The Republic of Wine by Mo Yan

exuberantly drunk; the aroma intoxicated constellations, which winked happily and swayed in the sky, like little urchins on swings; intoxicated fish in the river hid among lithe water weeds and spat out sticky, richly mellow air bubbles. To be sure, birds braving the cold night air drank in the aroma of liquor as they flew overhead, including two densely feathered owls, and even some field voles chomping grass in their underground dens. On this spot of land, full of life in spite of the cold, many sentient beings shared in the enjoyment of man’s contribution, and sacred feelings were thus born. ‘The popularity of liquor begins with the sage kings, though some say Yi Di, and others Du Kang.’ Liquor flows among the gods. Why do we offer it as a sacrifice to our ancestors and to release the imprisoned souls of the dead? That night I understood. It was the moment of my initiation. On that night a spirit sleeping within me awakened, and I was in touch with a mystery of the universe, one that transcends the power of words to describe, beautiful and gentle, tender and kind, moving and sorrowful, moist and redolent … do you all understand? He stretched his arms out to the audience, as they craned their necks toward him. We sat there bug-eyed, our mouths open, as if we wanted to go up to see, then eat, a miraculous potion lying in the palm of his hands, which were, in fact, empty.
    The colors emanating from your eyes are incredibly moving. Only people who speak to God can create colors like that. You see sights we cannot see, you hear sounds we cannot hear, you smell odors we cannot smell. What grief we feel! When speech streams from that organ called your mouth, it is like a melody, a rounded, flat river, a silken thread from the rear end of a spider waving gossamerlike in the air, the size of a chicken’s egg, just as smooth and glossy, and every bit as wholesome. We are intoxicated by that music, we drift in that river, we dance on that silken spider thread, we see God. But before we see Him, we watch our own corpses float down the river…
    Why were the owls’ screeches so gentle that night, like the pillow talk of lovers? Because there was liquor in the air. Why were geese, wild and domestic, coupling in the freezing night, when it wasn’t even the mating season? Again, because there was liquor in the air. My nose twitched spiritedly. Fang Nine asked in a soft, muffled voice:
    â€˜Why are you scrunching up your nose like that? Going to sneeze?’
    â€˜Liquor,’ I said. I smell liquor!’
    They scrunched up their noses too. Seventh Uncle’s nose was amass of wrinkles.
    â€˜I don’t smell liquor,’ he said. ‘Where is it?’
    My thoughts were galloping. ‘Sniff the air,’ I said, ‘sniff it.’
    Their eyes darted all around the room, searching every corner. Seventh Uncle picked up the grass mat covering the brick bed, to which Seventh Aunt reacted angrily:
    â€˜What are you looking for? You think there’s liquor here in bed? You amaze me!’
    Seventh Aunt was an intellectual, as I said earlier, so she was amazed.’ Back when she was still a newlywed, she criticized my mother for washing the rice so hard she scrubbed away all the ‘vitamins.’ ‘Vitamins’ had my mother gaping in stupefaction.
    The smell of liquor includes protein, ethers, acids, and phenols, as well as calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, sodium, potassium, chlorine, sulfur, iron, copper, manganese, zinc, iodine, and cobalt, plus vitamins A, B, C, D, E, H, and some other materials - but look at me, listing the ingredients of liquor for you people, when your Professor Yuan Shuangyu knows them better than anyone -my father-in-law’s neck deltoids had reddened over being praised by Deputy Head Diamond Jin. I couldn’t see the excitement in his face, though basically I could, or nearly so - but there is a pervasive something in the smell of liquor that