The Empty Chair Will Not Remain Empty Forever
作者：郑伟 2025年7月15日
编辑：赵杰 责任编辑：罗志飞 鲁慧文 翻译：鲁慧文
2025年7月13日，刘晓波先生逝世八周年。我们在洛杉矶圣莫尼卡海滩，摆放了一把象征“自由”的巨椅，手捧蜡烛，献上鲜花，为这位在囚笼中离世的诺贝尔和平奖得主，为那些仍在国内因言获罪、无处凭吊的良心犯，也为我们自己内心尚未熄灭的希望，留下一席之地。
2010年奥斯陆的诺贝尔颁奖礼。当天，刘晓波无法到场领奖，一把空椅子摆在台上，那是全世界对中国言论自由的一次无声凝视。今天，我们把这把椅子放到太平洋边，风从海上吹来，它提醒着我们：自由尚未抵达，空椅子依旧空着。
当我们在这片沙滩纪念刘晓波时，我也会想到：在大洋彼岸，浙江的钱塘江边，也曾有七位爱好自由的人，用献花和烛光纪念他，却因此身陷囹圄至今未得自由。多少年来，这样的故事一再发生：悼念成了罪名，记忆成了禁忌，可正因如此，我们才更不能沉默。
这场纪念，参与者有为争取民主自由而坐过牢的朱虞夫前辈，八九六四民运领袖王丹老师，也有刚刚逃离中国大陆来到美国的年轻人，有人流亡多年，有人家人至今在墙内承受打压；有人在八九年就与刘晓波并肩，也有人只是在读到《零八宪章》时，忽然明白“自由”二字意味着什么。我们都在这里，都是普通人。我们在风里手捧一根根蜡烛，不是要点亮什么宏大叙事，只是为了告诉自己：记住他，记住他所相信的，别让这把椅子永远空着。
有人问我，这样做有什么用？这世界冷漠久了，很多人不再相信纪念有什么意义。但我始终觉得，纪念是抵抗的一部分。当一个政权极力抹去真相、封锁历史、让人们彼此隔绝，那么哪怕我们只是一群在沙滩上点蜡烛、读诗的人，也在证明：总有人还记得。
刘晓波说过：“我没有敌人。”对一个用尽残酷手段对付他的体制来说，这是何等的羞辱，也是一种了不起的勇气。即便在牢狱里，他仍然相信温和的力量，相信通过理性和沟通推动中国走向宪政与自由。可他为此付出了生命的代价。他未竟的梦想，落在我们每个人的肩上。
这些年来，我见过无数个晓波：被逼离家乡的作家，因仗义执言而被喝茶的年轻人，声援香港反送中被帽子叔叔殴打的女生，举牌拉横幅的异议者……他们未必彼此相识，却在同一条通往自由的路上，结成一张看不见的网。这张网，就是晓波留给我们的遗产——一种不肯麻木、不肯遗忘、不肯屈服的精神。
此刻，海浪一遍遍翻腾，乌云也遮住了星光，风从大陆的方向吹来。我始终相信，总有一天，这把椅子会有人坐上去。不是因为一个人伟大到能改变一切，而是因为越来越多人选择记得、选择站出来，选择为自由留一把椅子。
愿晓波安息。愿我们不负这把空椅子背后的意义。
自由不会永远缺席，只要我们还记得。
The Empty Chair Will Not Remain Empty Forever
By Zheng Wei, July 15, 2025
Editor: Zhao Jie | Chief Editors: Luo Zhifei, Huiwen Lu | Translation: Huiwen Lu
On July 13, 2025, the eighth anniversary of Liu Xiaobo’s death, we gathered on the beach of Santa Monica in Los Angeles. We placed a giant chair—symbolizing “freedom”—in the sand, lit candles, offered flowers, and left a space not only for the Nobel Peace Prize laureate who died in captivity, but also for the prisoners of conscience still silenced in China, and for the hope that continues to burn within ourselves.
At the Nobel Prize ceremony in Oslo in 2010, Liu Xiaobo was unable to attend. In his place stood an empty chair on the stage—an unspoken gaze from the world upon China’s suppression of free speech. Today, we placed that chair by the Pacific Ocean. The wind blew from across the sea, and the chair reminded us: freedom has not yet arrived. The chair remains empty.
As we honored Liu Xiaobo on this beach, I thought of the other side of the ocean—on the banks of the Qiantang River in Zhejiang—where seven people who cherished freedom once lit candles and offered flowers in his memory. For that act, they remain in prison to this day. Such stories have repeated themselves over the years: mourning becomes a crime, and memory a taboo. But precisely because of this, we cannot remain silent.
Among those who participated in this vigil were elder Zhu Yufu, who was imprisoned for fighting for democracy; Wang Dan, a prominent leader of the 1989 student movement; young people who had just escaped from mainland China; and others who had lived in exile for years, whose families remain under persecution inside China. Some once stood shoulder to shoulder with Liu Xiaobo in 1989; others only came to understand the meaning of “freedom” upon reading Charter 08. We are all here. We are ordinary people. Holding candles in the wind, we are not trying to ignite some grand narrative—only to remind ourselves: remember him, remember what he believed in. Don’t let this chair remain empty forever.
Some have asked me, “What’s the point of this?” In a world numbed by indifference, many no longer believe that remembrance has meaning. But I have always believed: to remember is to resist. When a regime spares no effort to erase truth, block history, and isolate people from each other, then even a group of people lighting candles and reading poems on a beach is proof that someone still remembers.
Liu Xiaobo once said, “I have no enemies.” To a regime that treated him with utter brutality, this was a profound humiliation—and an extraordinary act of courage. Even in prison, he held firm to the belief in nonviolence, in reason and dialogue, as the path toward constitutional democracy and liberty in China. For this belief, he paid the ultimate price. His unfinished dream now rests on all of us.
Over the years, I have seen countless Xiaobos: writers forced from their homes, young people harassed for speaking truth, girls beaten by plainclothes thugs for supporting Hong Kong’s protests, dissidents holding banners in lonely defiance… They may not know each other, but they are all on the same road to freedom. Together they form an invisible web—a legacy Liu Xiaobo left behind. A spirit that refuses to grow numb, refuses to forget, refuses to submit.
Tonight, the waves crash again and again. The clouds have obscured the stars. The wind is blowing from the direction of the mainland. And yet, I still believe: one day, someone will sit in that chair. Not because a single person is powerful enough to change everything, but because more and more people choose to remember, choose to stand up, choose to keep a chair for freedom.
May Liu Xiaobo rest in peace.
May we live worthy of the meaning behind that empty chair.
Freedom will not be absent forever—so long as we remember.
