The Unbearable Lightness of Being

"You're in your hometown? You've gone back to Xihe? Why didn't you tell me you were back?" Ning Chunyan asked incredulously.

"Why should I tell you?" Chen Qingluo walked around barefoot, her Bluetooth earpiece flashing. "I don't want to go out. Every time I come back, there are a bunch of people surrounding me. I can't do anything. It's so annoying."

"Indeed," Ning Chunyan agreed wholeheartedly. "But then why did you come back?"

"I'll come back for the same reason you came back."

"Oh, so you also used attending Professor Li Tingfang's 70th birthday celebration as an excuse to escape back home and avoid the pressure of academic work, papers, and other aspects of life, giving yourself a breather."

Chen Qingluo said, "No, that's not it. I don't have any formal education. Every year I go back to Xihe for about half a month to see rural China and make sure I don't become detached from the people."

Ning Chunyan chuckled. Chen Qingluo's words carried a hint of resentment, and she knew the source of that resentment.

Chen Qingluo achieved fame at a young age, but her early books were not accepted by some senior scholars who criticized her for lacking depth and intellectual depth. So she went on to pursue a master's degree and then a doctorate at Nanjing University. Now, those same people dare not criticize her anymore, as that would be tantamount to discrediting Nanjing University and her lineage; instead, they criticize her for being out of touch with the masses.

Chen Qingluo said, "To be honest, I'm quite envious of you. At least you still have the weight of your studies. Since graduating, I've lost all pressure. Now I feel lightheaded and honestly a bit lost."

Ning Chunyan said, "'The unbearable lightness of being,' right? 'Women always yearn to bear the weight of a man's body. The heaviest burden also becomes the image of the strongest vitality.'"

Chen Qingluo scoffed: "Don't listen to Milan Kundera's nonsense. Whether or not another person is there, we are all at the top of the food chain in this world. What I need is not the weight of a man, but the weight of money. I don't have enough money yet."

Ning Chunyan said, "No wonder they say your novels are too inorganic and lack human emotion. I sincerely hope that The Little Prince can awaken your fantasies about love."

"To awaken my fantasies about love, all you need to do is give me a hormone injection," Chen Qingluo said. "What love? It's all a prank of the brain and genes."

Ning Chunyan didn't answer her, his fingers monotonously tapping on the keyboard. Chen Qingluo quickly finished reading a passage from "The Little Prince's Love Letter" and said to the person on the other end of the phone:

"I understand why you like The Little Prince."

"Right!"

Ning Chunyan put her hands away and excitedly picked up her phone: "I knew you'd appreciate him too! He's really special!"

Chen Qinglu commented, "He wasn't doing speech therapy; he was creating. Every word he wrote showed signs of careful consideration and refinement. I could even sense that he had instinctively thought about the rhythm of the rhetoric and the length of the sentences."

Ning Chunyan nodded repeatedly: "Yes, that's why we admire The Little Prince. Many of us believe that although these are scripts for speech therapy, their literary merit is undeniable."

Chen Qingluo became a little interested: "Look, his first sentence, 'I know you work very hard, and as your friend, I feel sorry for you, but as your boss, I can't show it,' is very clever."

"He started with a seemingly random, unstructured conversation, but it was actually packed with information. It highlighted the personalities of both parties in the therapy session, making the conversation flow naturally and even connecting with the rest of the text, adding a touch of romance."

Ning Chunyan nodded repeatedly: "Yes, and from the very first sentence, it brings about the contradiction and conflict of identity and complex interpersonal relationships. This contradiction runs through the entire text from the very first sentence."

Chen Qingluo said, "He wasn't doing speech therapy. He was creating. Actually, this isn't a script, but a novel with a special theme."

"right."

"I can guarantee that this little prince doesn't understand women at all in real life."

Why?

"Because when he was creating these scripts, he was definitely not thinking, 'I want to conquer this woman,' but rather, 'I want to climb the highest mountain of literature so that this woman will definitely feel how awesome I am.' He didn't actually know how to please women; he just foolishly thought that if he was good enough in literature, the other person would definitely feel it."

"But the women were still pleased."

"Yes. Because you women are just as stupid as him," Chen Qingluo said.

"He's like a poet. You are merely the subjects of his poems; he uses them to express his feelings. It's like the ancient poems about plum blossoms and snow; although they describe snow and plum blossoms, they are actually expressing the poet's own thoughts."

"But you plum blossoms and snowflakes actually listened to him so foolishly, thinking that the poet was shining from head to toe. He didn't try to please you, and you didn't care if he pleased you. You were just secretly fascinated."

Ning Chunyan was extremely unwilling; she clenched her small fists tightly, but she couldn't refute what Chen Qingluo said. Her interpretation was very harsh, but she was right.

After a long pause, she finally came up with a rebuttal: "I think you've simplistically described the Little Prince."

"Yes, after all, I only read one chapter," Chen Qingluo said. "I think I need to emphasize one more point: although he's a lousy poet whose mind is always on how to recite poetry beautifully, he's not pretentious. He's not pretentious at all. The reason he's not pretentious is that he wants to make money. He didn't deceive himself into thinking he was so noble."

Most Chinese people are familiar with the word "kitsch" through the book "The Unbearable Lightness of Being." In layman's terms, it's somewhat similar to "pretending to be superior, using low-cost behavior to make oneself appear sacred and sublime."

For example, "If you don't share this, you're not Chinese"; dozens of people died in the California wildfires but a cat was rescued, and people prayed for the cat and sang praises for life; today is Kobe's birthday, so everyone should not take helicopters... These are all kitsch behaviors.

Of course, there are also some emotionally sensitive individuals who are genuinely moved by the meaning contained within these events. Opposing kitsch is not opposing emotion itself, but rather opposing hypocritical sublimity and domineering kitsch. In other words, when everyone is moved, you must allow some people not to be moved; and when you are not moved, you don't have to pretend to be.

In the case of the Little Prince, he was single-mindedly focused on creating literature within his speech therapy scripts, but he wasn't using literature to maintain a sense of superiority; he simply genuinely believed in the power of words and the infectiousness of literature. He believed he could make money through literature.

Chen Qingluo said, "In conclusion..."

"In summary?"

"In conclusion, the Little Prince did not marry," Chen Qingluo stated firmly. "He's a completely straight man who only thinks about literature. What reason would someone like that have to have a wife?"

……

"The Little Prince is a writer who has taken romance to the extreme," a man at the table commented. "To put it nicely, he's romantic; to put it bluntly, he's a womanizer who has even turned womanizing into literary merit."

Director Yang, standing nearby, wrinkled his nose: "Chasing girls is chasing girls, and literature is literature. They're completely unrelated. How can chasing girls produce literary value?"

Xie Cong waved his hand: "You don't know this, these days picking up girls is a skill. What's that joke again? Before graduation, your parents said, 'Dare to date? Try it.' After graduation, your parents will urge you to get married. Try not being able to find a partner."

"Our country is severely lacking in education about love. Many young people have absolutely no experience in dating before leaving school, so a seasoned romantic like the Little Prince suddenly appears out of nowhere!"

The man nodded: "Yes! The Little Prince is a product of our current distorted literary market—vulgar and obscene, yet it's accepted by the mainstream."

Someone nearby said, "It may be vulgar, but it really works. Lots of girls fall for it. I've learned a few lines from The Little Prince, and they really make girls happy."

The man laughed loudly: "That's why I say it's a product of a distorted market! These days, as long as it works, that's all that matters. Get famous first, who cares about the backlash!"

Director Yang shook his head: "I haven't seen it, I've only heard about it. From what you've said, I don't think it has much substance."

"It never had any substance to begin with," Xie Cong hiccuped. "What's the point of substance these days? Everyone's just looking for fun. Those people in the literary world are all opportunists; they'll fawn over whoever's popular. Who cares about the seriousness of literature? They're all long dead!"

Wang Zixu, listening from the side, frowned. Lin Feng leaned closer and whispered, "Brother, have you ever heard of the Little Prince?"

"no."

"Why do I feel like you have something to say?"

After a long silence, Wang Zixu said softly, "I just think they're a bit kitschy."

What does "kitsch" mean?

"I'll tell you after we finish eating."