I’ve read one of Jia Pingwa’s more recent works,《自在独行》Walking Alone Freely, which was pretty solid, but I still haven’t read his most famous novel, 《废都》 Ruined City, which was banned for 13 years in China due to sexual content.
Anyway, I couldn’t love this little story any more. In it, you’ll sympathize with an inanimate object, wonder at the glory of the night sky, shake your head at your own small-mindedness, and wonder whether or not this constitutes satirical commentary on the art world or a jab at those who judge by appearances.
Some language stuff
The difficult language here mostly isn’t grammatically difficult, it’s just referencing stuff we don’t see in daily life outside of China, so it’s hard to imagine the scene, or it’s colloquial Chinese that doesn’t show up in the dictionary.
想以它垒山墙 – In paragraph two, the narrator is talking about ways the ugly rock was to be used, and he mentions that uncle “wanted to use it to lay (垒) the gables (山墙)”. I had to look up pictures of 山墙-style gables to understand what they were talking about, because western gables don’t require stone. Take a look, makes a lot more sense if you do.
洗一台石磨 – Same kind of thing here: this says, “to wash a millstone”. But “washing a millstone” doesn’t make sense in context. Turns out 洗 in this case does not mean “wash”. The process of making a millstone involves carving a pit out of rock and rinsing it off as you go. So, in the context of the story, this means “to make a millstone”.
我们这些做孩子的 – Colloquial Chinese, meaning “we kids”.
每每到了十五的夜晚 – Literally, “Every time it reached the 15 night.” Took me a sec to figure out what he meant by 十五, since he doesn’t say 十五日， or 十五天, but in context, he’s talking about the night of the full moon, so the “15” is in reference to the 15th of the month, or the middle of the month, around which time the full moon appears.
丑得不能再丑的丑石 – Also colloquial phrasing. Let’s break this one down real quick:
丑 – Ugly
得 – To the point that
不能 – Could not
再 – Again
丑的 – Ugly
丑石 – Ugly rock.
That’s a whole lot of ugly. This is equivalent to the English phrase “An ugly rock so ugly that it couldn’t be uglier.” You can use this phrasing with many different descriptors. “美不能再美” = “Couldn’t be more beautiful”, or “普通不能再普通” = “Couldn’t be more ordinary”.
以丑为美 – This construction is little difficult because both 以 and 为 have so many meanings in Chinese. In this case 以 means “on the basis of”, and 为 is “to be”. In English, we’d probably flip this around: “To attain beauty through ugliness”, or “To be beautiful because of one’s ugliness”.
If you want more Jia Pingwa, you can pick up Ruined City in Chinese or English.
《丑石》
我常常遗憾我家门前的那块丑石呢：它黑黝黝地卧在那里，牛似的模样；谁也不知道是什么时候留在这里的，谁也不去理会它。只是麦收时节，门前摊了麦子，奶奶总是要说：这块丑石，多碍地面哟，多时把它搬走吧。
于是，伯父家盖房，想以它垒山墙，但苦于它极不规则，没棱角儿，也没平面儿；用錾破开吧，又懒得花那么大气力，因为河滩并不甚远，随便去掮一块回来，哪一块也比它强。房盖起来，压铺台阶，伯父也没有看上它。有一年，来了一个石匠，为我家洗一台石磨，奶奶又说：用这块丑石吧，省得从远处搬动。石匠看了看，摇着头，嫌它石质太细，不太采用。
它不像汉白玉那样的细腻，可以凿下刻字雕花，也不像大青石那样的光滑，可以供来浣纱捶布；它静静地卧在那里，院边的槐荫没有庇覆它，花儿也不再在它身边生长。荒草便繁衍出来，枝蔓上下，慢慢地，竟锈上了绿苔、黑斑。我们这些做孩子的，也讨厌起它来，曾合伙要搬走它，但力气又不足；虽时时咒骂它，嫌弃它，也无可奈何，只好任它留在那里去了。
稍稍能安慰我们的，是在那石上有一个不大不小的坑凹儿，雨天就盛满了水。常常雨过三天了，地上已经干燥，那石凹里水儿还有，鸡儿便去那里渴饮。每每到了十五的夜晚，我们盼着满月出来，就爬到其上，翘望天边；奶奶总是要骂的，害怕我们摔下来。果然那一次就摔了下来，磕破了我的膝盖呢。
人都骂它是丑石，它真是丑得不能再丑的丑石了。
终有一日，村子里来了一个天文学家。他在我家门前路过，突然发现了这块石头，眼光立即就拉直了。他再没有走去，就住了下来；以后又来了好些人，说这是一块陨石，从天上落下来已经有二三百年了，是一件了不起的东西。不久便来了车，小心翼翼地将它运走了。
这使我们都很惊奇！这又怪又丑的石头，原来是天上的呢！它补过天，在天上发过热，闪过光，我们的先祖或许仰望过它，它给了他们光明，向往，憧憬；而它落下来了，在污土里，荒草里，一躺就是几百年了？！
奶奶说：“真看不出！它那么不一般，却怎么连墙也垒不成，台阶也垒不成呢？”
“它是太丑了。”天文学家说。
“真的，是太丑了。”
“可这正是它的美!”天文学家说，“它是以丑为美的。”
“以丑为美？”
“是的，丑到极处，便是美到极处。正因为它不是一般的顽石，当然不能去做墙，做台阶，不能去雕刻，捶布。它不是做这些玩意儿的，所以常常就遭到一般世俗的讥讽。”
奶奶脸红了，我也脸红了。
我感到自己的可耻，也感到了丑石的伟大；我甚至怨恨它这么多年竟会默默地忍受着这一切，而我又立即深深地感到它那种不屈于误解的寂寞的生存的伟大。