By accident, I came across the simplified version of Jean-Christophe when finishing my junior middle school. How amazing ! I was so absorbed by Jean-Christophe’s sprit towards truth , love and art .Then I found its author Romain Rolland(1866-1944).
He is a French novelist, dramatist, essayist, mystic,pacifist, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1915.Apparently , he is outstanding .From my standpoint , his best workis Jean-Christophe, which was a ten-volume novel , finished between1904 and 1912 and tells an epic story of a German musical genius.It is so great that I had read its Chinese version twice.
It has 1200 pages ,so large. Before Jean-Christophe, Rolland had already published a biography on Beethoven in 1903. Although this work was partly based on the life of the composer, it also took elements from Mozart’s and Wagner’s careers. Rolland portrayed his main character as a heroic figure, a fighter for social justice. He is abrave, uncompromising soul. “He would rather die than live by illusion. Was not Art also an illusion? No. It must not be. Truth!Truth! Eyes wide open, let him draw in through every pore theall-puissant breath of life, see things as they are, squarely face his misfortunes,–and laugh.” (from Jean-Christophe, vol. I) After killing a policeman, Christophe flees to Switzerland, and starts his career as a composer. He returns to Paris as a celebrated artist, and dies there. In the end his life rejoins the River of Life. It earned Rolland the Nobel Prize. In his later works he remained faithful to the Romantic idea of the artist as a lonely genius.
I also know that Romain Rolland had an effect in politics,history art and others. Among Rolland’s other works are several psychological biographies of artists and politicians (Michelangelo,Danton, Beethoven, Tolstoy etc.).However , it is difficult for me.
I think , people eat to live , not live to eat.What is life and how to make a meaningful life ? Everything are insignificance and nothing is worth my hard work .But Romain Rolland told me, truth and justice is of the extremely importance and there is being many things that mislead the truth and justice.A hero is those acting not for the suffering of himself but of others. We should tend to be a hero, and help others to rebuild the order of society. So long as there is injustice , we should fight with it .Meaning of life is not in my heart , but others’ need.This is the meaning of life.I am not longer confused.