Changes
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Summary
Changes is an essay collection by Wang Kunlou, a writer from Baoshan, Yunnan (born 1954 in Changning County, Yunnan; graduated from the Philosophy Department of Yunnan University in 1985; long engaged in research on the culture of the Western Yunnan War of Resistance). The author describes himself as a member of the "post-50s" generation, born in the countryside and long resident there, participating in collective farm labor and witnessing firsthand the rural economic reforms and the enormous changes in rural society over the decades that followed; after joining the workforce and moving to the city, the changes in the city and urban life also fell within what he saw and heard. Most of what the book recounts are old matters the author personally experienced and witnessed: spinning tops, iron hoops, little picture books, hand warmers, open-air square movies, and all kinds of country foods; pig bladders, stone mills, water mills, water pestles, flails, straw rain capes, bamboo hats, wheelbarrows, straw mats, straw sandals, thatched houses and earthen stoves, brick and tile kilns, wells, and other farm tools and household objects fading into the distance; old trades and systems such as village carpenters, wooden buckets, hand weaving, and work-point rating; and the rise and fall in daily life of double-cassette recorders, Hero-brand fountain pens, wristwatches, black-and-white photographs, and letter exchanges that began "seeing your words is like seeing you." Through the rise and fall of these ordinary objects, the author writes of clothing, food, housing, and transport moving from "eating one's fill" to "eating well," from the monotony of blue-gray to a colorful diversity, recording the journey of ordinary people who took part in building and also enjoyed life. With personal memory as its thread, the book interweaves the evolution of material life with the social transformation of a region; plain in style and dense in detail, it is a chronicle of rural change with a flavor of folk oral history.
Editor's review
这是一部由普通人写下的“物之史”。王琨楼把一个个正在消失的物件请回纸面：石磨、水碓、连械、蓑衣、鸡公车、草鞋、木桶、土灶……它们曾是乡村生活的基础设施，如今只在记忆里运转。作者不写宏大叙事，而是从陀螺、小人书、广场电影、一块手表、一封书信入手，用具体可感的细节，呈现出衣食住行几十年间由匮乏到充裕的轨迹。对习惯从统计数据理解社会变迁的读者来说，这样的民间记述别有一种说服力：变化不是抽象的曲线，而是亲历者手上的触感与心里的落差。文字质朴，行文带有滇西地方色彩，适合作为乡土记忆与民俗器物的读本，也适合馈赠经历过那个年代的长辈。
Who it's for
A good fit for
- 经历过上世纪五六十年代乡村生活的读者，可唤起共同的记忆
- 关注民俗器物、乡土社会变迁的读者，可作为口述史式的读本
- 喜爱生活化、质朴散文的中青年读者
- 中小学语文教师，可从中选取素材做乡土写作与生活观察教学
Not a good fit for
- 期待系统学术论证或数据分析的社会学研究者
- 偏好强情节、小说化叙事的读者
Reading tips
- 不必按序通读，可按器物或主题挑篇目，每次读三四篇更有余味。
- 阅读时不妨对照自己家乡的同类物件与用法，做一份个人生活史笔记。
- 可与家庭中的长辈一起读，把书中的场景当作口述访谈的引子，记录家族记忆。
About the publisher
Yunnan People's Publishing House
China · Founded in 1951
Yunnan People's Publishing House is a comprehensive publisher with foreign literature and philosophical works as important publishing directions. Its representative books include Les Misérables (3 volumes), The Republic, Timaeus, Gitanjali, A Ship at Sea, a Horse in the Mountains: Poems of Lorca, On the Motion of the Heart and Blood, The Harmony of the World, and Xinmin Shuo, covering categories such as foreign literature, Western philosophy, literature, popular science, and history. Its author resources include Victor Hugo, Li Yumin, Plato, He Xiangdi, Song Jijie, Tagore, Xiao Xingzheng, and Federico García Lorca, among Chinese and foreign writers and translators. The press is adept at combining classic works with quality translations, balancing academic value and readability; public information on its fuller publishing features and plans is limited.
Contents
- The Spinning Top, a Whirling Childhood
- The Iron Hoop That Rolled Out a Handsome Boy
- Little Picture Books, Our Shared Memory
- When I Was Little, I Carried a Hand Warmer to School
- Remembering the Open-Air Square Movies
- Flavors of the Countryside
- The Childhood "Pig Bladder," Not an Empty Joy
- A Lamp Like a Bean, Lighting the Country Night
- The Stone Mill, Wisdom That Turns Without Rest
- The Water Mill, an Ancient Rolling Ballad
- The Water Pestle—the Bumping, Clattering Country Life
- The Flail, the Earliest Threshing Machine
- The Palm-Bark Rain Cape—the Oldest Raincoat
- No Wind or Rain Beneath the Bamboo Hat
- The Wheelbarrow, the Earliest "Tractor"
- The Straw Mat, One Warp and One Weft for a Thousand Years
- Straw Sandals, Once the Fashion
- Thatched House · Earthen Stove · Cooking Smoke
- The Brick and Tile Kiln, a Thousand-Year Song of "Every Family Housed"
- Building Wind-and-Rain Walls from Pounded Earth
- The Years of Walls Built from Earth Blocks
- The Well Brimming with Nostalgia
- The Village Carpenter, Fading into the Distance
- The Wooden Bucket, a Lost Cultural Imprint
- The Double-Cassette Recorder, Youth from Side A to Side B
- The Fountain Pen, When "Hero" Had Nowhere Left to Shine
- The Colorful Life Inside Black-and-White Photographs
- A Wristwatch, My Own Affordable Luxury
- "Seeing Your Words Is Like Seeing You," Affection and Friendship at the Tip of the Pen
- Hand Weaving, a Fading Memory
- Forty Years Ago, Work-Point Rating in the Countryside
FAQ
这本书与三联书店“新知文库”中的书是同一本吗？
不是。《变迁》为云南人民出版社2021年出版的王琨楼散文集，与生活·读书·新知三联书店“新知文库”系列图书无关，仅因电子书合集收录而得名。
这本书是学术著作还是一家之言？
它属于个人回忆性质的散文集，作者以亲历者身份记叙乡村与城市生活的变化，带有民间口述色彩，并非严格的社会学或史学研究专著。
没经历过那个年代的读者读得懂吗？
可以。书中对石磨、水碓、连械、蓑衣等物件的来历与用途都有具体描述，年轻读者可借此了解上一两代人的日常生活，只是少了一分熟悉的亲切感。
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