Literary Master 1978.

Chapter 137 Is Xiaolin going to the Literature Institute?
Time passed little by little, and when it was almost half past nine, the award ceremony was about to begin. Several directors, deputy directors and leaders of the Cultural Association of the jury walked onto the podium.

The chairman of this jury was Mao Dun, and there were three deputy chairmen, namely Zhou Yang, Ba Jin and Liu Baiyu. There were also Zhang Guangnian and others from the Writers Association.

After several people came on stage, Mr. Mao Dun gave a speech first. The old man is now the leader of the Writers Association and the chairman of this year's jury, so it is reasonable for him to give the opening speech.

"As the director of the award committee, I did very little work. I have to state that due to my poor eyesight, I only saw a small number of works. Most of the work was done by other comrades, and I only listened to many reports.

I think this award is very good. Among the 27 winners, there are old and middle-aged people, but the vast majority are young people who started writing after Buzz Buzz Buzz. They are the new force and the future successors of our literary career.

They have taken the first step in the Long March in literature and art. I believe that among these people, there will be the future Lu Xun..."

When Mao Dun finished speaking, Zhang Guangnian interjected: "It will also produce the future Mao Dun."

There was a sudden burst of laughter in the meeting hall, and the originally serious atmosphere became relaxed and lively because of his joke.

Lu, Guo, Mao, Ba, Lao Cao, after so many years since the founding of the People's Republic of China, whether it is Lu Xun or Mao Dun, their status in modern and contemporary literature has long been established.

Mao Dun didn't mind his interruption at all and continued speaking with a smile. Then Zhou Yang, Zhang Guangnian and others spoke.

After the speeches, it was time to present the awards. The names of the writers were called out on stage, and the writers below went on stage one by one to receive their award certificates and souvenirs from Mao Dun, Ba Jin and other award presenters, and then took photos.

Although the awards are divided into first, second and third prizes, everyone goes on stage together when presenting the awards.

Lin Chaoyang went on stage with the award-winning writers and stood in the middle. His work "The Shepherd" received the highest votes from readers and the most support from experts this year, so Mao Dun was the first to present the award to him, and then the guests later presented awards to others.

Everyone was busy awarding prizes. Ding Ling looked around the stage with the certificate in her hand, but couldn't find the target. She asked, "Is Comrade Wang Qinglai here?"

Zhang Guangnian, who had just finished presenting an award at the other end of the team, immediately ran over and pulled Ding Ling in front of Lin Chaoyang, "Just give it to him."

Ding Ling was a little stunned, "Are you taking it for me?"

Zhang Guangnian laughed and said, "What do you mean by being the author? He is the author!"

Upon hearing this, Ding Ling's face was filled with surprise.

When the people around heard Zhang Guangnian's words, they all looked over. Their eyes first stayed on the certificate in Ding Ling's hand for two seconds. The name of the award-winning writer "Wang Qinglai" was indeed written on it.

Wang Qinglai is Lin Chaoyang?

Then everyone's eyes turned to the certificate in Lin Chaoyang's hand.

Xu Lingjun and Wang Qinglai are both Lin Chaoyang?
What's happening here?
This sudden situation shocked everyone on the stage. The guests below the podium could not hear clearly what Zhang Guangnian had just said. They only saw everyone collectively saluted Lin Chaoyang with shock on their faces. This strange situation immediately attracted everyone's attention and discussion.

The people on the stage were watching the excitement, and there was a constant buzzing sound from the audience, which suddenly turned the originally harmonious and smooth situation in the venue into a mess.

The organization of the National Excellent Short Story Award was handled by the editorial department of People's Literature. Seeing that there was some chaos at the scene, Zhang Guangnian stepped forward, bent down and held the microphone.

"Hey, hey, hey! Everyone, be quiet and maintain discipline in the meeting."

Zhang Guangnian's control of the situation temporarily restored order in the venue, and the award ceremony on the stage continued.

After everyone received their awards, it was time for a group photo. After the photo was taken, Lin Chaoyang was left on the stage by Zhang Guangnian.

“There was a little incident on the stage just now, and I’m sure everyone is very curious.

Let me explain to everyone, you saw that Comrade Chaoyang received two certificates, right?
One is the award certificate for "The Shepherd", and the other is the award certificate for "Qiu Ju Goes to Court".

This is because both of these works were written by Comrade Chaoyang, and 'Xu Lingjun' and 'Wang Qinglai' are both Comrade Chaoyang's pen names. "

As soon as Zhang Guangnian finished speaking, there was a loud noise in the conference hall, and hundreds of guests were all shocked.

It is not uncommon for a writer to have two pen names, but in one award ceremony, both pen names and two works won awards, and they were national awards. This feat is too legendary and anyone who hears it will be shocked.

The National Excellent Short Story Award is the first national literary awards event in New China. It is hosted by authoritative organizations such as the China Literary Association and People's Literature, and the jury includes literary masters such as Mao Dun and Ba Jin.

Even among the award-winning group, there are famous artists such as Ru Zhijuan, Deng Youmei, Wang Meng and Gao Xiaosheng.

It is already a rare thing for an ordinary person to be selected for the award, and it is almost certain that he will have a place in the Chinese literary world in the future.

But who could have imagined that someone could win two prizes in such an authoritative and grand award!
Hundreds of eyes in the conference hall were focused on Lin Chaoyang, making him feel that even the air was a little hot.

"Now, please allow Comrade Chaoyang to express his feelings!"

Zhang Guangnian said this and handed the microphone to Lin Chaoyang.

According to last year's practice, the writer who won first place in the award had the opportunity to speak. Last year, the speaker was Liu Xinwu.

"The Horse Shepherd" was the first place in this year's award, so this opportunity naturally fell to Lin Chaoyang.

Everyone in the venue had just been shocked by the news that Lin Chaoyang had won two awards. Naturally, everyone was curious about Lin Chaoyang's speech at this time.

When Lin Chaoyang went to the editorial office of People's Literature before, he was told that he would be giving a speech at the award ceremony, so he was prepared.

He stood on the podium, looking at the heads of people below the stage, and used the image of a worker explaining a PPT, and the heads of people below the stage immediately turned into garlic heads.

“I would like to thank all the readers and judges for their recognition of me and my work.

Just now several gentlemen reviewed the difficulties and hardships and development process faced by my country's literary circles over the past years. Compared with them, I am still an elementary school student, so I will dare to stand in the last year of the 1970s and look forward to the 1980s.

The 1980s in my imagination should be an era full of change and ideals, an era of turbulent thoughts and flourishing culture.

In recent years, due to past repression, the people have developed a great demand and preference for literature. I think this trend will continue in the 1980s.

This is a blessing for our literary community, but it is also something we need to treat with caution.

Literature is like a mirror, reflecting not only the people's tenacity and courage at historical turning points, but also the responsibility and exploration of our literary workers in social development.

I have always believed that the most important value of literature is to serve as a mirror. Criticism and praise, exposure and eulogy, these are not enough to summarize the value of literature.

The boundaries of literature should be vast and boundless. The love of the people is the foundation for it to take root and sprout, and the people also draw strength from literature.

We literary workers must have a determination that literature should give strength to the people! " Lin Chaoyang's speech was brief, but every word was carefully chosen and powerful.

As soon as he finished speaking, there was warm applause from the audience.

If the speeches of Mao Dun, Zhou Yang and others just now still had some official color, then Lin Chaoyang's speech was full of personal color.

Especially the last sentence "Literature should give strength to the people" was so thought-provoking that many people present were excited after hearing it.

After finishing his speech, Lin Chaoyang completed his mission and walked down the podium holding two certificates and souvenirs.

The podium was less than twenty meters away from the seats, and everyone's eyes were following his figure.

At today's award ceremony, no one was more prominent than him, not even the literary giants.

As soon as he sat down, Liu Xinwu said in an exaggerated tone: "Chaoyang, you have been hiding this from me for so long!"

Lin Chaoyang smiled and exchanged a few words with him. The eyes of the people around him were all on Lin Chaoyang.

Everyone knows that "The Horse Wrangler" received the highest vote rate and received the highest recognition from expert judges in this year's awards ceremony. The winner, Lin Chaoyang, has already attracted much attention.

When it came to the award ceremony, Lin Chaoyang's two pen names and two works received honors at the same time. He seemed to be the brightest star at today's award ceremony.

The award ceremony is over and today's award ceremony is coming to an end.

When the show was over, Zhang Guangnian pulled Lin Chaoyang aside and introduced him to an old comrade who was wearing glasses and was nearly 60 years old.

"This is Director Xie Jin!"

Hundreds of people from the arts and cultural circles came to the award ceremony today, and it was not surprising that there was a film director among them.

The domestic film industry and literary circles have always had close ties, and many classic film works are adapted from novels.

With Zhang Guangnian's introduction, Lin Chaoyang exchanged a few words with Xie Jin.

Because there was a symposium in the afternoon, the two did not talk much. Xie Jin only said that he would find an opportunity to visit.

The afternoon symposium was actually more like a meeting.

Unlike the large gathering of hundreds of people in the morning, the symposium in the afternoon was mainly for the jury and award-winning writers, and the topics of the symposium mainly revolved around the award judging process and the winning works.

When talking about choosing "The Horse Shepherd" as the first work to be awarded this year, several judges expressed their opinions.

"I personally think that "The Record of Director Qiao's Taking Office" should be selected as the first article. It has a significant advantage over "The Shepherd" in terms of its social impact and ability to intervene in life. It has the fighting power that literary creation should have.

But in terms of popular support, The Wrangler is indeed more popular. "

Since its publication in July last year, "The Record of Director Qiao's Taking Office" has been widely welcomed and hotly discussed by readers and the literary community.

He even created the category of "Reform Literature", which has a great influence, so it is not surprising that he has supporters on the jury.

Sha Ting said: "Each work has its own focus. For example, "The Traitor" has a clear distinction between love and hate, and tells the story based on the facts, with narration and discussion, and is written a little casually. "The Record of Director Qiao's Taking Office" focuses on reform, has a broad perspective, and has very good artistic quality. The advantages of "The Shepherd" are that it is very similar to "Director Qiao", but it has a little more of each of the advantages of "Director Qiao", so it is reasonable to list it as the first article."

In front of many award-winning writers, many judges reviewed the judging process at the time, not shying away from their personal subjective opinions and sticking to the facts. The many writers present listened with great interest, and even those who lost a place did not feel resentful at all.

For many young writers who won awards today, it is a great honor to be able to communicate closely with these literary predecessors and masters.

Lin Chaoyang's "The Horse Shepherd" is the work with the highest number of votes from readers and the highest number of experts' support this year. In addition, his feat of winning two awards alone naturally made it the focus of everyone's attention and discussion.

Two judges, Ding Ling and Feng Mu, also wrote reviews of his works, and everyone spoke highly of Lin Chaoyang.

Ba Jin even called Lin Chaoyang to his side and asked with a smile: "Should I call you Comrade Wang Qinglai or Comrade Xu Lingjun?"

Lin Chaoyang smiled and said, "Why don't you call me Chaoyang?"

"Wang Qinglai is Xu Lingjun. Today's award ceremony was not in vain. I will go back and tell Xiaolin, she will definitely be surprised."

Ba Jin's smile was a little mischievous, and he said to Lin Chaoyang, "I read Qiu Ju's Lawsuit earlier and thought it was well written and very realistic.

Xiaolin showed me your novel "Parents' Love" a while ago. The style has changed a lot. It is very similar to the styles of "The Shepherd" and "Little Shoes". It's a pity that you don't write about the countryside anymore!"

Ba Jin's words immediately reminded Lin Chaoyang of the letter Li Xiaolin had written to him before, which was after "Parental Love" was sent to "Harvest".

At that time, Li Xiaolin wrote to say that "Parents' Love" was accepted, but mentioned her father Ba Jin's views on the novel. He thought it was a pity that Lin Chaoyang did not continue with the realism that reflected rural life.

There are many writers who write about rural life in this era, such as Gao Xiaosheng who is nominated for this year's award, but the style of "Qiu Ju Goes to Court" is rare.

However, most writers who wrote about rural society in this era continued the literary tradition of the 1950s and 1960s, which were derived from novels about liberated areas and had strong political elements.

Many novels are similar in creation, with no major differences, such as the character settings. There are hard-working and selfless grassroots rural cadres, activists who are determined to follow the path of collectivization, backward elements who waver between the two paths, and class enemies who engage in sabotage.

Although each writer handles the plot differently, in the eyes of the literary world, the writing style has fallen into a cliché and stereotyped way of doing things.

What makes the novel "Qiu Ju Goes to Court" different from other domestic rural-themed novels is its spicy writing style and strong irony, which breaks the barriers and styles of rural-themed novels.

"'Qiu Ju Goes to Court' is not actually about the countryside, but the officialdom," Lin Chaoyang said with a smile.

Lin Chaoyang only answered with one sentence, but Ba Jin felt as if he had suddenly been enlightened. After a moment's thought, he laughed and clapped his hands.

"You, the author, gave me a heads up! That's right, that's more accurate."

After laughing, Ba Jin asked again: "Your style is unique. I think you can continue writing!"

The old senior urged him to update, and Lin Chaoyang was too embarrassed to refuse, so he said, "I will definitely write it when I have the chance."

Ba Jin nodded and encouraged him again.

As the two were chatting, Ding Ling asked Lin Chaoyang, "Xiao Lin, are you going to the Wenjiang Institute?"

(End of this chapter)