to buy "genius drugs" from him; he would report on competitors' studios; he would bribe public school teachers to "sell" their students to him.

In order to "retain students", Zhang Chao would even take boys to brothels.

This description completely broke through the cognitive bottom line of Cheng Yongxin and Bi Feiyu. They really couldn't imagine that there would be a teacher who would do such a thing -

[Zhang Chao walked in front, his leather shoes stepping through the puddles on the road in Xiasha Village, reflecting the distorted signs and flashing neon lights. The boy behind him pretended to be mature and put his hands in his pockets, but the frequency of swallowing saliva revealed his nervousness. His Adam's apple rolled up and down like a medicine grinder; the whites of his eyes were particularly blue in his wide eyes, as if a chick was about to break out of the shell. Was this how Liu Mei saw herself at the time? Zhang Chao couldn't remember, after all, it was a lifetime ago.

He thought that by hiding pornographic novels and comics on the bookshelf and wrapping them in "World Classics" covers, the most dangerous place would become the safest place. He didn't know that Zhang Chao had read many books and even remembered the thickness of most of them. Only men can understand the depression of teenagers, and only men can handle it best. Zhang Chao couldn't lose him. Not only for the 500 yuan fee for a class, but also because his father was a small leader in a senior high school. When he arrived in Shenzhen, Zhang Chao saw leaders as big or small. He gradually realized that officials are like money, the bigger the official, the more valuable it is, and the more things you can buy.

"Teacher Zhang..." The boy with black-framed glasses tugged at his sleeve, "I'm still a little scared. If my dad knew..."

"Know what?" Zhang Chao patted his shoulder, waving his phone in his hand, "It's time to sprint. There's a quarrel at home, so we're taking extra classes in the hotel, working on the questions all night. I just called him on video - your dad will only be touched." In the elevator, the mirror reflected a flushed face. Zhang Chao remembered that he was also at a loss when he rolled into bed with a woman for the first time. That woman was not Liu Mei. Zhang Chao did not become a man that night.

The moment the door opened, the smell of cheap perfume hit me. Three girls in sailor uniforms stood up, the lace edges on their knees like unhealed wounds. The oldest one held a lollipop in his mouth and glanced at the boy's school badge: "Wow, you're from a senior high school?"

The boy with black-framed glasses suddenly turned around and tried to leave, but Zhang Chao held his shoulder. He leaned close to the boy's ear and said in a sticky voice like honey, "After tonight, you will be a man."

Cheng Yongxin and Bi Feiyu put down the manuscripts in their hands at the same time, with a hint of confusion in their eyes.

"Harvest" magazine is in Shanghai, and both of them have studied and worked in BJ. They have seen how the elite parents in these two big cities are "competitive" in education, but they never thought it would be as "competitive" as in the novel.

Is the future really that crazy?
Everything seems so absurd, yet one cannot help but believe it, because every exaggerated description in it can be traced back to today's reality.

Cheng Yongxin asked uncertainly: "Is this...realism?"

(End of this chapter)