Rebirth 2004: A lone figure in the literary world

Chapter 107 "New Concept Essay Contest", resurrection! (5000 words long chapter)
Zhang Chao had a two-day exchange visit in Hong Kong Island, and was then invited by Mingchuang Press to do two days of signing and interviews before flying directly to Shanghai.

During this period, he opened a bank account and stock account in Hong Kong Island. He first asked Mingchuang Society to transfer the royalties to the Hong Kong Island bank account, and then asked Pan Yaoming to introduce a reliable securities broker. Pan Yaoming readily introduced the securities broker who had been serving Mr. Cha for many years to Zhang Chao.

After Zhang Chao talked with the other party, he decided to transfer another sum of money to him after the Spring Festival in addition to the royalties from Mingchuang Publishing House, and let him manage it on his behalf.

The other party asked: "What is Zhang Sheng's investment direction?"

“Just buy all of Tencent.”

"Just this one?"

"right"

"...In terms of operation..."

"No need to operate, just put it aside after buying it."

“…How long?”

"Always."

When Zhang Chao arrived in Shanghai, there were still four days left before the rematch of the 4th "New Concept Essay Competition". Yu Hua, the chairman of the jury, had not yet arrived in Shanghai.

The main reason why Zhang Chao came so early was to confirm the details of the supplement with New Sprout magazine.

After seeing the detailed plan Zhang Chao brought out and the special gift he prepared for the publication of this supplement, Zhao Changtian and Li Qigang felt relieved.

Zhang Chao wants his "Midnight Tide" to have a development foundation other than himself, so signing authors is the top priority.

The famous writers of the older generation will not "give themselves up" so easily; the famous writers of the younger generation have been divided up by Lu Jinbo and Xiao Si, leaving only some "scatterbrained soldiers".

All in all, the soil provided by this era for the growth of new literary talents is too thin.

Most of the old literary journals have strict review requirements and a long publication cycle, which are extremely unfriendly to new literary talents.

Newly created literary publications, for market considerations, have highly unified aesthetic tendencies and are almost all copies of Xiao Si, Annie Baby, Lolo and others.

Blogs have not yet entered the mainstream public's vision, let alone Weibo and the like.

This also led to Zhang Chao's impression that the domestic literary world has been dominated by the "post-80s" (who became famous in the 20s) for 80 years.

It was not until after 2015 that this situation began to ease, and a group of genuine writers born in the 80s and even 90s emerged, ushering in a new round of metabolism in the domestic literary world.

Zhang Chao also wanted to try and see if he could make this era come sooner.

If you publish a magazine yourself, applying for a publication number is a hassle. However, by using the old journal "New Sprout" to publish it as an independent supplement, you can bypass many obstacles.

As for whether it will really become independent in the future, that depends on its development.

In the past two days, Huang Jiefu also brought him good news - "Ma Li has agreed to join the company and will start working after the Spring Festival."

Yu Hua and other judges arrived in Shanghai the day before the semi-finals, checked into the hotel, and held a meeting with New Sprout magazine to discuss some details of the semi-finals.

Zhang Chao did meet an "acquaintance" - Bi Feiyu, the writer who won the Zhuangzhong Literature Award with him this year.

The biggest controversy comes from the setting of the first prize.

When the "New Concept Essay Contest" started, there were 12 first prize winners in Group A (senior high school students), only 5 first prize winners in Group B (middle school group excluding senior high school students), and only 30 first prize winner in Group C (youth group under 1 years old excluding middle school students).

The number of people in the semi-finals is about 220

Later, as the scale continued to expand, the number of first prize winners in Group A and Group B quickly swelled to nearly 30 people, while Group C still maintained a scale of 1-3 people.

On the one hand, it is due to the significant increase in the number of submissions, and on the other hand, it is also because the interests are difficult to balance. Group C has nothing to do with admission, so there are not many submissions and the award is not well received.

But the situation this time is completely different, with the number of submissions to the preliminary round hitting a new low.

So this time Yu Hua proposed a new point of view: "Since our competition has nothing to do with university admissions, why do we need to set a rigid number or ratio for the awards? The first prize can be left vacant. If the standard is not met, then there is no prize - who says there must be a first prize in the competition?"

Li Qigang was anxious and argued, "If there is no first prize, how can we explain it to the students and parents? It will be hard for the media to justify it! We will publish a collection of essays after the competition. What's the point of not having a first prize?"

Bi Feiyu said: "Don't always think about who you have to give an explanation to. If it's good, it's good. If it's not good, it's not good. Many of us are willing to be judges this time because we see that the competition is no longer related to admissions. We think that without this layer of interest, we may be able to find more real gold."

Zhang Chao also added: "The competition should not only be prepared to leave the first prize vacant, but also be prepared to temporarily set up a special prize or other prizes. If there are really outstanding players, they should be given the honor they deserve."

This statement also won the judges' unanimous approval.

Zhao Changtian made the final decision: "For this session, we will not set any pre-set number of winners for any award! We just want everyone to see that the 'New Concept Essay Contest' is not a competition where people sit in a row and share prizes, but a competition where real guns and real materials are used!"

One day later at 1:1 pm, the rematch officially began and the duration was still 30 hours.

The number of participants in the rematch is still 220. Although most of them are still students from Group A and Group B, the proportion has decreased. The number of people in Group C has reached a new high in all previous competitions.

The judges only knew the topic of the semi-final after the competition started.

The first question, composition based on material, requires you to write from the perspective of a blind person, continuing his perceptions and stories of the train journey in the material.

The second question is a composition with the topic “Chinese Farmers in My Eyes”.

It should be said that these two questions can still reflect a certain "novelty" from the perspective of the questions. The first question is limited to the perspective of the blind, which deprives the most common visual description in literature. All contestants are not blind, and they are required to continue the story from the perspective of the blind, which puts a considerable test on their imagination and empathy. The second question examines the "sincerity" of the contestants. "Farmers", whether as a group or as individuals, are the most portrayed and described, the most profound image in Chinese literature, without a doubt. There are many writers among the judges who are famous for describing farmers and rural areas, such as Bi Feiyu.

Therefore, if the contestants who choose this topic show some kind of exaggeration or hypocrisy in their writing, they will be quickly seen through by the judges. Only by writing with great sincerity can you win recognition.

In the judging room, Zhang Chao finished reading the two questions and said to Hua with a smile, "It's also difficult for me to write the second one. I don't have complete experience of living in the countryside, and the 'farmers' I have observed are mainly vegetable farmers in the county town and surrounding areas, so I don't have a deep understanding of them."

Yu Hua said: "In fact, from the perspective of the topic, every New Concept Competition has done well. I still remember when I participated in the first judging session, I was like a bitten apple..."

At 4: p.m., the semi-finals officially ended. After the essays were sealed with names, they were sent to the desks of each judge.

There were only 220 essays in the semi-finals, but there were nearly 20 judges, so the process should have been fast. However, due to repeated cross-examination, each essay that was retained or eliminated had to be reviewed by at least four or five judges, so the progress was extremely slow.

Zhang Chao felt the difficulty of being a judge for the first time. Unlike the "continuous marking" in the previous life, many contestants of the "New Concept Composition Competition" have formed a relatively distinct personal writing style in terms of textual expression, which cannot be simply summarized as "good" or "bad".

However, what made many judges happy was that there were obviously fewer contestants this year who pretended to be profound, rebellious, and sad. Essays with simple language and real content dominated the mainstream.

Of course, controversy is inevitable.

"You see, this is definitely off topic. The beginning is 'I am not familiar with farmers, but migrant workers.' Migrant workers are essentially workers, not farmers. They sell their labor as a commodity in the city and get paid. Their way of life is completely different from that of farmers."

"What do you know about 'migrant workers'? 'Migrant workers' are still 'farmers' in spirit. They follow the values ​​and lifestyle of farmers - living together with fellow villagers and being extremely frugal... So this essay is on topic and should be given a high score."

Zhang Chao also saw many essays that made him "embarrassed". For example, in an essay about the first question, the author chose to continue writing the material from the perspective of a "fake blind man" and wrote a suspenseful story. The truth was not revealed until the last moment when "I" took off my sunglasses.

The story was well written, but does the "fake blind man" count as the "blind man's" perspective? Zhang Chao chose to give it a high score, but the other judges eliminated it, and there was inevitably another argument between the two.

Similar debates ran through almost the entire review process. After the special college entrance examination recruitment was abolished, there were no more "supervisors" sent by various universities in the review room. The review atmosphere was much more relaxed and everyone was able to speak freely.

During the break, Zhao Changtian said to Hua: "I haven't seen such a noisy judging scene in many years."

Yu Hua smiled and said, "This is how we really select works! Teacher Zhao, don't you think Zhang Chao actually did a good thing? This class of students really gives me a glimpse into the future of Chinese literature."

Bi Feiyu said: "I used to live in the countryside, and I know that if too much fertilizer and pesticide is used on a piece of land, it will become compacted and the crops on it will be 'burned to death'. At this time, if you can't be ruthless and smash and plow the compacted layer and turn up the new soil underneath, then the land will be useless."

Another judge quipped, "Are you talking about farming?"

Zhao Changtian listened to the judges talking one after another. He could only smile bitterly but had no words to say.

By noon the next day, all the awards had finally been decided. There was no vacant first prize, but the number of people had dropped sharply from more than 20 to nearly 30 to 10. After the list was announced, Zhang Chao actually saw some names that he was quite familiar with in his previous life:
Shuang Xuetao, Zheng Zhi, Ban Yu, Zhu Yiye, Zhang Yiwei, Gong Wanying...

Zhang Chao was at a loss: Apart from Zhang Yiwei, has anyone else participated in the "New Concept Composition Competition"? I have no memory of it at all.

Although some of these people were still high school students and some were already college students; some won first prizes and some won second prizes - but in Zhang Chao's memory of his previous life, the earliest of them would not embark on the literary path until after 2010. How come they all appeared in 2005?

What's the point of gathering the "Tiexi Three Musketeers" in one competition?

Did they participate in the "New Concept Essay Contest" in the original historical trajectory but did not win a prize; or did they want to participate because the New Concept Essay Contest has faded away?
The truth is unknown, but since they have been selected, Zhang Chao has no intention of "letting them go". More than 10 years later, they are all well-known "post-80s" backbone forces in the literary world!

There were no admissions teachers from prestigious universities gathering at the award ceremony in the afternoon, but the number of reporters covering the event was even greater than the previous controversial ceremony—most of them were there for Zhang Chao.

The award ceremony was quite calm, even deserted. After taking a few symbolic photos, the reporters fixed their eyes on Zhang Chao, who was sitting at the end of the judges' seat, and they were all eager to try.

Of course, Zhang Chao would not be stupid enough to snatch the microphone from his teacher and jury chairman Yu Hua at this time, so he sat as steady as a rock without even raising his head.

Yu Hua spoke on behalf of the judges of this competition: "In fact, many people advised me not to come, saying that the reputation of the 'New Concept Essay Competition' is 'smelly' and if I come, my reputation will also be 'smelly'. But after thinking it over, I decided to come. Not only will I come, I will also bring Zhang Chao here to let him smell it and see whether it is 'smelly' or 'fragrant' - after all, it is his 'evil' that was created!"

Yu Hua continued, "But this time, before I came to Shanghai to be a judge, no one invited me to dinner, no one asked me what the topic of the semi-final was, and no one gave me someone's essay to look at in advance... None of these happened, and I suddenly felt very relieved to be the chairman of the jury.

The current "New Concept Writing Competition" does not allow special recruitment, does not allow extra points, and before Zhang Chao came to be a judge, there were not many media outlets reporting on it. But it is precisely because all these fame and benefits have been stripped away that its essence is revealed - writing.

Last year, the number of preliminary entries was more than 40, but this year, there are less than 5. I am very grateful to the hundreds of thousands of students and their parents who decided not to participate. After all, it is like looking for a needle in a haystack, and there will be many regrets. Your non-participation has greatly reduced the guilt of our judges.

After judging the first and second prizes of the semi-finals, are there any missed gems? As the chairman of the jury, I can say responsibly that there are definitely some, but not many. I can assure you that this is the most intensely debated and cross-examined writing competition I have ever experienced, but the judges are in the most relaxed mental state.

As long as the 'New Concept Essay Contest' maintains this momentum, it will still be a platform worthy of our young authors' trust, and it will still be a fertile ground for nurturing a new generation of writers. I am still willing to be a judge - but I will not be the director anymore, it's too tiring!"

There was a burst of laughter in the small auditorium.

Then it was the turn of the leaders of New Sprouts to speak, but they all knew that the reporters didn't care at all, so they ended it quickly and quickly handed the microphone to Zhang Chao.

Zhang Chao took the microphone and calmly said to the hungry-eyed reporter, "Some people say I am the 'Voldemort' of youth literature, and some people say I smashed the pot because I couldn't eat. But this pot itself is broken and rotten!
What I did in the past was not to smash the pot, but to open the lid so that everyone could see what the hole inside looked like. What I did today was not to mend the pot, because instead of mending the pot, it would be better to start over and build a new pot.

This is what I said before, the supplement that will be published together with the New Sprouts magazine, a supplement that belongs entirely to young people - Youth. This magazine will only accept submissions from authors who are no older than 22 years old. Even I, the editor-in-chief, am a temporary position. At the age of 22, I was laid off.

It will never be "monopolized" by certain authors or editors-in-chief. It belongs to every young person who truly loves literature.

We hope that everyone can see a different world belonging to young people through "Youth", where there is not so much self-pitying love, not so much self-pitying decadence, not so many brand-name jewelry and clothes and shoes, and it is no longer limited to Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou.

It can have the stench of manure after the land has just been fertilized, the black smoke from coal mines that never stops all day, and the dilapidated factory buildings where time has frozen on the day the machines stopped turning; of course, it can also have souls that have nowhere to go in the steel and concrete jungle, the salty and fishy winds at the seaside, and the cramped life in a small county town...

I always believe that as long as there is a suitable platform, there will be more than one Zhang Chao in China. In this competition, I saw many authors with such potential. In the future, the winners of the New Concept Essay Competition can become contracted authors of "Youth School";
Youth Magazine will also accept submissions from all young people who meet the age requirements, and invite the best of the best to participate in the next New Concepts Contest! I will also serialize my new novel, The Great Doctor, from the first issue of the magazine.

Writers cannot stay young forever, but literature always needs young people. "

After Zhang Chao finished speaking, he looked down at the stage, not at the reporters, but at the award-winning authors. Almost every one of them stared at him with burning eyes, as if to pierce Zhang Chao's soul.

Zhao Changtian, Li Qigang and Zhang Chao all understood: "New Concept Essay Competition" has truly been reborn!
(End of this chapter)