Lu Xun: 'Before there is genius'

In January 1924, Lu Xun spoke to students and alumni of a Beijing secondary school. It was five years after the May Fourth movement, and China’s writers and critics were asking loudly why the new literature had yet to produce a genius. Lu Xun, by then the country’s best-known writer of fiction, turned the complaint around.

Genius, he said, grows only where there is soil for it, and he named three habits of his day that were sweeping the soil away: a retreat into classical scholarship, a pride in homegrown writing that shut out translation, and critics who trampled young writers for being immature.

His advice to the students was to become soil themselves: to read, translate, introduce and write, however small the task.

I am sharing this translation because the argument applies to the work of journalists today.

At Gazzetta, we've been studying how people get reliable information in distorted contexts. Such discussions so often to dwell on exceptionally insightful or extraordinarily courageous reporters and teams. Our work suggests again and again that this is the wrong starting point and Lu Xun's speech is a reminder that our argument isn't new.

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一九二四年一月十七日在北京师范大学附属中学校友会讲

A talk given on Jan. 17, 1924 to the alumni association of the middle school attached to Beijing Normal University

我自己觉得我的讲话不能使诸君有益或者有趣，因为我实在不知道什么事，但推托拖延得太长久了，所以终于不能不到这里来说几句。

I do not think my talk can be of any use or interest to you, because I really know nothing. But I have put this off and made excuses for so long that in the end I had to come and say a few words.

我看现在许多人对于文艺界的要求的呼声之中，要求天才的产生也可以算是很盛大的了，这显然可以反证两件事：一是中国现在没有一个天才，二是大家对于现在的艺术的厌薄。天才究竟有没有？也许有着罢，然而我们和别人都没有见。倘使据了见闻，就可以说没有；不但天才，还有使天才得以生长的民众。

Among the many demands people now make of the literary world, the call for a genius is one of the loudest. This plainly shows two things: first, that China at present has no genius; second, that everyone is tired of the art we have now. Is there a genius at all? Perhaps there is, but neither we nor anyone else has seen one. Going by what we have seen and heard, we can say there is none; and not only no genius, but no public of the kind that lets genius grow.

天才并不是自生自长在深林荒野里的怪物，是由可以使天才生长的民众产生，长育出来的，所以没有这种民众，就没有天才。有一回拿破仑过Alps山，说，“我比Alps山还要高！”这何等英伟，然而不要忘记他后面跟着许多兵；倘没有兵，那只有被山那面的敌人捉住或者赶回，他的举动，言语，都离了英雄的界线，要归入疯子一类了。所以我想，在要求天才的产生之前，应该先要求可以使天才生长的民众。——譬如想有乔木，想看好花，一定要有好土；没有土，便没有花木了；所以土实在较花木还重要。花木非有土不可，正同拿破仑非有好兵不可一样。

A genius is not a freak that springs up and grows by itself in deep forest or wilderness. Genius is born of and raised by a public that allows it to grow, so without such a public there is no genius. Once, crossing the Alps, Napoleon said: “I am higher than the Alps!” How grand that was. But do not forget the many soldiers following behind him. Without them he would simply have been captured or driven back by the enemy on the other side, and his actions and words would have left the realm of the hero and fallen into the category of the madman. So I think that before we call for a genius, we should first call for a public that can let genius grow. If you want tall trees and fine flowers, you must have good soil. Without soil there are no flowers or trees, so soil really matters more than they do. Flowers and trees cannot do without soil, just as Napoleon could not do without good soldiers.

然而现在社会上的论调和趋势，一面固然要求天才，一面却要他灭亡，连预备的土也想扫尽。举出几样来说：

Yet the talk and the trend in society today is, on the one hand, to demand a genius and, on the other, to want him destroyed, and even to sweep away the soil prepared for him. To give a few examples:

其一就是“整理国故”。自从新思潮来到中国以后，其实何尝有力，而一群老头子，还有少年，却已丧魂失魄的来讲国故了，他们说，“中国自有许多好东西，都不整理保存，倒去求新，正如放弃祖宗遗产一样不肖。”抬出祖宗来说法，那自然是极威严的，然而我总不信在旧马褂未曾洗净叠好之前，便不能做一件新马褂。就现状而言，做事本来还随各人的自便，老先生要整理国故，当然不妨去埋在南窗下读死书，至于青年，却自有他们的活学问和新艺术，各干各事，也还没有大妨害的，但若拿了这面旗子来号召，那就是要中国永远与世界隔绝了。倘以为大家非此不可，那更是荒谬绝伦！我们和古董商人谈天，他自然总称赞他的古董如何好，然而他决不痛骂画家，农夫，工匠等类，说是忘记了祖宗：他实在比许多国学家聪明得远。

One is “putting the national heritage in order”. Since the new ideas came to China they have in fact never had much force, yet a group of old men, and some young ones too, have already been frightened out of their wits and taken to talking about the national heritage. They say: “China has many good things of its own. To leave them unsorted and unpreserved and chase after the new instead is as unworthy as throwing away an ancestral inheritance.” To bring out the ancestors to make one’s case is of course most imposing. But I simply do not believe that a new jacket cannot be made until the old one has been washed and folded. As things stand, everyone is still free to do as he pleases. If the old gentlemen want to put the national heritage in order, they are welcome to bury themselves under the south window reading dead books. The young have their own living learning and new art. Each does his own thing, and there is no great harm in that. But to raise this as a banner and rally others to it is to cut China off from the world forever. And to hold that everyone must do this is more absurd still. When we chat with an antique dealer, he naturally praises his antiques, but he never curses painters, farmers and craftsmen for forgetting their ancestors. He is in fact far cleverer than many scholars of national learning.

其一是“崇拜创作”。从表面上看来，似乎这和要求天才的步调很相合，其实不然。那精神中，很含有排斥外来思想，异域情调的分子，所以也就是可以使中国和世界潮流隔绝的。许多人对于托尔斯泰，都介涅夫，陀思妥夫斯奇的名字，已经厌听了，然而他们的著作，有什么译到中国来？眼光囚在一国里，听谈彼得和约翰就生厌，定须张三李四才行，于是创作家出来了，从实说，好的也离不了刺取点外国作品的技术和神情，文笔或者漂亮，思想往往赶不上翻译品，甚者还要加上些传统思想，使他适合于中国人的老脾气，而读者却已为他所牢笼了，于是眼界便渐渐的狭小，几乎要缩进旧圈套里去。作者和读者互相为因果，排斥异流，抬上国粹，那里会有天才产生？即使产生了，也是活不下去的。

Another is the “worship of original writing”. On the surface this seems in step with the call for genius, but it is not. In spirit it has a strong element of rejecting foreign ideas and foreign flavours, and so it too can cut China off from the currents of the world. Many people are already tired of hearing the names Tolstoy, Turgenev and Dostoevsky, but which of their works have been translated into Chinese? With their gaze locked inside one country, they are bored by talk of Peter and John and must have Zhang San and Li Si. And so the original writers appear. To be frank, even the good ones cannot do without borrowing some technique and manner from foreign works. Their style may be polished, but their thinking often falls short of the translations, and some go so far as to add traditional ideas to suit the old temper of the Chinese. Yet readers are already caught in their net, so their field of vision gradually narrows until it almost shrinks back into the old snares. Writers and readers are each other’s cause and effect: they reject what is different and hold up the national essence. How could a genius be born there? Even if one were born, he could not survive.

这样的风气的民众是灰尘，不是泥土，在他这里长不出好花和乔木来！

A public with such habits is dust, not soil. No fine flowers or tall trees will grow from it.

还有一样是恶意的批评。大家的要求批评家的出现，也由来已久了，到目下就出了许多批评家。可惜他们之中很有不少是不平家，不像批评家，作品才到面前，便恨恨地磨墨，立刻写出很高明的结论道，“唉，幼稚得很。中国要天才！”到后来，连并非批评家也这样叫喊了，他是听来的。其实即使天才，在生下来的时候的第一声啼哭，也和平常的儿童的一样，决不会就是一首好诗。因为幼稚，当头加以戕贼，也可以萎死的。我亲见几个作者，都被他们骂得寒噤了。那些作者大约自然不是天才，然而我的希望是便是常人也留着。

A third is malicious criticism. People have long been calling for critics to appear, and by now many have. Unfortunately a good number of them are men with a grievance rather than critics. A work has barely reached them before they grind their ink in a rage and at once write a very superior verdict: “Ah, how childish. What China needs is a genius!” Later, even those who are not critics take up the cry; they picked it up by hearsay. In fact even a genius’s first cry at birth is the same as any ordinary child’s. It is never a fine poem. Something immature that is injured at the outset can wither and die. I have seen several writers scolded by them until they shivered. Those writers are most likely not geniuses, but my hope is that ordinary people be kept too.

恶意的批评家在嫩苗的地上驰马，那当然是十分快意的事；然而遭殃的是嫩苗——平常的苗和天才的苗。幼稚对于老成，有如孩子对于老人，决没有什么耻辱；作品也一样，起初幼稚，不算耻辱的。因为倘不遭了戕贼，他就会生长，成熟，老成；独有老衰和腐败，倒是无药可救的事！我以为幼稚的人，或者老大的人，如有幼稚的心，就说幼稚的话，只为自己要说而说，说出之后，至多到印出之后，自己的事就完了，对于无论打着什么旗子的批评，都可以置之不理的！

For the malicious critic, galloping a horse across a field of young shoots is of course great fun. But it is the shoots that suffer, ordinary shoots and shoots of genius alike. Immaturity beside maturity is like a child beside an old man: there is no shame in it. It is the same with writing: to be immature at first is no disgrace. If it is not injured, it will grow, ripen and mature. Only senility and decay are beyond cure. I think that immature people, or older people with a young heart, should say immature things if that is what they have to say, speaking only because they want to speak. Once it is said, or at most once it is printed, their part is done. Whatever banner the criticism flies, they can ignore it.

就是在座的诸君，料来也十之九愿有天才的产生罢，然而情形是这样，不但产生天才难，单是有培养天才的泥土也难。我想，天才大半是天赋的；独有这培养天才的泥土，似乎大家都可以做。做土的功效，比要求天才还切近；否则，纵有成千成百的天才，也因为没有泥土，不能发达，要像一碟子绿豆芽。

I expect nine out of ten of you here would also like to see a genius appear. But as things are, it is hard not only to produce a genius but even to have the soil to grow one. I think genius is mostly a gift of nature; the soil that grows genius, though, is something it seems all of us can be. Being soil is closer to hand than calling for genius. Otherwise, even if we had hundreds or thousands of geniuses, without soil they could not thrive and would be like a saucer of mung bean sprouts.

做土要扩大了精神，就是收纳新潮，脱离旧套，能够容纳，了解那将来产生的天才；又要不怕做小事业，就是能创作的自然是创作，否则翻译，介绍，欣赏，读，看，消闲都可以。以文艺来消闲，说来似乎有些可笑，但究竟较胜于戕贼他。

To be soil we must broaden our minds: take in the new, shake off the old patterns, and be able to accept and understand the genius who is yet to come. We must also not be afraid of small tasks: those who can write should of course write; the rest can translate, introduce, appreciate, read, look, or pass the time. To use literature to pass the time may sound rather laughable, but it is still better than injuring it.

泥土和天才比，当然是不足齿数的，然而不是坚苦卓绝者，也怕不容易做；不过事在人为，比空等天赋的天才有把握。这一点，是泥土的伟大的地方，也是反有大希望的地方。而且也有报酬，譬如好花从泥土里出来，看的人固然欣然的赏鉴，泥土也可以欣然的赏鉴，正不必花卉自身，这才心旷神怡的——假如当作泥土也有灵魂的说。

Compared with genius, soil is of course hardly worth mentioning. Yet unless one is steadfast and able to endure hardship, it is probably not easy to be soil either. Still, it depends on human effort, and offers better odds than waiting idly for a heaven-sent genius. This is where the greatness of soil lies, and also where there is in fact great hope. And there is a reward as well. When a fine flower comes up out of the soil, those who see it naturally enjoy it, but the soil can enjoy it too. One need not be the flower oneself to feel one’s heart lift, supposing, that is, that soil has a soul too.