Gao Xing-Jian

GAO Jian-INS (p. 1940) - Chinese writer, novelist, translator, playwright, painter. Nobel Prize in Literature 2000.
Born January 4, 1940 in the province of Ganzhou in East China. Father - a clerk in a bank, his mother was fond of amateur theater, and instilled in his son an interest in Western literature and drama. As a child, he studied drawing, playing the violin, I tried to write.

After high school, Gao Xing-Jian studied French language and literature at the Institute of Foreign Languages in Beijing. In early 1960 his mother was sent to work in the countryside, where the accident had drowned. His first literary experience - novels, plays and articles - in the years of the Cultural Revolution, the future writer had to be destroyed. He was sent to a labor camp, where 6 years he worked as a farmer in the fields. Even in the most difficult time he secretly continued to write, not hoping someday to publish.

Upon returning to Beijing, worked as a translator in the Chinese Writers Association, became the official playwright of Beijing People's Art Theater. In 1978 was published his first story. In 1979, the first time he went abroad - to France and Italy. In 1980-1987 in the Chinese literary magazine published his short stories, essays and plays. In China, were published 4 books: "A preliminary discussion of the art of modern fiction" (1981), "Dove on behalf of the Red Beak" (1985), "Collection of Pieces" (1985), "In search of modern forms of dramatic presentation" (1987).

Several experimental pieces Gao, written partly under the influence of Brecht, in part - from Artaud and Samuel Beckett, were placed in the Theater of Folk Art in Beijing. The debut production of "alarm" (1982) was a great success. Absurdist drama "Bus Stop" (1983) recalls Beckett's play "Waiting for Godot" - a satirical parody of how a group of people over 10 years, all the waiting and waiting for the right bus. The play was subjected to adverse criticism in the press and the government was dismissed as slander intellectual perversion. The play "The Savages" (1985) also provoked heated debate. Dramaturgy Gao Xing-Jian, united the elements of the ancient theater masks and Western modernism

Summer of 1982 began work on his major work - the novel "The mountain spirits". In the 1980 attack on his work was going on - play the "Other Shore" was banned in 1986, others were not allowed on the stage. It was a difficult period - Gao said that he was suffering from lung cancer - a diagnosis was not confirmed later. In order to distract and avoid persecution, he went almost a year to hike on deaf Chinese provinces along the banks of Yangtze River from its source to the sea.

In 1987, he was allowed to go abroad. He left China as a writer 'black list' and soon settled in France as a political refugee. Here he continued to write in Chinese, French, living in the shadows and obscurity, earning a living as an artist.

After the events at Tiananmen Square in 1989 came from the Chinese Communist Party. And after the public condemnation of the actions of the authorities the door to his home has been closed.

In the play "Runaways," written for the theater center in Los Angeles, but the set later in Germany, the shooting in Tiananmen Square was replaced by the events in Nazi Germany. His works were not published in China, the play banned, but enjoyed great success in Hong Kong and Taiwan. In 1998, Gao Xing-Jian became a citizen of France.

The most famous work - impressionistic novel pilgrimage "Mountain Spirits" (1989), consisting of 81 chapters - based on impressions from trips to the southern and south-western China. Here still alive shamanistic rituals, legends of outlaws sound like the truth, and you can meet with these Taoist - supports age-old wisdom. His travel experience - meeting with the peasants and Taoist sages - help the writer to a new understanding of themselves, to feel inner freedom and find your own attitude.

The novel is complex in form, it uses various literary styles, techniques. The author wrote: "In my solitude I have no cure, so as a partner for conversation, I can only consider himself '. His 'I' is crushed, divided, vzaimootrazhaetsya. 'I', 'you', 'he', 'it' signify its various internal states. Perhaps this author's style derives from the enthusiasm Gao theater and drama. In the plays he is often put before the actors get used to the role of the task and simultaneously talk about what is happening as if from outside.

One of the main reasons for the book, as Gao and creativity in general - a skeptical attitude toward conventional and authoritarian views: 'On the history, history, history of: History can be read in different ways, and it - major discovery'.

In English: "The mountain spirits" was published in 1999.

According to the Swedish Academy, awarding Gao Xing-Jiang for "Mountain Spirits" in 2000 the Nobel Prize, the novel 'is one of those brilliant works that are outside the literary tradition, they can only be compared with the same self'. Receiving the Nobel Prize Gao rated as 'support of the Chinese writers, Chinese literature, Chinese people'. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs also saw in this event was a political maneuver that does no credit to China.

In a small essay, "My view of the writer's work" (2000) Gao rejected the idea of 'duty of literature to the masses', he believes that 'literature has nothing to do with politics, it's a pure matter of individual personalities'. Literature, which does not fight for social progress, and focus on internal, deeply spiritual process, he proposed the name 'cold literature'.

In the autobiographical "Bible of one man" (2000) Gao describes the Cultural Revolution in China Eyewitness. Many voice of the narrator, as it was in "Mountain Spirits", is now reduced to three basic: 'you' (the author himself), 'he' (his old friend) and 'it' (female).

Gao Xing-Jian - a well-known graphic artist (ink and watercolor). He has held 30 international exhibitions, he makes the illustrations for their own books. Gao and known as a translator - wrote equally well in both Chinese and French. He translated into Chinese Beckett, Ionesco, Brecht and Artaud.

Total wrote 18 plays, 4 collection of literary criticism and 5 novels. He was awarded the title of Chevalier of the Order of Arts of the French Government (1992), Prize of the French Community of Belgium (1994) and others.

Creative and life path Gao - a bright example of mutual influence of cultures in the modern world.