How does Mo Yan blend history and folklore in his novels?
The earth remembers everything, you see. The history of a place is not just what is written in books; it lives in the very soil, in the superstitions that bind us, in the songs our grandmothers sang. When I write, I listen to these echoes. I take the ghost stories told around crackling fires, the legends of ancient heroes and demons, and I let them dance with the harsh realities of, say, the Cultural Revolution or the Great Leap Forward. In 'Red Sorghum Clan,' the wild spirit of the land is as much a character as any human. The folklore provides the texture, the deep, enduring memory, while history provides the storm. Together, they create a world that is both deeply familiar and utterly astonishing, much like life itself.