The Lunar New Year is fast approaching, and it's time again to revisit the classic New Year film Fat Choi Spirit. It's hard to believe that it's already a 22-year-old work.
In the film, Andy Lau's character, a mahjong expert, teaches us that "good character with cards reflect good character with people", but in terms of creativity, good work doesn't necessarily mean good character. I've been confused for the past 5 years, no, actually for the past 10 years - though I wasn't aware of it back then - about whether a singer's character should influence how we feel about their work. If you're also from Hong Kong and enjoy Cantonese songs, you probably understand the confusing context of this era.
The Turing Test of a Work
I don't understand art, and my art criticism is naïve, but at least I know that appreciation of a work should not be prejudiced nor influenced by the artist's personal life, and remains a common consensus among art critics. Disregarding a work because of the artist's character is inappropriate and non-sense.
Once, I attended the book launch of Mann Shin's new book White Lies at One Punch Bookstore. The topic came up accidentally, and I asked the guests present about my doubts. The response from the veteran novelist Tam Kim made a deep impression on me. Tam Kim, familiar with both novels and classical music, cited the famous German composer and playwright Wagner, known for his Bridal Chorus, as an example. He said that music should be judged as music. Even though Wagner was a despicable person in his personal life and extremely anti-Semitic, we should not negate his outstanding achievements in music; otherwise, we would miss out on great compositions.
The logic wasn’t unfamiliar to me, and after confirmed by Tam Kim, I tried again to focus solely on the work when listening to music, putting aside prejudices and not considering the singer's character and political views. However, after trying hard, I concluded that I just couldn't do it. More and more songs and singers I used to like or even be obsessed with, I don't want to hear or see anymore. They are still the same songs, same singings, but I can't appreciate them anymore. Since I'm not an art critic, listening to music can be a purely personal enjoyment. As I can't judge purely by skill, I might as well follow my own set of standards. Not only do I no longer force myself to separate one’s work from one’s character, now I associate both even more than before.
I'm not saying that an artist or singer's character should be a factor in evaluating their work, nor am I saying "good character equals good work". More fundamentally, for me, the work itself is an extension of the creator's character. In an era of information overload and artificial intelligence, where there's always more content than one can appreciate even at ten times the speed, I find that mere skill is not enough to move me. The work must embody the creator himself. When the work “carries a person”, it’s not really about being created and performed by a real person, but the creator infusing their own life, or even their soul, into the work, responding to the times through their craft.
Many times, bands and singer-songwriters are particularly appealing because they tell their unique stories. Following a band or a singer-songwriter is like growing with them, sharing their joys and sorrows. Even if they lack the best music, lyrics, arrangement and production teams, or their performances are not top-notch, they can still be moving. Conversely, even the most outstanding performance, if alienated from the singer's life and the messages in the songs are purely constructed, may still be a good work, but it will not be one I like. In the near future, it might even struggle to respond to the challenges posed by AI-generated works.
This is the case even for pop music, which is a group effort, and even more so for writing. Otherwise, why not just use ChatGPT? "Carry a person" in the work is my "Turing Test" as an appreciator of creations.
Book Lovers' View of Dung Kai Cheung
With these insights, I revisited whether I, as a writer, have met my own expectations of creators. My answer is, occasionally.
My blog is called chungkin Express, a name that's overly direct, meaning exactly my expression (chungkin is the Hong Kong-style romanization of "rebuilding"). In recent years, with societal changes and perhaps personal growth, I have increasingly emphasized the publicness in writing. I view educating about web3 citizenship as a personal mission, feeling that addressing public issues in writing is the only way to do justice to my readers. Three years ago, I repositioned the weekly newsletter, also named after my blog, as Blockchain Sociology. Occasionally, when writing becomes too exhausting, I insert a casual thought and immediately feel guilty.
However, the reaction from readers often contradicts my intentions. Many express a preference for my "Simpleton's Diary" entries about everyday life, while the in-depth explanatory articles I labor over are predictably less popular even before hitting the publish button. When interacting with readers, I jokingly call them gossipers, insisting not to base topics on the number of likes, but secretly, I understand their sentiments, because I am also a reader. (And also curious about authors' personal lives?)
Last year, Ditu Press reissued The History of the Adventures of Vivi and Vera in a new format, and I "came out" as a fan of Mr. Dung Kai Cheung (hereafter referred to as D). Recently, with the reissue of Kokoro, I reread it and gained a deeper understanding and more profound impact. In the realm of writing, I can't compare to D in terms of quality and quantity. But if I had to make a comparison, Kokoro is like novelist D's "Simpleton's Diary" amidst his ambitious, voluminous works—a seemingly less public-oriented material that actually satisfies the 'gossip' cravings of readers.
A Brief Background of D: Dung Kai Cheung debuted in 1992 and gained recognition with two United Daily News Literary Awards in 1994. From 1995, he published a variety of works, including collections of short stories, campus sketches, novels, and the V City Tetralogy, receiving numerous accolades and several adaptations into stage plays. In 2005, he published the lengthy novel The History of the Adventures of Vivi and Vera, the first in his Trilogy of Natural History. This was followed by the second part, History of Times in 2007, and the first volume of the third part, The Origin of Species: The Educational Age of Beibei's Rebirth in 2010. His stories, seemingly prescient of Hong Kong's future, showed D's engagement with society through his writing, solidifying his position as a writer "writing in the world, for the world." However, as the series grew more complex and couldn't keep up with societal changes, hundreds of thousands of words were rewritten multiple times without evolving into satisfactory works, leading D into a creative bottleneck and anxiety disorder, which improved after half a year in 2013.
In 2014, D was selected as the Writer of the Year for the Hong Kong Book Fair. That same year, the Sunflower Movement in Taiwan and the evolution of Occupy Central into the Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong occurred. The second volume of the Trilogy of Natural History's third part was unfinished and increasingly disconnected from reality. D said, "Continuing to write would only be like a madman talking to himself." His anxiety worsened, “feeling symptoms akin to a dying patient – rapid heartbeat, difficulty breathing, inability to eat, weakness, and pain throughout the body”. In this context, the mysterious woman こころ entered D's life. Using him as the main character, she wrote Kokoro through his hands, which was published in early 2016. Not only did it gradually heal him mentally it also led D out of his creative slump. He later wrote several novels like The Spirit and AI receiving further acclaim and getting back on track in his creative journey.
In plain, unartistic terms, Kokoro marks the beginning of "Dung Kai Cheung 2.0" It's not hard to imagine why the veteran novelist D would choose to reissue Kokoro to kick off the "Dungfookei Express" self-publishing project.
Kokoro and the Differentiating Mind
From a purely literary standpoint, Kokoro might not be the most outstanding among D's diverse works. However, this personal novel, infused with a significant amount of personal elements, is undoubtedly the most quintessential Dung KaiCheung piece.
Since his early work Atlas: The Archaeology of an Imaginary City, D's creations have always had a characteristic that blurs the line between reality and fiction. However, his fiction Kokoro stands out as feeling incredibly real, even brutally honest at times. Thankfully, D himself admits in the new preface that “he has laid bare his experience of suffering from severe anxiety over several years in the most frank and direct way”. Otherwise, I might have suspected that I was being manipulated by the 'dictator' D again. D once said that fictional narratives can possess truth. Previously, I thought this was merely 'linguistic trickery', but upon rereading Kokoro, I finally understood its meaning. In expressing feelings, the reality within fiction can even surpass that in factual records. A realistic record describing the experience of anxiety could never capture the depth that Kokoro does.
Even if you've never read any of D's novels, Kokoro would be an excellent starting point. Although lengthy, it's divided into 56 chapters of a few thousand words each, allowing for coherent yet independent reading. Apart from a few Zen-like Buddhist verses, it's written in an accessible style, including narrative, dialogue, monologue, and descriptive passages, all blending smoothly and naturally. Additionally, the novel's core metaphor is very apparent, even to someone like me without formal literary training. Listening to how D converses with Kokoro and how he fictionalizes another female character Anxiety from a complex triangle relationship to a final realization of the non-duality of mind and body is both thrilling and entertaining.
As mentioned earlier, I often struggle between personal and public writing, torn between my ambition in science communication and readers' interest in my daily life. Revisiting Kokoro and inspired by the occasionally naïve but sporadically wise こころ, I found a new perspective. To paraphrase こころ's incisive words:
"The differentiating mind! The opposition you set up from the beginning between yourself and others is a delusion created by the differentiating mind. Since it is a delusion, any attempt to transcend it will not be successful."
Indeed, my fixation on the world's importance surpassing my own, which seemed humble on the surface, actually set up an opposition between the individual and the group. This perspective made me see myself as too special, even somewhat arrogant. In reality, the lack of interest from readers in my scientific articles is similar to my disinterest in pop songs without a story. It was due to my overly conscious effort to write about public issues, resulting in works devoid of self, leading to a disconnect with the readers. Recognizing that I am a part of the world, and by letting go of the differentiating mind and living with heart, even my writings about my ordinary self will inevitably carry a universal aspect, resonating with contemporaries, peers, and readers with similar experiences. Writing about oneself, in the end, is also writing about the world.
Such a simple truth, D must have learned from こころ eight years ago, enabling him to let go of his obsessions, gracefully accept the unfinished Trilogy of Natural History, and shift from outward to inward, creating the Trilogy of Spirtual History.
After Kokoro, The Spirit, and AI, D continued his tireless creation. Although no longer explicitly focused on responding to the world, his works remained grounded. After the transitional A Son and the new experiment The Posthuman Comedy, his recent work 香港字starts from everyday life, infusing a large amount of historical data without losing its charm. Without deliberately conveying a message, it responds to the times with a very unique perspective. Although it hasn't caused a stir in the literary world, it represents another peak in his career in my eyes.
Self-Publishing and Connecting with Readers
Regarding connecting with readers through his work, Kokoro goes beyond its content in embodying D's spirit, also manifesting this connection in its publishing format.
D, not lacking in publishing support, chose the more challenging route of self-publishing Kokoro. He oversaw every aspect of the process, collaborating with editors, designers, technicians, and sales channels. He communicated directly with each reader, personally signed every book, and even went the extra mile by giving away treasures like out-of-print editions, a physical print version of 心．特集 and 心之映象 NFTs as gifts.
Beyond connecting with readers, D invested a great deal of effort and took the risk of being misunderstood as engaging in a publicity stunt, all to demonstrate the potential of self-publishing to an industry facing challenges. He aimed to "provide a permanent storage and free distribution medium for his work, supplementing the limitations of physical books."
Even if you're not a fan of D or find his novels lengthy and complex, it's hard to deny that Mr. Dung Kai Cheung has integrated his work and character to the utmost. Writing in the world, for the world, he has remained consistent throughout his journey.
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