Literary Master 1983

Chapter 272 Several Moments in History

For this investigation, Guangming Daily dispatched a large research team of more than ten people. The reporters all came from urban families, and from major cities like Shanghai and Guangzhou.

I had only heard about the huge economic disparity between urban and rural areas, but I had never actually experienced it. Before I left, the local officials repeatedly reminded me: "No matter what happens, don't show surprise in front of others."

A female reporter asked, "Why can't we be surprised?"

The cadre said, "Even though they are not well-off, they still know to write their own names and have a sense of shame. Your surprised expressions make everyone feel very embarrassed."

The reporters from Guangming Daily all remembered this incident and told themselves that no matter what happens, they should never be surprised.

The group traveled in several cars, with the drivers, guards, and local guides serving as their companions. They traveled from the north to the central region, and then to the southernmost part of the area, without prior notice, setting off on a whim and stopping whenever they pleased; in each place, they went directly into the villages and visited every household.

I visited more than twenty villages, without holding meetings or giving any reports; I simply listened, observed, asked questions, and took notes.

The actual investigation still shocked them: first, in a low and dilapidated thatched hut, because it was too dark inside, it took them a while to discover that there was a little child in tattered clothes sitting inside.

There was a chimney on the thatched roof. At noon, the intense sunlight shone through the chimney, leaving a dazzling beam of light. The little boy was reading a storybook there.

This scene is so shocking. It's like a modern-day version of "stealing light by chiseling a hole in the wall."

The reporter asked, "Where are your family members?"

"They've all gone to work in the south."

"It's class time now, why aren't you in school?"

The little child immediately fell silent, a frightened expression on his face. After repeated questioning by the reporter, the little child said:

"I borrowed a book from school, and everyone in the school wanted to take it from me. I couldn't win against them, so I finished reading the story before going to school."

The reporter picked up the book; it turned out to be a thin copy of "Little Shoes." Beside the little boy was a Chinese language textbook, but he wouldn't look at it; instead, he insisted on reading the storybook.

The child said, "Storybooks are much more interesting than language textbooks!"

The reporter flipped through the Chinese textbook and found it was full of theoretical content. He thought to himself, "No wonder kids prefer to read novels."

The textbooks used at the time were the 82 edition, which was revised after the reform and opening up. Compared with the previous editions, it did not make much of a breakthrough. The Chinese language textbooks still contained a lot of class theory, which was very obscure and difficult for children to understand.

Afterwards, the reporters visited another place. This place is an old revolutionary base area with slightly better economic development. Half a century ago, out of the local population of 200,000, as many as 100,000 young and middle-aged people directly or indirectly participated in the war and sacrificed their lives. To this day, it remains a well-known hometown for supporting the military.

They found an elderly farmer who had three children: two had joined the army and gone to the south, and the youngest was studying locally.

The eldest son, stationed at the front, was a voracious reader of novels and frequently sent letters home, sharing his reading reflections. In recent years, he had often mentioned an author named "Yu Qie." This National Day, the military announced personnel adjustments, meaning some soldiers would be released back into civilian life. This soldier, who had fought on the front lines, wasn't afraid to continue fighting, nor was he worried about finding a job after his discharge. Instead, he was saddened that he wouldn't be able to smoke free cigarettes or read novels anymore since he was no longer on the front lines.

At school, the teachers also talked about Yu Qie's novels, so the old farmer asked his youngest son, who was still in school, to memorize the "Yu Qie stories" he had heard and read them to him.

The youngest son is only a few years old and can't remember many of the stories clearly. The reporter listened for a while and found that the child's recitation was haphazard and missing many key plot points.

For example, Yu Zecheng was clearly a member of the Military Intelligence Bureau, but later became a member of the Bureau of Investigation and Statistics. By relying on the infighting between the Military Intelligence Bureau and the Central Bureau of Investigation and Statistics, as well as the factional struggles within the Kuomintang, Yu Zecheng cleverly distanced himself from the situation and became an untouchable figure.

The child, however, knew nothing of these things and simply said it was an enemy spy. The novel's meticulously planned power struggles were transformed into an adventure story fueled by the protagonist's invincibility.

It really omits all the essence of the novel!

The reason this novel is so popular in Taiwan is because it's so realistic!
A reporter from the Guangming Daily, a native of Guangzhou, read the latest installment of the novel series "Lurking" and the "New Reality" series published by Huacheng Publishing House. The Shanghai literary edition was released, and the Guangzhou edition followed a little over a week later. This reporter then read the entire "Lurking" novel to the old farmer… This reading took almost a whole day, continuing until dusk and the moon was high in the sky.

The story begins with Yu Zecheng, a Kuomintang agent, and continues until he and Zuo Lan meet again, and Yu discovers that this female student from Central University is actually a member of the underground Communist Party...

The old farmer listened with great interest, and even went out of his way to find some local tobacco to smoke. As he smoked, he said in a daze:

"So this is the real story! No wonder my son stayed there and didn't want to come back! I didn't want to come back either! There are novels like this to read every day at the front, and free cigarettes and alcohol too. It's like living in paradise!"

The reporter gave the family a brand-new set of the TV series "Lurking," and the old farmer was so happy that he shed tears.

The last place the Guangming Daily visited was the government building of a poor village. There, they encountered "newspaper readers," a group of people who specialized in telling stories. These readers were highly sought after in the countryside and were typically grassroots intellectuals such as village teachers, barefoot doctors, or brigade accountants. Because many people were illiterate at the time, these readers were needed to convey government policies and guidelines.

Newspaper readers also bore the heavy responsibility of storytelling, and popular novels of the time would be read aloud by them. At that time, government agencies and public institutions at all levels had a habit of subscribing to literary magazines, but many people could not read the stories in them or borrow them. There was only one administrative unit and one magazine in a village, but there were at least several thousand people in the village, so the contents of the magazine had to be read by newspaper readers using their voices.

Here, it wasn't just Yu Qie's novels that were popular; almost all novels were. Qu Tiening's "The Red Shirt Without Buttons," written a couple of years ago, and A Cheng's "The Chess King" were both extremely popular. The newspaper reader's mouth was dry from talking, but he couldn't stop, because a group of people were watching him intently as he continued.

A reporter interviewed a newspaper reader: "Is it hard work?"

The newspaper reader said, "Although it's hard work, it's very fulfilling. I talk about these things more than I talk about major policies. And to be honest, many people don't care about international affairs anymore; they come here specifically to listen to stories."

The reporter then asked, "Is there anything you want to report?" A middle school teacher replied, "The novels here have been read to death and talked about to death. I hope the government can publish more novels, or even invite some people to give lectures on novels."

The investigation team from Guangming Daily wrote a report on the matter, titled "The Supply of Spiritual Food is Imminent," which immediately attracted social attention upon publication.

The higher authorities issued an instruction: We must care about the spiritual nourishment of the masses; we must address both material and spiritual needs.

The literary circles that Yu Qie belonged to immediately held a year-end conference, and theoretical magazines such as "Literary Gazette" and "Beijing Literature and Art" published articles. Everyone stood up to promote their own views, and Yu Qie, because of his outstanding achievements this year, was selected to give a report to everyone.

The meeting was held in the auditorium of Yenching Normal University, and Yu Qie spent a few days preparing.

The advocacy of this "spiritual nourishment" also occurred in the original timeline, but not this early. Originally, it happened around the early 1990s, mainly targeting the poorly made cult films produced by film studios, and its influence was limited to the film industry. Unexpectedly, it has now spread to the literary world ahead of schedule.

How could it be earlier than planned?

Could it be that some big shot read the novel or saw the news and was inspired to make this suggestion?
I wonder if Jia Pingtu still dares to write "Ruined Capital"...

A few days later, Yu Qie said in his report: "We are indeed lacking in material conditions at present. We are well aware of the articles published in Guangming Daily and the calls from above. However, resources are limited. Should we give everyone a literary journal?"

He exclaimed, “That’s unrealistic. Not only that, it’s also unrealistic to give every college student a literary journal. I went to Yenching University—the best university in the country. Even there, many people at my school couldn’t afford a novel, and we read very quickly. One book isn’t enough, and even ten or a hundred wouldn’t be enough.”

Suddenly, Yu Qie remembered that a textbook editorial committee would be established next year, and a number of contemporary novels had been selected for the new textbooks. After much thought, Yu Qie set his sights on the textbooks:

"The rise of any nation begins with success in education; we can hardly make a difference in the adult world in the short term, so a more realistic solution is to focus on nourishing children's minds, and the most important thing is to compile good language textbooks..."

"In short, Chinese language textbooks are not just literacy textbooks; to a certain extent, they are also public consumer goods and windows into the world. The texts in Chinese language textbooks should not only be read by students, but also by teachers and students' parents... Students in impoverished mountainous areas have to find novels to read on their own. I think, why not let their textbooks already contain a few contemporary masterpieces?"

"Decades later, when children from rural areas move to the city, they may look back on their textbooks and wonder why they included 'Tiananmen Square,' 'Children's Palace,' 'Times Tower in New York,' and so on. What connection do they have with Chekhov of Russia and Flaubert of France?"

"They were puzzled—these things were so far removed from their lives at the time. It would have been better to talk about how to cut pig feed or how to harvest wheat. It took them decades to go from the 'children's palace' in textbooks to the real children's palace, and only then did they learn from Morse code reference books in big cities that Yu Zecheng had sent them another piece of intelligence, which had been lost for decades... They felt that what they had learned before was useless."

Yu Qie laughed and said, "But we want to include these things in textbooks decades in advance because it was through reading novels that these children developed a curiosity about the world and actually left their mountain villages to enter big cities with youth centers. Many people in society don't understand these things, but we as writers should understand them."

As soon as Yu Qie finished speaking, the entire room erupted in enthusiastic applause. A reporter from Guangming Daily, who had come to the capital to attend the conference, was so moved by the scene that he published an article titled "More Stories, Less Theory."

Liu Shahe sat below. He nodded as he noted the scene down, intending to tell it to the people of Taiwan.

Today, the last piece of land that Yu Qie has failed to reach in the Chinese world may be this banana leaf.

Liu Shahe was puzzled: Yu Qie was obviously a very farsighted person, so why was he unwilling to participate in this international writing exchange program?

Liu Shahe went directly to Yu Qie and asked, "When you write novels, you already think about the impact decades later; the higher-ups say that we should pay attention to spiritual nourishment, and you immediately thought of starting with textbooks, so why are you unwilling to participate in international writing exchange programs?"

Liu Shahe said the exact same thing that Yu Qie had heard in Chengdu.

"The glory days of Russian and French literature are long gone. What the public doesn't know today is that the most developed and active region for literature in the world is actually the United States. It is the highest stage for literature in the world. The poet Bei Dao is in the United States, most of the golden generation of literature from Yenching University's Class of '79 are in the United States, and outstanding writers from Taiwan and Hong Kong have also visited the United States... That's the status the United States holds."

This is true; the United States is a genuine cultural powerhouse. The writing exchange that Nie Hualing organized would never have had such influence anywhere outside of the US. Americans are wealthy and powerful, and their publishers are exceptionally influential, capable of propelling any top-tier author to global stardom.

Yu Qiedao: "Of course, Chinese writers from all over the world should come and exchange ideas, but the occasion doesn't have to be limited to a certain place. To be frank, I don't like the place Nie Hualing was in."

He added, "As long as Taiwanese writers extend an invitation, I will definitely go to the United States to participate. The United States is so big, why should we limit ourselves to the University of Iowa?"

Liu Shahe was shocked: You don't want a free stipend, you don't want a free plane ticket, you don't want a prestigious degree from the University of Iowa... Don't these things matter to you?

Wait a minute, it seems that Yuqie really doesn't need these.

In November, Yu Qie's "New Reality" series was released in Japan. The series was originally scheduled for release in September, but was postponed for two months due to the Yasukuni Shrine visit controversy. Nevertheless, the novels were very popular after their release.

Iwanami Shoten has mastered the art of reaping the benefits of young Japanese literary enthusiasts.

They deliberately portrayed Yu Qie as an opposition figure who "faces injustice head-on and dares to speak out." A group of people in Japan, after reading Yu Qie's novels, immediately invoke his name whenever they encounter any social ills.
"Look, Yu Qie already wrote that in his novel!"

"If we could act according to Mr. Yu's wisdom, how could society have become like this!"

Several renowned Japanese literary figures wrote reviews.

Inoue Yasushi said that Yu Qie's book "is about foreign lands, but it is actually of great use to us. The spirit of the Tang people is clearly reflected in Mr. Yu."

Haruki Murakami, a pillar of Japanese literature, recommended these works, saying, "After reading them, I felt even more resentful about the gap in literary talent compared to the gap in football talent."

(End of this chapter)