Twenty-five years ago, he wrote this novel, a short story with far-reaching implications

Who is the most controversial writer in China?

I am afraid there is no one else but Yan Lianke.

Born in Henan in 1958, this writer is known as the "master of absurd realism".

His works have won the Lu Xun Literature Prize, the Lao She Literature Prize, the Malaysian Flower Tracer World Chinese Literature Award, and he was the first Chinese writer to win the Kafka International Literary Award.

Many of his masterpieces, such as Dreams of Ding Zhuang,, Me and My Fathers and Them, have been translated into more than thirty languages and sold worldwide.

Twenty-five years ago, he wrote this realistic novel, The Years, the Months and the Days, a short story with far-reaching implications.

Yan Lianke himself wrote in the preface of the book, "I believe that those who hold the pen religiously and wait will eventually see the light of the spirit to God's sight again in the dark night seed."

The novel contains the following story.

When the village was hit by a drought of a thousand years, all the people left the village to make a living elsewhere.

Only a 72-year-old man, the first master, was left with a blind dog, who insisted on staying in the deserted village, guarding the only piece of corn and waiting for it to bear children.

Yan Lianke was once asked why he wrote about such extreme scenarios, to which he replied, "It's not extreme. In my village, droughts, floods and all kinds of disasters are discussed every year. Today's urbanites think these situations are rare; in fact, weren't the floods in Henan two days ago real events?"

Indeed it was.

Many of the scenarios in the stories of The Year and the Month and the Day seem to be exaggerated, but in fact they have a strong sense of realism.

The story's protagonist, Master Xian, was limited to two meals of boiled corn seed porridge a day with his blind dog to protect the corn he had planted with his own hands, which became one meal a day as water sources became scarcer and scarcer.

In order to water the corn in the field, the first master and his dog, could only walk halfway down the slope to the toilet in the early morning, leaving the manure for the corn.

The village well dried up and in order to draw the little bit of groundwater that seeped out, the first master threw a quilt to the bottom of the well and fished it out when it was full of water, squeezing the water out and putting it in a bucket.

This water, both for yourself to drink, to bring corn grits porridge, but also to save a little to water the corn in the ground.

The sun shines brightly every day, finally drying out the well completely.

The first master's quilt could no longer absorb any water.

There was no way out, but the first master still did not want to leave the village.

The reason is also very realistic.

He was so old that it was hard to say whether he would make it out of the village alive.

Moreover, he was not sure about the young corn seedling that had sprung up in the ground at home.

The seedling was a spiritual support for the lonely man.

When the villagers all leave overnight, he takes his blind dog and guards the corn, struggling against the endless drought.

In The Year, the Month and the Day, Yan Lianke uses rich colours to give us a superbly realistic picture of the disaster.

The blindingly white daylight, the cracked yellow soil, the green corn, and the yellow-haired wolves guarding a spring.

The first master accidentally found this spring and wanted to pick up water to water the corn, but he was targeted by a pack of yellow-haired wolves, who then appeared and surrounded the first master.

An old man, facing a pack of wolves, could not say he was not afraid.

He had only one belief in his heart, that if he held on and did not fall down, he would survive.

He held up his stretcher, straightened his back and stared at the wolves without blinking his eyelids, confronting them and not daring to let up, not daring to let the wolves see his timidity and weakness.

From sunset to nightfall, until the wolves were so tired that they fell asleep on the ground, Master Xian did not dare to doze off.

For once he closed his eyelids, the wolves would pounce on him and devour him alive.

The first master, who had escaped the wolves, could not escape the clutches of the drought after all.

Although he had water to drink, he had nothing to eat and was so hungry that he became dizzy.

The blind dog that accompanied him was also so hungry that his ribs were exposed and he had no energy to bark.

One man and one dog, just keeping watch over the corn tree, living from day to day.

At this point in the story, many people can basically guess how it will end.

The last watchman, the first master, is bound to be in a bad way.

But that is not the point.

There are only two things we want to tell you.

One is that one's faith is important.

Without faith, we cannot succeed in many things.

For example, if Master Xian did not have the faith to guard the corn, he would not have survived this long.

Perhaps he fled the village as long ago as the people in the village.

Without faith, on the night of the confrontation with the yellow wolf, the first master, an old man, would not have been able to retreat in one piece; he would have been buried in the wolf's belly and died without a body.

It was having a persevering thought in his heart that allowed the first master to survive time and time again and survive with difficulty.

Another thing is not to give up hope.

In The Year, the Month and the Day, the corn plant that the first master guards is a symbol of hope.

All the crops in the village have died in the drought, but there is only one single seedling in his field.

Is this not the hope that Yan Lianke has planted in the hearts of his readers?

Hope is always there, as long as we don't give up.

In The Year, the Month and the Day, the villagers who had left the village eventually returned and found this corn in their ancestor's field, which had grown as thick as a calf and as long as an arm, producing seven full seeds the size of the belly of a finger.

It is written in the Hanshu Ruler's Almanac that the seven are the four seasons of heaven and earth and the beginning of man.

The meaning of these seven corn seeds is clear as day.

It is also his persistence and watchfulness that has left a last hope for the whole village.

As Yan Lianke said, those who wait religiously will eventually see the light.

The first master waited for his light, and the villagers also waited for their long-lost hope.

One reader had this to say about The Year, the Month and the Day: One man, one dog and one seedling, what a life force. The sun, the moon, the stars, the crops and the earth are all full of life in the text.

If you too have been lost and overwhelmed, if you too are caught in a stalemate and unable to extricate yourself, you may want to read this book, follow Yan Lianke's writing and enter the world of the first master, and find faith and hope in your heart again.