Back to 80: My literary life.

Chapter 683 Winter Fishing
After washing up, Li Li slept in Ruirui's room, and they both got into the same bed.

The little girl was wearing pajamas. She looked sideways at Li Li next to her. Her big eyes rolled and she said, "Aunt, do you like my dad?"

"Ah?! Ruirui, don't talk nonsense! It won't be good if your mother hears it!" Li Li suddenly felt a little flustered and said hurriedly.

"I'm afraid my mother will hear it, so I'll speak softly. Auntie, do you like my dad?" The little girl leaned close to Li Li's ear and whispered.

What a little devil!

Of course Li Li still denied it.

"no."

"Then why are you so nice to my dad?" Ruirui asked again.

"Your father is a good man, of course I have to be nice to him." Li Li regained her composure and said with a smile.

"Don't think I'm a kid who doesn't understand anything, huh!" Ruirui pouted:
"I can see it. Look at my dad's eyes. The pretty aunts on TV look at uncles in the same way!"

Oh my God
Are children maturing so early nowadays?
Li Li felt a headache for a moment. After thinking for a while, she stretched out her arms and gently hugged the little girl: "Rui Rui, I can't like your father. Your mother and I are best sisters. Your mother loves your father very much. I can't do anything to let your mother down."

"Can't two women like the same man at the same time?" the little girl asked innocently, "I've seen a TV show about martial arts, where a brother liked several sisters."

A martial arts TV series?
Li Li remembered that after she came back, Xijing TV was broadcasting a Hong Kong and Taiwan martial arts film "The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber".

"Ruirui, the brother you are talking about is called Zhang Wuji, right? Although he liked several sisters, didn't he only marry one named Zhao Min in the end?" Li Li said.

"But if this happens, the other sisters will be very sad. That brother is not a good person at all." Ruirui said.

Me@#￥￥%
Li Li was both angry and amused.

I, a PhD in literature and a university professor, am actually no match for a little girl in elementary school!

She had no choice but to act like an elder: "Rui Rui, you are a child and you don't understand what adults say. You won't understand even if I tell you. You can't tell these words to anyone else from now on, not even to your mother, understand?!"

"Okay, go to bed quickly! You have to go to school tomorrow." Li Li pinched the corner of the quilt for the little girl.

"Then, auntie, you take me to school tomorrow."

"Okay, okay, I'll take you there. Go to bed quickly. Good night."

"Good night, aunt."

The little girl soon followed.

Li Li habitually wanted to turn on the light to read, but when she thought of the little girl following her, she had to hold back.

Thinking about what her little niece had just said, Li Li couldn't help but sigh softly.

No sleep tonight.

After Christmas, 1995 arrived quickly.

As soon as the New Year's Day holiday was over, the review meeting of the Second World Chinese Literature Award Reading Class was held as scheduled.

The meeting was still held in Tangcheng Hotel. During the ten-day meeting, the participants had intense discussions and finally, after three rounds of voting, the list of shortlisted literary works was announced.

25 works including Yu Hua's "To Live", Wang Xiaobo's "The Golden Age", Li Jing's "Parents' Love" and James Coleman's "Too Late" were successfully shortlisted.

As a member of the reading class, Fang Minghua can finally relax.

Today is January 15th, Sunday. Although this week is a short week, Fang Minghua got up early in the morning, packed up his fishing gear after breakfast, and drove out to fish.

Of course, he was not alone, Bai Miao and Jia Pingwa went with him. Since the beginning of last summer, Fang Minghua had taken Bai Miao to the Feng River to fish a few times, and Bai Miao also fell in love with this kind of entertainment. Both of them were rookies, so neither laughed at the other.

Besides, it’s better than playing mahjong in the house, right?

When Jia Pingwa discovered that the two of them were secretly doing this recreational activity, he immediately joined in. At first Fang Minghua thought he was a rookie like himself, but he didn't expect that this guy was quite proficient in fishing.

"My hometown, Dihua Town, which you have also been to, is located on the bank of Danjiang River. When I was a child, my family was poor, so I often went to the river to catch shrimps and fish. I would take an embroidery needle from home, burn it red and then twist it to make a fish hook. I would make the float from corn cores, and dig some earthworms from the mud by the river as bait, and then run to the river to fish." Jia Pingwa explained.

"We were poor back then. Not only were people hungry, but fish were hungry too, so fishing was easy. I would often catch a large basin of fish and shrimp and bring it home."

"Selling it for money too?" Fang Minghua asked.

"Sell? Maybe people in the city will want it, but no one in the country wants it. Minghua, you don't know that whether you steam or fry fish and shrimp, you must have vegetable oil, otherwise it will smell fishy. But at that time, each person only had two taels of vegetable oil per month, so how could they let you fry it?!"

"Now I go fishing purely to recall the good old days and think of the good old days." Jia Pingwa said at last, holding a cigarette.

Well, just go and reminisce about the good times, we are here for entertainment.

Today Fang Minghua first went to the Writers Association’s staff quarters to pick up Bai Miao and then headed straight to the Ba River.

Although it was winter and the sky was gloomy, it could not suppress the enthusiasm of the two men. They went fishing at a place called Three Lotus Flowers on the Ba River, on Ba Liu West Road. When they rushed over, they saw a Fukang car parked on the side of the road. The license plate number was Jia Pingwa's.

Sure enough, when Fang Minghua parked the car, he saw Jia Pingwa sitting on a stool fishing by the river not far away.

While fishing, he held a cigarette in his hand.

Although the weather was cold, the river had not yet frozen. The two men immediately picked up their fishing gear and folding stools and set up their positions around Jia Pingwa. With him around, they didn't have to look for a fish nest.

"Are you here? Where's Lu Yao? Didn't he clamor to come during the meeting two days ago?" Jia Pingwa greeted them when he saw them.

"Him? He's still perfecting his novel." Fang Minghua replied.

After hearing this, Jia Pingwa shook his head.

Lu Yao spent three full years writing the book "Collapse", but it still hasn't been finalized.

But that's just his temper.

If compared with Tang Dynasty poets, he belongs to the Kuyin school like Jia Dao.

None of the three are professional anglers, they just do it for fun, so they don't have to worry about not talking while fishing, they just chat while fishing.

As they chatted, they talked about the review meeting of the reading class. The three of them were all members of the reading class, so naturally they had something in common.

"I didn't expect that Wang Xiaobo's 'The Golden Age' would be shortlisted so easily. I thought it would cause a lot of controversy," said Jia Pingwa.

"Are you talking about those erotic descriptions?" Fang Minghua asked back.

"Yes, look at the plots written by Wang Xiaobo. The descriptions in my book Wasted City are nothing. You still insist on criticizing me. What a bunch of cowards!"

At the end, Jia Pingwa couldn't help but swear.

It seems that he is still brooding over the attacks on his book "Wasted City" in the literary world in the past two years.

But to be honest, compared with the euphemistic language used in Jia Pingwa's "Wasted City" to describe eroticism, Wang Xiaobo is much more straightforward in his "The Golden Age".

Even Jia Pingwa's good friend Bai Ye, deputy editor of China Social Sciences Press, commented: "The publication of The Golden Age almost killed all previous novels about sex!"

Before Fang Minghua could answer, Bai Miao beside him said, "Who made you, Jia Pingwa, so capable? In Minghua's words, you used Zhuang Zhidie to mock the intellectual elites of today. Who else should they scold if not you?!"

(End of this chapter)