Rebirth 2004: A lone figure in the literary world

Chapter 18 The Difficulty of Writing a Novel
There is an original novel for "Young Like You". After watching the movie, Zhang Chao also found the original novel and read it briefly. The difference between the novel and the movie is quite large.

The screenwriter of the film retained the main character relationships and the story framework, but reshaped a lot of details and blurred the content of the murder part. However, as a whole, it is more concise than the original novel, and the plot structure is stronger, which can give Zhang Chao more room to play.

Novelists and screenwriters are basically two different professions. The former is more self-centered, while the latter serves film and television projects and focuses on the broadcast effect.

So Zhang Chao decided to use the movie version as a basis, adding some of his own creative ideas, especially increasing the role of the male protagonist Xiaobei. This is probably the difference between the creative preferences of male and female authors.

In addition, the original story contains many details of life that only exist after 2015, such as every student has a mobile phone, developed instant messaging software, social media, and cameras throughout public places.

These all need to be changed according to the actual situation in 2004.

The novel begins with a gloomy afternoon when Hu Xiaodie suddenly falls from a building. Cheng Nian, her good friend, ignores the strange looks from others and walks to Hu Xiaodie's body from the crowd. He takes off his school uniform and covers her body with it to protect her last bit of dignity. However, this action attracts a cold and angry gaze from the crowd. Cheng Nian's life will be changed forever because of this kind gesture...

"At this time, Cheng Nian didn't know that not all young men were as pure as her. And the malice in Wei Lai's heart was enough to eclipse the fire of hell.

To Wei Lai, Hu Xiaodie's desperate jump off the building did not mean the end. She wanted to destroy not only her body, but also her spirit and even her soul. Cheng Nian's sympathy for Hu Xiaodie made Wei Lai feel that Hu Xiaodie was not "dead yet..."

In one hour, I typed more than a thousand words and started the novel. Compared with the original story, Wei Lai appeared earlier and his psychological description was more straightforward. But Zhang Chao's purpose in writing this novel was not just to reflect the problem of school bullying.

He also wanted to explore the malice of teenagers. When he was a teacher in school dealing with various bullying incidents, he found that the malice of these middle school students towards others was often almost unreasonable, but as dark as the abyss.

An unintentional word, action, or even a look from the victim, as well as a teacher's criticism or praise... can all be the trigger for bullying. If the victim does not resist, the bullying behavior will continue to escalate until the victim's life is taken away.

The coldest and most inhumane words he had ever heard in real life came from the mouth of a student he dealt with:
"She didn't die, did she? Then why punish me?"

So in addition to the heroine Cheng Nian and the hero Xiao Bei, the character of Wei Lai is also very important. She cannot be simply portrayed as the image in the original story, who appears to be a rich girl, a good girl, and a top student, but is secretly the head of a school bully. Although this has a certain duality, two poker cards placed back to back are not three-dimensional.

The original story does not fully explain why she has such a dual personality. Although she has a mother with a strong sense of hierarchy and a tendency to shirk responsibility, and a cold and harsh father, it is not enough to make her so cruel.

Therefore, exploring the process of Wei Lai's character formation is also the focus of Zhang Chao's conception.

And the increase in Wei Lai's role should not overshadow the main character. The character characteristics of Cheng Nian and Xiao Bei should also be explored more deeply. Only in this way can the narrative be balanced and the sentence be more shocking -

"You protect the world, and I protect you."

In this case, the number of words in this novel may be more than 20. If I can type 2000-3000 words every day at the radio station, slack off in class, and write 2000-3000 words by hand, then I can write 5000-6000 words a day - of course, it is impossible to be so smooth every day.

So it would take at least 40 days to finish this novel. But he would have to go to school for the winter break after one more week of classes next week. The winter break for senior high school students is only 10 days, and they would have to go back to school on the seventh day of the Chinese New Year. During this time, he could borrow a computer from his mother's workplace to write.

The only problem is that I can’t go to the computer room to surf the Internet anymore, so the updates on “Blog China” may be suspended for a while. Oh, and there’s a learning achievement report meeting tonight…

Zhang Chao finished typing early, copied the article, and went to the school's public telephone booth. He inserted his IC card and dialed Dongfang Xing's number according to the number he wrote down in his notebook.

Dongfang Xing, who was far away in Yanjing, was overjoyed when he saw a call from a landline number starting with the Fuhai area code. He quickly picked up the phone and said, "Hello, is this Zhang Chao? I finally found you. Who is this number from?... You must buy a mobile phone!"

"Are you looking for me?"

"I called your house several times this afternoon but no one answered."

"Oh, my dad lives in school during the week and only comes back on weekends. My mom might not be off work yet. What's going on?"

"Of course there is something, a big thing, a very good thing. Do you know how much of a response your three articles caused?"

"...Uh..." Zhang Chao certainly wanted to know, but he couldn't say that he was punished by the school for secretly surfing the Internet, so he could only vaguely say: "I'm not sure... The school is having final exams recently, so I was busy and didn't watch the news."

"I understand. Let me tell you, because of the promotion of our 'Blog China' and 'Southern Weekend', your three articles have, in the past two days,..." Dongfang Xing told Zhang Chao what had happened before the evening.

When talking about the universities participating in organizing the competition canceling their special recruitment quotas, Dongfang Xing's emotions reached a peak: "...with these three great articles, you have stripped the skin and bones of New Sprout magazine and the New Concept Essay Contest. Your three articles are like three scalpels and three artillery shells! In addition, the several articles you published this week about Sister Furong have also received very good responses, and each article has a readership of..."

Dongfang Xing was still chattering, but Zhang Chao was already confused - the university canceled the policy of recruiting the first and second prize winners of the "New Concept Essay Competition"? Then wouldn't my plan to take advantage of this opportunity and have the university recruit me also go down the drain?
The original logic of this plan can be summed up in the classic line from The True Story of Ah Q: "The monk can touch it, but I can't?"

Now that monks can’t touch it, doesn’t that mean I can’t touch it either?
Zhang Chao has cut off the path for everyone to enter top universities through writing, which is equivalent to cutting off his own path. Now Zhang Chao is no longer a little nun, but a tiger's butt. Which university dares to touch it?

Zhang Chao's head was buzzing, and he was stung by the boomerang he threw. He still underestimated the influence of "Southern Weekend". As for "Blog China"... in terms of public influence, it is just the existence of "That night, Kobe and I scored 83 points together".

Dongfang Xing talked for a long time and finally got to the point: "Now many reporters have called Southern Weekend and want to interview you. Their editor-in-chief asked me to ask you what you think. I think this is a good opportunity, as long as we plan well..."

At this moment, Zhang Chao could no longer listen to what Fang Xing said. His parents would come to the school next week, and his disciplinary notice would be posted on the bulletin board. What was the difference between exposing his identity at this time and what Pang Yun had experienced in the past two days?
So he quickly rejected Dongfang Xing, saying that he was too busy with the end of term and wanted to keep a low profile. Without waiting for Dongfang Xing to say anything, he hung up the phone and ran to the school auditorium.

Dongfang Xing thought about it and decided to invite her again, so he called back the number. But after a long while, the call was picked up. However, a female voice came from the other end of the line: "Hello?"

Dongfang Xing was stunned and asked, "Who are you? Where is Zhang Chao?"

(End of this chapter)