What is the theme of Fortress Besieged?

Judging from the clues of the novel, the book focuses on what Fang Hung-chien saw and heard in Shanghai and the mainland after returning from studying abroad, and the love and marriage of Bao, Su, Tang and Sun run through the book. Objectively speaking, the discussion of love and marriage is indeed one of the themes of Fortress Besieged. In fact, the author Shen Ming Dow has clearly pointed out in the book: "I also talked to Bertie about her marriage and divorce. He quoted an old English proverb that marriage is like a golden birdcage. The birds outside the cage want to live in it, and the birds inside want to fly out. So leave, leave, and there will be no games. " Miss Su said, "There is also a saying in France. However, this is not a birdcage, but a besieged castle. People outside the city want to rush in, while people in the city want to escape. Hung-chien, isn't it? " Hung-chien shook his head to show that he didn't know. Some critics think that these two paragraphs are the titles of Fortress Besieged, which is the best interpretation of the meaning of Fortress Besieged. I don't think so. It should be admitted that the title of the novel Fortress Besieged was originally taken from the allusions of these two countries, and it is indeed a metaphor for marriage. But the function of these two paragraphs in the book is only to explain the origin of the word "besieged city", and it is definitely not the final explanation of the meaning of the book. In fact, in the preface, the author said very enlightened: "In this book, I want to write about a certain part of modern China society and a certain kind of characters. When writing this kind of people, I didn't forget that they are also people, just people with the basic roots of hairless bipeds. " Society is the society during the Anti-Japanese War; Characters refer to those new and old international students and all kinds of intellectual groups; Finally, the emphasis on "people" reminds us to explore deeply and not stay on the surface. In other words, as a classic novel, its theme is often not single, and the author explains that the meaning of "besieged city" obviously includes more than marriage and love. In the book, we see that the protagonist Fang Hung-chien returned to Shanghai from studying in Europe. Because of his love failure, he fell out with his nominal in-laws, and went to the mainland to enter the "besieged city" of San Lv University. Fang Hung-chien was in the filthy "dye vat" of San Lv University, and felt that it was not his ideal place either, so he had to go back to Shanghai. But at this time, Shanghai has been occupied by the Japanese, and the situation is sinister. Fang Hung-chien lost his job because he refused to serve the Japanese puppet government, and then fell out with his wife. The final result is to leave Shanghai again. This extends the metaphor of "besieged city", a person's psychological state, to "everything in life" This is the extension and deepening of marriage like a besieged city. It is not difficult to find in the book that the protagonist Fang Hung-chien has repeatedly expressed his feelings in the article: In fact, Fang Hung-chien came and went in the two besieged cities of university and Shanghai, and finally failed to find the answer. The failure of love, marriage and career is like the evil forces lurking in him. This kind of anguish and hesitation about life and the pursuit of life can also be understood as the anguish and hesitation about the future life of China people under the siege of China during the Anti-Japanese War. Or the confusion of western military, cultural and economic invasion of China in the 20th century. If we study it carefully and deeply, we will also find that the concept of the word "besieged city" can also rise to a philosophy of life, surpassing the times reflected in the novel. It discusses the specific setbacks and failures of life to people, and then shows the macro level of human spiritual dilemma. In the preface to Fortress Besieged, Qian Zhongshu reminded readers: "When writing this kind of people, I didn't forget that they are human beings, just people, with the basic roots of hairless biped." That is, the ultimate goal of Fortress Besieged is all mankind, which is a philosophical thinking of life. In the second half of the novel, there is a lot of discussion about this philosophy. For example, in the eighth chapter of the book, Fang Hung-chien talked with Sun Roujia about the fate of reunion on the boat back to Shanghai, and the people he met on the boat were also inevitable by accident. Fang Hung-chien said, "It's like turning on the radio. When you turn the needle on the surface, you hear half a sentence of Peking Opera from a radio station in the east and half a sentence of report from a radio station in the west. Suddenly, half a foreign song, half a Kunqu opera, and pieces of trouble, all inexplicably together. But every broken fragment, in the program broadcast by your own radio station, has its ups and downs, which is not nonsense. Just identify a radio station and listen to it to understand its meaning. " Sun Roujia complained: The last chapter of the novel is the most philosophical chapter in the book, and it is also the center of the theme of Fortress Besieged, which covers the whole book. The most typical philosophy is the old clock that Mr. Fang gave his son, which is seven minutes slow every hour. At the end of the novel, Fang Hung-chien fell asleep and suddenly knocked six times: six o'clock was five hours ago, and Hung-chien was walking home, trying to be nice to Jou-chia and persuading him not to upset the couple about yesterday; Jou-chia was at home waiting for Hung-chien to come back for dinner, hoping that he would make up with menstruation and work in her factory. This untimely opportunity inadvertently contains the irony and sadness of life, which is deeper than all languages and all smiles. This philosophical fable particularly profoundly expresses the uncertainty of modern life. That old clock, which loses seven minutes per hour, is a symbol of Fang Hung-chien, the history of China and the people. He is a self-lost person in time, and he is also a lost, stagnant and dead-end person in time. To sum up, we can easily get the theme of Fortress Besieged: on the surface, it describes the hesitation and loss of life pursuit such as marriage, love and career, and then implies that life is like a besieged city. Due to the limitations of human understanding, the yearning for desire is ultimately the result of disappointment, which ultimately leads people to explore the philosophical implications of life feelings.