I am a literary giant in Japan

From a geographical point of view, Japan and Greece are both located in the Eastern Hemisphere and Northern Hemisphere of the blue planet, but in fact the straight-line distance between the two countries is about 9430 kilometers, and the flying distance is even longer.

In 1998, there were no direct flights from Tokyo's new international airport to Athens, Greece.

Taking the two little ones into consideration, Kitagawa Hide compromised and chose Qatar Airways, which had the shortest flight time.

During this period, the family of four will rest for four hours in Doha, the capital of Qatar, and then set off again, arriving at Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport at noon the next day.

20 hours later.

At 11 noon on November 21, Hide Kitagawa and his family got off the plane smoothly in Athens, Greece.

Greece has a typical Mediterranean climate, with dry and hot summers and mild and rainy winters as its main characteristics. From November to February, the average temperature is about 11°, which is quite comfortable and pleasant.

Even in the relatively cold capital Athens, snowfall is only seen occasionally in the coldest month of February, when the overall daytime temperature remains around 2°.

Because he brought two cute little ones this time, Kitagawa Hide was worried that they would not be able to acclimate to the climate in a foreign country, so he did not start the trip directly on the day of landing, but stayed at the Four Seasons Hotel Astir Palace in Athens for one night.

That night.

"My dear! This is too expensive! Just a simple stay for one night costs 1500 drachmas!"

Mengzi, who had just coaxed the two little ones to sleep on the soft white bed, couldn't help but complain to Kitagawa Hide who was typing at the desk.

In her hand was the bill that the waiter had just brought. The total consumption for their family of four tonight was about 1987 drachmas, of which the room fee was 1500 drachmas!

The drachma is the official currency of Greece and is issued by the Central Bank of Greece.

After the European Union was officially established on January 1999, 1, Greece adopted the euro and has never changed since then.

Compared to the euro, the Greek drachma exchange rate is very unstable and fluctuates drastically almost every day.

At this time, the exchange rate of drachma to yen was about 1 drachma to 88 yen.

In other words, the room rate for Kitagawa Hide's family of four tonight is about 13.2 yen, which is about one-third of the monthly salary of a Japanese office worker. Even though this is the most luxurious five-star hotel in Athens, it is indeed very expensive.

The most crucial thing is that the drachma exchange rate is unstable. Mengzi inquired and found that 1 drachma could only be exchanged for 71 yen yesterday, but it inexplicably increased by 17 yen today. In other words, they lost 2.55 yen in one day.

Mengzi, who has always been frugal, certainly couldn't stand such an outrageous thing.

Kitagawa Hide was typing while listening to his wife's complaints, then he smiled calmly and said, "It is normal for the exchange rate to fluctuate greatly recently. After all, the European Union is about to be established, and it is estimated that it will not be long before the drachma will become a thing of the past in Greece.

As long as you don’t buy a lot of drachmas, this small change doesn’t matter at all.”

With the current size of the Kitagawa family, let alone a mere tens of thousands of yen, even if two or three zeros were added to the end, Kitagawa Hide wouldn't even blink an eye if he suffered a loss.

"That's true." Mengzi pursed her lips. Her current private savings were close to 11 figures, and she couldn't even feel the change of such a small amount of money.

But I'm just very angry!
After complaining, Mengzi didn't want to disturb Kitagawa Hide any further, so she just lay on the bed and looked at the pile of small gifts brought by the waiter.

Although the room rates and various expenses are ridiculously expensive, the Four Seasons Hotel Astir Palace has also done very well in other aspects and deserves the title of the first luxury hotel in Athens.

The total value of the small gifts given upon check-in is no less than 300 drachmas.

Mengzi pedaled her bicycle towards the air and found an interesting thing from a pile of small gifts.

VIP tickets to the Royal Theatre of Greece.

The hotel gave them a total of four VIP theater tickets that could be used within a week based on the number of guests staying in the hotel.

As long as they have these tickets, the family can go to the nearby Royal Theatre of Greece to watch plays at any time, any show and any seat.

The guidebook the waiter brought included a list of recent Royal Opera House productions.

Yumeko, who graduated from the Faculty of Literature, loves watching dramas. When she was in China, she was one of the die-hard fans of Japanese Noh drama and would go to watch one or two performances almost every month.

Like the dramas next door, Japanese Noh, Greek classical drama, and British and American dramas have all declined somewhat and cannot keep up with the trend of modernization.

Especially in Western countries, there are a large number of new forms of entertainment such as symphonies, which make the declining drama even more decadent.

The Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded to playwrights many times in recent years, and the Royal Theater of Greece directly gave away such expensive VIP tickets as gifts, which shows that the literary circles of various countries do not want this cultural treasure to decline completely.

Unfortunately, it seems that this method of rescue is not very effective, and the decline of drama seems to be inevitable.

Kitagawa Hide did not experience the Shakespearean era when drama was at its most prosperous. When he came of age, the theatrical culture of various countries in history was also declining one by one.

He didn't have much interest in or idea about theatrical culture, but every time he saw the actors on the huge ancient stage next door singing hard to the sparse audience, he always felt a sense of loneliness that only belongs to literati.

This time it’s drama, won’t it be physical literature and pure literature next time?
After the millennium, with the increasing development of the Internet, physical novels have indeed become less and less popular year by year, and fewer and fewer people go to bookstores and newsstands to buy books and magazines.

Everyone is holding mobile phones and other electronic products, using short videos, electronic games and other things to fill their fragmented time. Even the once popular online novels are becoming less and less popular, not to mention physical books and pure literature, which are the tears of this era.

Therefore, when he heard Mengzi talking about drama again, Kitagawa Hide, who had been typing non-stop, stopped his work for the first time and turned to look at her.

"Remember when we climbed over the wall to watch the Noh play together in high school?"

Kitagawa Hide couldn't tell Mengzi about his experiences in his past life, so he had to use their shared memories to introduce the topic.

Mengzi was stunned for a moment, then nodded and smiled, "Of course I remember. At that time, you and Rei-chan were very accommodating to me. Because I loved watching Noh and Kyogen, you both skipped classes to watch with me.

But I remember that we went there more often and Li-chan couldn't stand it anymore. As soon as she left school, she went straight to the pachinko arcade and ignored us completely. "

"Haha, yeah. I didn't expect that in the blink of an eye, it was already more than ten years ago."

Kitagawa Hide was talking about their high school memories, but what was running through his mind was his past life next door.

"Yumeko-chan, why don't you take the two little ones to the theater tomorrow?"

"Eh? Tomorrow?" Mengzi knew Kitagawa Hide's travel habits. The next day after landing, he would visit all the interesting and fun places in the local area and then eat a lot.

Kitagawa Hide is a person who doesn't like his plans to be disrupted, and in this regard, Yumeko will be very accommodating and supportive of him.

I didn't expect that this time, he would take the initiative to break his own principles.

"Yeah." Kitagawa Hide nodded with a smile.

"Great! Then I'm going to pick a play carefully and go to bed early so that I can have plenty of energy to watch the play tomorrow!"

Mengzi raised her fist and was obviously much happier. She actually had a lot of things she wanted to do and see.

But under traditional Japanese education, housewives are like castrated cats. It is difficult for them to have their own thoughts and they dare not express their demands to their partners.

This has nothing to do with their occupation, ability or wealth, but is the pure influence of traditional Japanese bridal training.

The benefit of this kind of bridal practice is that it prepares a very virtuous and capable wife for the man before marriage.

The downside is that some of these housewives may cheat on their husbands, become mentally ill or even kill their husbands over time because their self is suppressed too much.

Therefore, after entering the new era, with the disappearance of traditional Japanese education, traditional bridal training has also become the tears of the times.

Kitagawa Hide didn't think so much. He had a positive view on love and always treated Yumeko equally.

Seeing his young wife smile, he was also happy from the bottom of his heart.

After traveling through time and space and choosing this kind of life, isn't it just to make yourself, the people you care about, and the people around you live happier?

noon the next day.

The Kitagawa Hide family, who were lying on their comfortable big beds, were awakened by a notification call from the hotel.

It turned out that Tokyo, more than 9000 kilometers away, was suddenly in a frenzy because the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and Kawaide Shobo had announced "1Q84" in advance.

After Kawaide Shobo spent nearly 1 million yen to hang up the concept posters of "84Q" at various transportation hubs in Tokyo, readers were excitedly discussing what kind of novel this would be.

Judging from the books written by Kitagawa Hide recently, such as "Hanzawa Naoki", "Asakusa Red Group", "Tokyo People", "White Tower", "The Villain", etc., except for "The Little Prince" which was deliberately written for children, his writing style is obviously moving towards a more documentary direction.

But the title of this book is too abstract, and no one can guess what the subject of his new book will be.

Even so, readers' enthusiasm for Kitagawa Hide's new book remained unabated, which really shocked the conservative writers headed by Nagai Kazukaze.

".Nagai Kazufu was obviously frightened by the readers' high expectations of you, Kitagawa.

He had lived in Europe for many years before, and our overseas market had not yet expanded there. When he was called back, he certainly had no idea how terrifying your influence was in the world.

He seemed to be really panicking when he found out that just a book title could arouse such a big response! He even asked the two major financial groups to add money to do a wave of publicity and promotion.

Saito Reina said excitedly on the phone.

Originally, the two major conglomerates increasing their stakes and adding more money would have made them even more anxious, but with Kitagawa Hide's support and after learning the real reason why they added the money, they were no longer worried.

The reason for calling was purely to tell Kitagawa Hide the good news, and to let him relax overseas and not rush to get "1Q84" out.

Kitagawa Hide didn't care much about these things. In the end, quality is king in literary creation. In his eyes, Nagai Kazufu, who always wanted to rely on tricks to deal with him, was no different from Tanizaki Ichiro, Arima Yoshiyoshi and others.

After Nagai Kazufu was defeated, the seven "world's best" in the old Japanese literary world almost all withdrew from the stage of history.

This era once belonged to them, and also to people like Kitagawa Hide, but ultimately it belongs to the writers of the new era.

Overthrowing the conservatives, strengthening the new forces, and then supporting a new group of "the best in the world" to come to power, is what Kitagawa Hideo was going to do by the end of 1998!

"Oh, by the way, a medical professor named Tang Ze Minxing called me a few days ago and said that he couldn't get in touch with you. Would you like to call me back if possible?"

After she finished talking about everything, she realized that the call was an international one. Saito Rena quickly explained the last thing and then hung up the phone in a hurry.

Like Mengzi, although she had already achieved financial freedom, every time she had to make a big purchase, her heart would always skip a beat and she would subconsciously start saving money.

"Professor Tang Ze?"

Hearing that Toshiyuki Karasawa had come to see him many times, Kitagawa Hide was puzzled and called the office of the full professor of the First Department of Surgery of the Affiliated Hospital of the University of Tokyo.

I don’t know if it was because of the time difference or because the other end was too busy, but Kitagawa Hideichi called three times in a row and no one answered.

Unable to contact Toshiyuki Karasawa, Kitagawa Hide had to give up and went to the nearby Royal Theatre of Greece with his family.

Because it was the weekend and it was just past lunchtime, the streets were full of indigenous people who came out to relax.

In the 90s, Greece was not yet a tourist destination, and there were few Asian faces here.

Kitagawa Hide's family of four are all good-looking, with a rare oriental appearance, which immediately attracted the attention of many natives.

The play that Mengzi chose was "Oedipus Rex" written by the famous ancient Greek playwright Sophocles. Aristotle once highly praised this play as the most classic "perfect tragedy".

The heroine of "Oedipus Rex" is the very famous Greek drama actress Katina Paxino, who is said to be the dream goddess of all Greek men.

Therefore, there were a large number of people watching this play, and a long black queue formed at the narrow ticket gate.

Mengzi, who is quite familiar with theatrical culture, observed her surroundings excitedly while giving Kitagawa Hide and the two little ones some basic knowledge about Greek drama.

"Oedipus Rex is based on the Greek myth about Oedipus killing his father and marrying his mother. It is a very classic and typical Greek tragic conflict - the conflict between man and fate."

Mengzi pointed at the beautiful poster in her hand and said excitedly,
“There are actually many stories in Greek mythology about humans rebelling against gods and fate, but in order to highlight the tragic color, they are all like Oedipus, who ultimately lost to fate.

After learning a lot about Greek drama, I suddenly felt that there seemed to be nothing wrong with tragedy.

Only this kind of spirit of knowing clearly that "God's revelation" cannot be violated but still obeying it can truly affirm the spirit of personal freedom.

Isn't that right, dear?"

Whenever Yumeko talks about literary topics that interest her, she instantly transforms from the gentle Yamato Nadeshiko into the chattering literary girl she is now.

As she spoke, perhaps realizing that her behavior was a bit out of line and rude, she quickly pursed her lips, hugged Kitagawa Toru, shrank her head, and stopped talking.

Kitagawa Hide actually liked her free and easy look, and after patting her head gently, he smiled and replied, "Yes, you are right.

Only tragedy can bring out the charm of this spirit of personal freedom.

If you just write about a happy ending, you won’t be able to convey the profound ideological connotations to the audience.”

"If you only write about happy endings, you won't be able to convey the profound connotations to the audience.
Sir, you are absolutely right!
Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to eavesdrop on your conversation with your wife."

An old man in a suit standing behind them suddenly interrupted, then immediately took off his hat to apologize to the two of them and introduced himself.

"My name is George Seferis, and I am also a big fan of Greek drama." (End of this chapter)