The short story "Pumpkin" is not widely noticed, but the elderly man's homemade "broom" in the article has sparked heated discussions among classical literature enthusiasts.
Before writing this article, I asked the teachers in the county history compilation group what this thing is called. 👇
As a child, I often saw my grandmother using it to scrub the large iron pot.
Pour in a little hot water, use this bamboo brush to scrub in circles, and after cleaning, a few scoops easily remove the dirty water from the pot. The technique is skilled, clean, and neat, like practicing Tai Chi.
Nowadays, non-stick pans can cost hundreds or thousands; the key to their expense is the non-stick coating. If this bamboo brush is used to scrub, it damages the coating, and the pot becomes useless.
You can often still see these bamboo brushes for sale at the market, with young people treating them as handicrafts.
I remember there is another type of bamboo brush, a bit longer than the one for pots, used for cleaning toilets. People in Shanghai call it "Huan Xian," which seems to have a source, but I won't introduce it in this article.
So, what is the bamboo brush for pots called in the local dialect?
"Xian Zhou" sounds like "Xian Zhao." When I asked a few elderly villagers, they each had their own interpretations of which character "xian" refers to; some said it means wash, some said fresh, and others said immortal.
"Washing broom," literally understood, sounds similar and looks similar, referring to the bamboo brush used for washing pots. But in the local dialect, "wash" is pronounced as "qiang," as in "qiang yichang" (washing clothes) and "qiang ren" (taking a shower). According to this pronunciation, locals should call it "qiang zhou," which is clearly not the case. Therefore, this "wash" is a product of folk wisdom, translated based on sound, shape, and meaning.
"Fresh broom" is a direct translation; although the pronunciation is the same, the meaning is different. It can be understood as a small broom made from fresh bamboo for washing pots.
"Immortal broom" also has the same pronunciation but a different meaning, and this term is even more interesting. It is said that every year on the 23rd or 24th day of the twelfth lunar month, during the Kitchen God Festival, families set up offerings on their stoves, including tea, pastries, and fruits. The immortal broom, as a tool for scrubbing pots on the stove, is naturally also offered, ensuring that the food cooked is fragrant and auspicious.
A word changes with the times. Ten years ago, "professor" and "expert" represented authority in the knowledge community; they would step in to represent the final opinion and outcome of a certain viewpoint or event, but now they have become derogatory terms.
In the article "Pumpkin," I used "washing broom" mainly for convenience. When I wanted to use the character "xian," you would find that the input method is far away, making it cumbersome to find.
Currently, new words are as numerous as stars, with terms specific to the system; internet slang; and symbols that avoid sensitivity by using numbers and letters. Every year, official media releases a list of popular internet terms. It is evident that creating new words is a trend in popular culture.
In the current global universal model data training set, Chinese corpus accounts for only 1.3%. In a country with a rich culture spanning five thousand years, claiming to be the number one in cultural output to the universe, why is the proportion of training data for artificial intelligence so low?
Professionals respond: High-quality corpus should possess seven characteristics: diversity, large scale, legality, authenticity, coherence, non-bias, and non-harmfulness.
Why can't Chinese corpus achieve these seven characteristics? I have no answer.
Dialects are nearly disappearing; why bother with which "xian"?
I think it's not a big deal; I can use any word, and even creating a new word is fine, as long as everyone can understand that this word represents a cleaning tool made of bamboo for scrubbing pots.
But I see a few elderly people in the group tirelessly discussing the origin of "xian," and while I am touched, I can't help but feel a bit sad. Writers today can only chew over an obscure character, with a sign on the desk saying "Do not discuss national affairs." This is the only way; what else can be done?
Classical literature enthusiast Teacher Yuan said:
"Reading 'xian zhou' as 'washing broom' is understandable, as the pronunciation is the same but the characters are different, or the sounds and characters are all different. However, writing 'xian zhou' as 'washing broom' in an article is absolutely unacceptable, because the radicals and strokes of Chinese characters have their own rules for forming words, such as pictographs, phonetic characters, and meanings, which are established by convention. This is the difference between spoken and written language. Imagine if 'xian zhou' were written as 'washing broom'; years later, if everyone has differing opinions and confusion, dictionary editors would have to painstakingly reference and cite, which could potentially become a historical case."
Folk culture researcher Teacher Jiang said:
"Choosing the character 'wash' in dialects is their cleverness; cleaning tools do not remain limited to bamboo. They need to be developed and advanced... The high-end vocabulary of literati (xian). Common people use practical language (wash). No need for pictographs; lacking culture (the urban dialect uses 'wash'), which is understandable. Because 'xian zhou' originally means bamboo broom."
My understanding is that if writing an essay, using "wash" is fine; for academic articles, "xian" is more appropriate.
Since the dictionary has this word, why create a new one? Seeking convenience and casually creating a new word causes many inconveniences and misunderstandings for future generations. If everyone casually creates new words, where does a dialect word originate from? Who can still clarify?
My habit of casually creating new words may stem from: first, laziness; second, the inertia of converting traditional characters to simplified ones, where seeing an obscure character makes me want to replace it with a simpler character; third, ideological castration, where the old is considered bad, and unfamiliar characters should be discarded, with modern people using modern characters.
My conclusion: If a dialect has a word with a definite reference, it is best to use the original word.
Years later, when encountering dialects, visitors may have to go to a museum. When they see a "xian zhou," they will be interested, and the guide will quickly step forward and say, "Everyone, look closely, this is a brush made of bamboo, called 'immortal broom,' and it is said that every year during the lunar calendar..."