Literary Master 1978.

Chapter 318: The Power of the Lost Pearl

Lin Chaoyang promised Li Shifei to write a magical realism work in the style of "One Hundred Years of Solitude". The previous novel had already been completed, so of course the creation of this novel had to be put on the agenda.

When people in later generations mention the great works of magical realism in China, many people's first reaction is "White Deer Plain" written by Cheng Zhongshi.

This magnificent work of nearly 500,000 words took the author Cheng Zhongshi four years to write. If the preparation work is included, it would take another two years.

For quite a long time, Cheng Zhongshi buried himself in piles of old papers and consulted the local chronicles of his hometown, preparing for this work, which he regarded as his "lasting work".

After the novel was completed, it was serialized in two issues of "Contemporary" and then published by the People's Literature Publishing House, which immediately caused a huge response among readers and the literary circles.

"White Deer Plain" became popular throughout China and made Cheng Zhongshi's name resounding throughout the Chinese literary world.

As for the fundamental reason why "White Deer Plain" is so popular, in addition to the countless efforts Cheng Zhongshi spent in creating this work, the most important thing is that this work has a strong national complex and profoundly reproduces the historical and social picture of the time.

With "One Hundred Years of Solitude" and "White Deer Plain" as samples, Lin Chaoyang's creative ideas are very clear. His work must be rooted in history and national culture. It just so happens that there is such a simple work in later film and television works for him to write.

He had the idea, but he still needed to work on the specific plot. After all, it was not easy to create a masterpiece.

When someone from his hometown invited him, he could take this opportunity to go back and check the local chronicles to accumulate materials and add details for his next creation.

The visitors from his hometown stayed at Lin Chaoyang's home for a morning and then left happily. Their work goals were exceeded on this trip, so there was no reason for them to be unhappy.

Lin Chaoyang made an agreement with them that he would go back to his hometown after the New Year’s Day.

"We'll be busy after the New Year!" Lin Chaoyang sighed after seeing people off.

Promising to write the novel for Li Shifei was just one of his jobs; he hadn't even started writing the script for "The Chess Master".

It would definitely take longer to write a novel, so he planned to seize the opportunity now to write the script first.

Before Laba, it is Xiaodongdong's full moon day. According to custom, a table of full moon wine should be set up.

Lin Chaoyang arranged the venue at Fengze Garden, and there were ten tables for the full moon banquet. Lin Chaoyang didn't have many relatives in Yanjing, and almost all the people who came were friends.

After Tao Yucheng and his family arrived at the hotel, he couldn't help but sigh at these people.

"Chaoyang has only been in Yanjing for a few years, why does it feel like he has friends everywhere?"

"Chaoyang's friends are all good ones, unlike your bad friends."

Tao Yucheng was mocked for no reason by his wife Zhao Li. He looked embarrassed and waved to Du Feng who had just walked in.

"Big brother!"

Du Feng greeted Tao Yucheng enthusiastically.

Tao Yucheng asked with a smile: "I heard that you made a lot of money this year!"

"It's okay, it's okay." Du Feng spoke in a low-key manner, but the expression on his face showed uncontrollable joy.

A careful calculation showed that he had been in business for more than a year. He had made two mistakes during this period, which cost him three or four thousand yuan, but he still made a lot of money. Not counting the expenses of more than a year, he was already a millionaire.

"Don't be so modest, you can even drive a car." Tao Yucheng joked.

"My car was assembled from spare parts," Du Feng explained.

As the two were talking, the Du family also arrived. Du Feng drove here by himself.

He went to greet his father Du Ruolin with his bag, but Du Ruolin snorted coldly and didn't even look at him.

Tao Yucheng asked secretly: "How did you offend the old man again?"

Du Feng touched his nose and didn't intend to elaborate. He just said, "Well, it's about my girlfriend."

He and Feng Juan had broken up a few months ago. It was normal for young people to break up after a relationship, but since they were both in the art troupe, they were too close when they were together.

After the breakup, rumors were bound to spread within the art troupe, and somehow Du Ruolin heard them.

In addition, Du Feng bought himself a car as soon as he made some money, which naturally made his father Du Ruolin dislike him in every way.

Du Feng chatted with Tao Yucheng for a few words, shook him off, went to congratulate Lin Chaoyang, and tried to take something out of his bag.

Lin Chaoyang said quickly: "No gift money."

"I know you don't accept gifts. This is a small gift for my nephew."

As he spoke, he took out a small gold lock from his bag. Lin Chaoyang couldn't accept it after seeing it, "It's too expensive!"

This year, the international gold price hit a new high, reaching more than 400 US dollars an ounce. The domestic gold price has also risen a lot, reaching more than yuan a gram.

The gold locket that Du Feng took out was specially made for children. It was not heavy, only about 20 grams, but it was still worth six or seven hundred yuan, which was equivalent to the income of an ordinary working-class person without eating or drinking for a whole year.

"Brother-in-law, don't be polite to me. This is what I should do."

Part of Du Feng's start-up capital for his business was borrowed from Lin Chaoyang and his wife. In addition, he would learn from Lin Chaoyang from time to time and was always grateful for their help.

After arguing for a while, Lin Chaoyang couldn't persuade him anymore and finally accepted the thing.

Tao's mother, who was sitting not far away, looked at what Du Feng had taken out and said to her cousin, "This child is too wasteful!"

"This kid doesn't know how to show off after making some money! But he did a good job today. I heard that Chaoyang and Yushu helped him a lot. This is what they deserve." "He has his own brains. I see that his business is doing well!"

Du Ruolin shook his head and said, "He just got lucky and caught up with a good time. What future can he have in trading? If he had even a third of Chaoyang's ability, I would be relieved."

In Chinese society, everything is inferior except for education, and merchants have been considered unworthy since ancient times.

People like Lin Chaoyang who are involved in literature are different. Everyone looks up to them when they tell others about them.

Listening to her cousin's praise for her son-in-law, Tao's mother revealed a hint of hidden pride on her face.

Sitting next to Du Ruolin and his friends' table were Liu Xinwu, Li Tuo and other acquaintances. The topic they were talking about was also related to Lin Chaoyang.

"This kid made all the money! No wonder he didn't ask for a gift money at the full moon banquet in Fengze Garden today." Li Tuo muttered enviously.

The Mao Dun Literature Prize has come to an end for more than a month, but its impact is still ongoing.

The most obvious impact is that the sales of several winning works increased sharply after the awards were announced, and they became popular reading materials that domestic literature lovers flocked to.

Lin Chaoyang's "The Chess Master" sold well after its publication in June this year. However, after several months of hot sales, the sales have gradually declined. Before December, the monthly sales were less than 12 copies.

But with the support of the Mao Dun Literature Prize, "The Chess Master" has sold another 30 copies in the past month, and the total sales have reached an astonishing 176 million copies.

If there is an annual bestseller list in this era, I wouldn't say "The Chess Master" is number one, but it will definitely be in the top three.

According to the publishing contract signed by Lin Chaoyang and Yenching Publishing House, the novel has currently brought Lin Chaoyang an income of more than 16,000 yuan just from royalties from the number of copies printed.

Several people were chatting about the sales and royalties of "The Chess Master" and were amazed.

Liu Xinwu sighed: "It's not just "The Chess Master", "The Death of Vincent Van Gogh" is selling even better this month!"

As soon as he said this, everyone understood what he meant.

This year marks the first time that the Mao Dun Literature Prize is held. The review process and award results have attracted close attention from all walks of life in the domestic literary community.

Even before the list of winners was announced, rumors had already spread that there were eight shortlisted works.

After the list of winners was announced, people began to wonder which novel would be the unsuccessful one.

Many people were surprised when they looked through the list of works submitted this year and found that The Death of Van Gogh was not selected.

Even Liu Xinwu couldn't help but ask at the symposium whether the eliminated work was "The Death of Van Gogh", let alone those ignorant onlookers.

The Mao Dun Literature Prize Jury did not give a positive response to outside speculation, but their evasive response instead deepened everyone's speculation.

When people cannot obtain open and authoritative information, gossip naturally becomes the authoritative channel that everyone trusts.

Regardless of whether "The Death of Van Gogh" was truly the selected work, it became so after people chose to believe the rumors.

The reason why so many people are willing to believe that "The Death of Van Gogh" is the work selected by the tribe and feel extremely sorry for him is ultimately because the level of this novel has been recognized by many people.

Especially since everyone believes that the winning of two or three works in this year's Mao Dun Literature Prize is debatable, this feeling of regret is even more prominent.

Many literature lovers regard "The Death of Van Gogh" as a victim of the politically-oriented selection of this year's Mao Dun Literature Prize, and many of them even wrote letters to the jury to express their dissatisfaction.

As the Mao Dun Literature Prize attracted widespread public attention, such rumors continued to spread, causing tens of thousands of readers to become interested in "The Death of Van Gogh" and rush to bookstores to buy it.

Just a few days ago, a new issue of "Reading" magazine was published, which contained an article titled "The Regret of Missing a Pearl in the First Mao Dun Literature Prize", which immediately attracted the attention of many cultural figures and readers.

"Reading" is a cultural review magazine that was founded in April 1979, the same month as "Huacheng".

The origin of this magazine is somewhat complicated. When it was founded, the editorial department of "Reading" was located in the People's Publishing House, which was nominally under the National Publishing Administration, and the publication was sponsored by the Research Office of the National Publishing Administration.

The responsible leader is Fan Yong, the vice president of Renwen Press, the editor-in-chief Chen Yuan belongs to the Commercial Press, and the deputy editor-in-chief Ni Ziming comes from the research office.

In its first issue in April 79, Reading boldly declared that "there are no forbidden areas in reading", which attracted the attention of the cultural community, which was still on the eve of a thaw at the time, and quickly won the praise of the cultural community and the love of readers.

In the following years, the sales of "Reading" hit new highs again and again, and the sales of a single issue had already exceeded 100,000 copies.

You should know that the style of "Reading" is much higher than that of ordinary literary magazines, so naturally its audience is not that large. The fact that it can sell over 100,000 copies in a single issue is enough to show how popular it is in the cultural circle.

The article "The Missing Pearls of the First Mao Dun Literature Prize" lists the works that made the final list of winners from five blogs, all of which are relatively popular long works.

The article objectively analyzed the advantages and disadvantages of the five novels and made bold guesses about the reasons for their failure to be selected. It was so convincing that it immediately caught the attention of many readers.

"The Death of Van Gogh" is the biggest regret of this year's awards, and naturally it was also included in the regrets of missed gems. When the author talked about its failure to be selected, he bluntly said that "The Death of Van Gogh" suffered from ideology.

It should be noted that among the readers of "Reading", people in the cultural field occupy a considerable group. Before this article in "Reading" came out, various arguments about the failure of "The Death of Van Gogh" to be selected were only circulated privately.

Now inspired by this article, many fans of "The Death of Van Gogh" can't help but speak up for this novel.

With the instigation of these fans, this novel not only became the biggest missed gem of this year's Mao Dun Literature Prize, but also the most profound victim of politically engaged literature.

Within just a few days, a large number of literature lovers began to cheer for "The Death of Van Gogh".

For a while, public opinion was very popular.

More than a month after the first Mao Dun Literature Prize was awarded, the buzz generated by the blog-selected work "The Death of Van Gogh" was even greater than those winning works.

It's incredible!
(End of this chapter)