Of all the essays Chinese students read in school, this might be the one they remember longest. 《背影》, or My Father’s Back, is barely 1,500 characters, and almost nothing happens in it. A young man is leaving his hometown after his grandmother’s funeral. His father insists on seeing him off at the train station. That’s the essay. But the author describes the scene in a simple, beautiful way that encapsulates a father’s love for his son.
The author, Zhu Ziqing (朱自清, 1898–1948), was 27 when he wrote it. By then he’d already done a lot of living: he’d grown up in Yangzhou in a declining literati family, watched his father lose his official post, studied philosophy at Peking University during the upheaval of the May Fourth Movement, and just taken a professorship at Tsinghua. He would later become known as one of the great prose stylists of his generation. But none of that fame had happened yet when he sat down to write about his father.
A quick note on what kind of writing this is. The genre is called 散文 (sǎnwén), which gets translated as “prose” or “essay” but is really its own thing in Chinese literature. Sanwen isn’t quite the personal essay you’d find in The New Yorker, and it isn’t memoir or criticism either. It’s a loose, lyrical form. Sometimes it’s a memory, sometimes a description of a place, sometimes a meditation, but in each case, the writer’s voice and feeling matter more than argument or plot. Sanwen has roots going all the way back to classical Chinese prose, but in the early 20th century writers like Zhu Ziqing reinvented it, making it intimate and modern. It’s the genre Chinese readers turn to when they want something short, beautiful, and heartfelt.
Beiying was written in 1925, smack in the middle of one of the most interesting linguistic moments in Chinese history. The May Fourth Movement of 1919 had pushed writers to abandon classical Chinese (文言文) and write in the spoken vernacular (白话文) instead — the language ordinary people actually used. It was a real revolution, where the younger generation pulled writing out of the hands of the rarified elite, and made it accessible for everyone. But the shift didn’t happen overnight, and writers of Zhu’s generation grew up steeped in classical texts even as they were inventing modern prose. So, in a lot of works published around 1919-1940, you get this fascinating in-between texture where a lot of the words are modern Chinese, but some of the words are classical still. The first novel I ever read start-to-finish in Chinese, 《边城》 by Shen Congwen, was written around this time, and I chose that novel without realizing it – I learned quite a lot. In Beiying, most of the essay is clean, simple modern Chinese, but it’s salted with classical phrases, and a whole letter from the father quoted in classical Chinese near the end. For an advanced learner, this is part of what makes the essay so worth reading.
One phrase in there I find worth pointing out: 天无绝人之路 translates directly as “Heaven never bars a man’s way”, but I would perhaps more directly translate this as some mix of “there’s always a way through a difficulty” and “God never gives you more than you can handle.”
Key vocab
祸不单行 – huò bù dān xíng – misfortunes never come alone
狼藉 – lángjí – in disorder, in a mess
踌躇 – chóuchú – to hesitate, to be indecisive
蹒跚 – pánshān – to stagger, to shuffle along
迂 – yū – old-fashioned, pedantic
颓唐 – tuítáng – dejected, dispirited, declining
情不能自已 – qíng bù néng zì yǐ – unable to control one’s emotions
惦记 – diànjì – to think of, to be concerned about
晶莹 – jīngyíng – sparkling, glistening
背影
我与父亲不相见已二年余了，我最不能忘记的是他的背影。
那年冬天，祖母死了，父亲的差使也交卸了，正是祸不单行的日子。我从北京到徐州，打算跟着父亲奔丧回家。到徐州见着父亲，看见满院狼藉的东西，又想起祖母，不禁簌簌地流下眼泪。父亲说：“事已如此，不必难过，好在天无绝人之路！”
回家变卖典质，父亲还了亏空；又借钱办了丧事。这些日子，家中光景很是惨澹，一半为了丧事，一半为了父亲赋闲。丧事完毕，父亲要到南京谋事，我也要回北京念书，我们便同行。
到南京时，有朋友约去游逛，勾留了一日；第二日上午便须渡江到浦口，下午上车北去。父亲因为事忙，本已说定不送我，叫旅馆里一个熟识的茶房陪我同去。他再三嘱咐茶房，甚是仔细。但他终于不放心，怕茶房不妥帖；颇踌躇了一会。其实我那年已二十岁，北京已来往过两三次，是没有什么要紧的了。他踌躇了一会，终于决定还是自己送我去。我再三劝他不必去；他只说：“不要紧，他们去不好！”
我们过了江，进了车站。我买票，他忙着照看行李。行李太多了，得向脚夫行些小费才可过去。他便又忙着和他们讲价钱。我那时真是聪明过分，总觉他说话不大漂亮，非自己插嘴不可，但他终于讲定了价钱；就送我上车。他给我拣定了靠车门的一张椅子；我将他给我做的紫毛大衣铺好座位。他嘱我路上小心，夜里要警醒些，不要受凉。又嘱托茶房好好照应我。我心里暗笑他的迂；他们只认得钱，托他们只是白托！而且我这样大年纪的人，难道还不能料理自己么？我现在想想，我那时真是太聪明了。
我说道：“爸爸，你走吧。”他往车外看了看，说：“我买几个橘子去。你就在此地，不要走动。”我看那边月台的栅栏外有几个卖东西的等着顾客。走到那边月台，须穿过铁道，须跳下去又爬上去。父亲是一个胖子，走过去自然要费事些。我本来要去的，他不肯，只好让他去。我看见他戴着黑布小帽，穿着黑布大马褂，深青布棉袍，蹒跚地走到铁道边，慢慢探身下去，尚不大难。可是他穿过铁道，要爬上那边月台，就不容易了。他用两手攀着上面，两脚再向上缩；他肥胖的身子向左微倾，显出努力的样子。这时我看见他的背影，我的泪很快地流下来了。我赶紧拭干了泪。怕他看见，也怕别人看见。我再向外看时，他已抱了朱红的橘子往回走了。过铁道时，他先将橘子散放在地上，自己慢慢爬下，再抱起橘子走。到这边时，我赶紧去搀他。他和我走到车上，将橘子一股脑儿放在我的皮大衣上。于是扑扑衣上的泥土，心里很轻松似的。过一会儿说：“我走了，到那边来信！”我望着他走出去。他走了几步，回过头看见我，说：“进去吧，里边没人。”等他的背影混入来来往往的人里，再找不着了，我便进来坐下，我的眼泪又来了。
近几年来，父亲和我都是东奔西走，家中光景是一日不如一日。他少年出外谋生，独力支持，做了许多大事。哪知老境却如此颓唐！他触目伤怀，自然情不能自已。情郁于中，自然要发之于外；家庭琐屑便往往触他之怒。他待我渐渐不同往日。但最近两年不见，他终于忘却我的不好，只是惦记着我，惦记着我的儿子。我北来后，他写了一信给我，信中说道：“我身体平安，惟膀子疼痛厉害，举箸提笔，诸多不便，大约大去之期不远矣。”我读到此处，在晶莹的泪光中，又看见那肥胖的、青布棉袍黑布马褂的背影。唉！我不知何时再能与他相见！