Literature, Art and Practical Struggle

by Happy Lim
Translated by Eunice Chen
from East Wind Winter/Spring 1985

It was a beautiful evening when I quietly sat before the window and enjoyed the scenery, my writing paper spread on my desk. I gazed at the vast heaven of this foreign country where there was a white floating cloud and a wisp of light smoke. Watching the gradually deepening dusk, my heart grew serene and peaceful, just like the air surrounding me. But I realized that as gorgeous as the landscape might be, it did not touch off my nostalgia the way my motherland did. What it reminded me of was a poem by Wang Can, "Climbing the Tower":

"Beautiful though is not my land,
What is it worth my stay!"

I thought of the time during the '30's when America encountered an unprecedented economic crisis and the people suffered from what they had never experienced before. Same as the numerous unknown poor, I had lived in hunger and cold and felt deeply depressed. There had been something that excited me, however: the knowledge of the vicissitude of human fate indicating that society moved forward amid savage and testing billows of life. And this awakening aligned me with those undaunted fighters who stood to parade the times of theirs.

I admired the ambitions and progressive thoughts of this great time, as well as the people of high character who lived then. I could not but believe and follow them to fight for the truth and a brighter future. I remember that on a silent night, I decided to dry my tears and start to write, epitomizing, in my poems, the rigor and bitterness of reality, as well as advocating that we must work with the suffering and progressive people of our time to strive for a better place to live. As for myself, I had to continue to write.

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Painting by Happy Lim