1月26日，《武漢》將全面上市。這本新書已經在德語區激發了廣泛的閱讀期待，這一切，是從去年10月舉的奧地利的Literatur im Nebel開始的，我是主賓。整整兩天，演員和作家同行們都在閱讀和討論我在S. Fischer Verlage出版的9本書。閉幕式上，赫塔 穆勒和我一起上臺，閱讀了《逃出中國》。
Literatur im Nebel最重要的節目，是S. Fischer Verlage主編漢斯和我的關於《武漢》的公開對話。我們討論了小說和記錄的界限，小說人物艾丁和非小說人物Kcriss、張展、張文芳的被警察逮捕的共同的命運，這些民間的調查記者，也和800多萬被強制隔離在家的武漢市民一樣，在不斷追問和尋找“武漢病毒”的來源……
在Literatur im Nebel之後，我接受了20多家媒體的採訪，其中重複得最多的問題是：你已經流亡10年，你目前住在萬里之外的柏林，你已經失去了在中國的本土作家的“現場感”，那麽，《武漢》是怎麽寫出來的？
自從2020年1月武漢封城開始，我每晚都在通宵工作，瘋狂地下載了數十萬字的資料。來源主要是中國科學院武漢病毒研究所的官方網站、國內各大網站、地方網站、微博、微信、博客等等，也包括推特上的自媒體。內容五花八門：1，“武漢病毒”的前世今生，2，這種“蝙蝠病毒”是怎樣傳染了武漢、全國和全世界？3，醫院人滿為患，4，火葬場晝夜忙碌，5，全國各地抓捕武漢人，6，專家之間關於”病毒來源“的唇槍舌戰，7，普通人之間的討論和對罵，8，突然死亡、自殺、跳窗、逃跑、封鎖所有的道路……
防疫正在关键时期，“严防死守”是必要的。但封门却过分了——任何人都没有，也不应该有这样的权力
全國幾千萬被強制在家坐牢的人，都被驚慌和恐懼所壓倒，都擠在網絡上，爭先恐後地發言、發照片、發視頻，中國網絡警察人數增加了幾十倍，依舊疲憊不堪，來不及刪除海洋漲潮一般的”違禁言論“和”謠言“。誰也不敢上門抓人了，大約有20多天，具有全球最先進的監控系統的中國網絡竟然”失控“——直到有一天，我的電腦被黑客攻擊，突然黑屏，徹底癱瘓了——幸運的是，我的資料也同時下載到了移動硬盤。
我不得不等待了一個星期，Kcriss終於出現了，我立即從浩若煙海的下載資料中浮出海面，撲上去，鯊魚一般”咬“住這個1995年才出生的、中央電視臺的前主持人，我寫的最早的一篇報道，就是關於Kcriss的，發表在”法蘭克福匯報“。
緊接著，從對Kcriss的記錄過渡到艾丁的故事——這是一曲獻給”武漢失蹤者“的哀歌。Kcriss、艾丁、張文芳、張展、方斌、陳秋實、王藏、艾丁的妻子…… 這些書中的現實的和虛構的人物，都被捕了。沒有被捕的，要麽染病死了，要麽在監獄中等死——他們不過是在被病毒襲擊的同時，想搞清楚襲擊自己的病毒來自哪裡……
寫小說《武漢》的時候，我收集了很多圖片，都是中國國內的普通老百姓偷偷拍攝的，他們都不敢署名，因為警方一旦知道這些圖片的作者，就會逮捕他們。
需要說明的是：這些圖片的作者，都是渴望這些圖片被許多人轉發，所以，如果也被西方媒體發表，他們會偷偷笑出聲的。這種感受，前東德的居民，會心領神會吧。
How was “Wuhan” written?
On January 26th, “Wuhan” will be fully launched.This new book has already generated a lot of anticipation in the German-speaking world, and it all started with the Literatur im Nebel in Austria last October, where I was the guest of honor. For two days, actors and fellow writers read and discussed my nine books published in S. Fischer Verlage. At the closing ceremony, Herta Müller and I took the stage together and read “Escape from China”.
The most important program of Literatur im Nebel was a public conversation between Hans, editor-in-chief of S. Fischer Verlage, and me about Wu Han. We discussed the boundaries between fiction and documentary, the common fate of fictional character Aidin and non-fictional characters Kcriss, Zhang Zhan, and Zhang Wenfang, who were arrested by the police, and the investigative journalists who, like the more than 8 million citizens of Wuhan who have been forcibly isolated from their homes, are constantly asking questions and searching for the source of the “Wuhan virus” ……
After Literatur im Nebel, I was interviewed by more than 20 media outlets, and the most repeated question was: You have been in exile for 10 years, you currently live 10,000 miles away in Berlin, you have lost your “sense of place” as a local writer in China, so how did “Wuhan” come to be written?
Since the closure of Wuhan in January 2020, I have been working overnight every night and have been downloading hundreds of thousands of words of information like crazy. The sources were mainly the official website of the Wuhan Institute of Virus Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, major domestic websites, local websites, microblogs, WeChat, blogs, etc., and also self-media on Twitter.The content is varied: 1, the past life of the “Wuhan virus”, 2, how this “bat virus” infected Wuhan, the whole country and the world, 3, overcrowded hospitals, 4, busy crematoriums day and night, 5, arrests of Wuhan people across the country, 6, the war of words between experts about the “source of the virus”, 7, the discussion and cursing among ordinary people, 8, the sudden deaths, suicides, window jumps, escapes, blocking all roads ……
The tens of millions of people forced to stay home in jail all over the country were overwhelmed by panic and fear, all crowding the Internet, scrambling to speak, post photos and videos, and the number of China’s Internet police increased dozens of times, still too exhausted to delete the oceanic tide of “forbidden speech” and “rumors The actual “banned words” and “rumors” can’t be removed in time. No one dared to go to the door to arrest anyone, and for about 20 days, China’s network, with the world’s most advanced surveillance system, went “out of control” – until one day, my computer was hacked and suddenly went black, completely paralyzed -Fortunately, my data was also downloaded to the mobile hard drive at the same time.
I had to wait for a week for Kcriss to appear, and I immediately surfaced from the sea of downloaded data and jumped on the shark-like “bite” of this former host of CCTV, born in 1995, whose earliest report I wrote about Kcriss was published in “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung”.
Immediately after, the transition from Kcriss’s account to Aidin’s story – a lament dedicated to the “missing people of Wuhan”. Kcriss, Aidin, Zhang Wenfang, Zhang Zhan, Fang Bin, Chen Qiushi, Wang Zang, Aydin’s wife …… The real and fictional characters in these books were all arrested. Those who were not arrested either died of the disease or died in prison – they were just attacked by the virus while trying to figure out where the virus that attacked them came from ……
When writing the novel “Wuhan”, I collected a lot of pictures that were secretly taken by ordinary people in China, and they didn’t dare to sign their names because the police would arrest them once they knew the authors of these pictures.
It is important to note that the authors of these pictures are eager to have them republished by many people, so they would secretly laugh if they were also published by the Western media. The former residents of East Germany will understand this feeling.
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