The Right to Light a Lamp

鄢烈山Northern Literature and Art Publishing House (Beifang Wenyi Chubanshe)2011

Rating 3.2
Word count
220K words
Chapters
1
Series
The Right to Light a Lamp
ISBN
9787531725312

Tags

Literature Essays and Miscellany Political EthicsSocial CriticismSocial ObservationHumanistic CarePublic ReasoningCivic SpiritInstitutional EthicsEssaysCultural Criticism

Summary

The Right to Light a Lamp is a collection of essays by the essayist Yan Lieshan, published in January 2011 by Northern Literature and Art Publishing House as part of the "Outrageous Essays" series, alongside works by Shao Yanxiang, Zhu Tiezhi, Liu Meng, and others. About 220,000 characters and 239 pages, it is divided into five parts and gathers commentaries and essays written between 2008 and 2010, positioning itself as "citizen writing" and using public reasoning to discuss social consensus, civic spirit, and institutional ethics. The pieces fall roughly into two categories: social criticism and cultural criticism. The former confronts reality, touching on political ethics, official-people relations, the household registration system, demolition and rights defense, information disclosure, and public opinion and censorship; representative titles include "Firmly Establish the Political Ethics That Human Life Is Paramount," "Never 'Make Enemies of the People,'" "The Inscrutable Film Censorship," "Why Are 'Red-Header Documents' Still So Red?," and "The Ugly Face of Unclear Delegation of Power." The latter starts from cultural phenomena, film and television works, and social psychology, reflecting the author's humanistic concern for the world. The title comes from an essay in the book on the Nujiang people's right to "light a lamp"; "lighting a lamp" is both a small daily matter and a symbol of ordinary people's basic right to voice demands and participate in public affairs. The author's style is emotional, sharp, and pungent, adept at irony and rhetorical questions, with a distinctive perspective that values rational inquiry rather than emotional venting. For readers who want to understand the landscape of Chinese commentary writing in the first decade of the 21st century and learn how to make reasoned, evidence-based comments on public issues, this book offers a representative sample.

Editor's review

《点灯的权利》不是一本给出标准答案的书，而是一本示范“如何提问”的书。鄢烈山是长期写作时评与杂文的老手，他把“公民写作”当作一种自我要求：不站队、不讨好，先把事实与逻辑摆清楚，再谈立场。书中的许多篇目针对的是当年的具体新闻——拆迁、户籍、信息公开、审查尺度——今天读来，这些事件的细节或许已经远去，但作者拆解权力话语、追问制度伦理的方法并不过时。 值得推荐的地方有三点。其一，文章短，节奏快，一篇一个议题，适合碎片时间阅读，也适合作为议论文写作的范本；其二，作者善于从一句官话、一个词条、一则新闻里找出矛盾，这种“抠字眼”的功夫对训练思辨很有帮助；其三，全书有一种不轻易下判断的克制，观点尖锐，但论证讲分寸，这在情绪化的网络表达中尤为难得。 当然也要提醒：这本书是2011年出版的时评结集，其中涉及的事件和语境都有明确的时效性，读者需要带着历史眼光去看，而不能当作对当下现实的直接描述。作为“岂有此理文丛”的一种，它与同丛其他杂文家的作品对读，更能看出那一代杂文写作的共同关切与不同笔法。

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Reading tips

  1. 先读自序与《点灯的权利》一篇，理解书名含义与作者的“公民写作”主张。
  2. 按辑阅读，每读完两三篇就停下来，回看作者是如何从具体事件推进到一般道理的。
  3. 遇到涉及当年新闻的篇目，可随手查一下事件后续，对照作者的判断检验其说理是否成立。
  4. 把书中喜欢的论证段落抄下来，作为自己写评论、写议论文时的结构范本。

About the publisher

Northern Literature and Art Publishing House (Beifang Wenyi Chubanshe) China · Founded in 1961

Northern Literature and Art Publishing House focuses on contemporary and modern literary and artistic works, literary theory, and translations of foreign literature, while also covering categories such as history, popular science, Eastern philosophy, and world classics. Its collection includes 737 titles, with representative publications ranging from traditional Chinese classics such as Records of the Grand Historian, The Exploitation of the Works of Nature, and The Analects to foreign literary works including the complete classic plays of Shakespeare, Balzac's Old Goriot and Eugénie Grandet (in celebrated translations by Fu Lei), and The Complete Sherlock Holmes. Its author resources span classical figures such as Sima Qian, Song Yingxing, and Confucius, foreign writers such as Shakespeare and Balzac, and translators such as Zhu Shenghao and Fu Lei. The press combines the transmission of classics with an orientation toward general reading, developing a distinctive profile in both the editing of traditional texts and the translation of foreign literature. Public information is limited, so the above emphasizes the publishing profile reflected in the books held in the collection.

Contents

  1. Outrageous Essays Series

FAQ

《点灯的权利》是关于什么内容的书？ 这是鄢烈山2011年出版的杂文时评集，收入“岂有此理文丛”，分五辑，主要讨论政治伦理、官民关系、户籍、拆迁、信息公开、舆论环境等公共议题，也有从影视与文化现象切入的评论。
书名“点灯的权利”是什么意思？ 书名取自书中一篇谈怒江百姓“点灯”权利的文章。“点灯”表面是日常小事，实则象征普通人表达诉求、获得基本公共服务与参与公共事务的权利，作者借此讨论公民权利的具体含义。
这本书的目录和豆瓣评分可靠吗？ 豆瓣评分约6.4分（基于三十余人评价），样本量较小，仅供参考。目录方面，各家百科与旧书网站收录的条目详略不一，版本间可能有出入，具体篇目以纸质书为准。
这本书现在还容易买到吗？ 该书2011年由北方文艺出版社出版，定价28.80元，目前属旧书流通范畴，在孔夫子旧书网等二手书平台较易找到，价格随品相浮动。购买前建议核对ISBN 9787531725312。

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About the author

鄢烈山 Author

Yan Lieshan is a Chinese author known for documentary literature and prose essays, though publicly available information about him is limited. Two of his works are included in the collection, with The Fortunes and Misfortunes of People Like Us as his representative title. Judging from their subject matter and categorization, his writing often starts from the circumstances of individuals and their contemporaries, moving between factual record and personal reflection. He pays attention to lived experience while also observing and pondering human nature and social conditions. His style is restrained rather than elaborate, tending to carry judgment through plain narration and forming a distinctive personal voice where reportage and commentary intersect. Because confirmable biographical details remain insufficient, his nationality, dates of birth and death, and educational background are not available here. Readers seeking a fuller understanding of this author may turn to the two works mentioned above and form their own sense of his orientation and concerns through the texts themselves.