Literary Master 1983

Chapter 321 Yu Qie has become a top-tier American writer

Shao Qi has distinct characteristics compared to Mu Qing. While previous reporters generally kept objective records, Shao Qi has her own clear personal insights.

In short, she believes that setting aside those legendary experiences, "Prometheus," "the child of the sun god," etc., are just external decorations, and Yu Qie is essentially a flesh-and-blood person.

That best writer in the country, a super writer who is several steps ahead of others, has a childlike heart inside him.

Shao Qi has read many of Yu Qie's novels, with "Lurking" being her favorite. In her view, Yu Qie is a character like "Yu Zecheng," and a more complete version of him from his later years.

Why is the character Yu Zecheng so great?
This character has become the template for male protagonists in domestic spy dramas. Previous spy dramas almost all featured perfect heroes, but Yu Zecheng's image has prompted the public to pay attention to underground workers again.

Shao Qi said, "After going through many hardships, Yu Zecheng has become our best comrade. What makes him more lovable than others is that he is still like a literary youth and a very energetic college student."

Upon hearing this, Yu Qie couldn't help but laugh: Shao Qi was clearly projecting the author "Yu Qie" onto the original timeline, rather than the actor Sun Honglei.

It turns out that reporter Shao is fluent in Eastern European languages ​​and previously worked as a translator in the editorial department of Xinhua News Agency. She had seen the Soviet TV series "Seventeen Moments of Spring," a story somewhat similar to "Lurking," about a Soviet agent named "Stilitz" who infiltrates the German security service…

For Shao Qi, the most memorable thing about this TV series was the cunning and shrewd handsome man Stirlitz, who liked to lie in the soft grass by the Berlin lake and daydream, because it made Stirlitz feel as if he had returned to the banks of the Volga River.

At that time, Stirlitz's gaze was very melancholy because he missed his hometown. Stirlitz also played the piano, and he expressed his emotions through his music.

So when the handsome Stirlitz had the chance to write a letter to his wife Sashenka, whom he hadn't seen for twenty-three years, at the end of the series, this meritorious agent who moved among the high-ranking officials suddenly lost his composure and began to stammer.

In the face of a world war, what does a twenty-year separation for a secret agent matter? It's a small matter, but for viewers who have followed the story, it can stir their emotions and bring them to tears.

Shao Qi wanted to capture moments like Yu Qie's.

This is the human side of a hero. Absolutely great figures cannot inspire awe. Only when a hero shows his human side and does great things can he inspire awe.

But it can't be because of gossip, because of Gong Xue!
Shao Qi didn't like Gong Xue. From a reporter's perspective, she felt that a hero's human side shouldn't be like this.

Consequently, Shao Qi also harbored some resentment towards Gong Xue. Using the excuse of "the objectivity of the documentary," she deliberately ignored Gong Xue's existence. Gong Xue would come to chat with Yu Qie every day, and Shao Qi intentionally avoided filming these things.

Gong Xue, however, did not take Shao Qi's attitude seriously.

The "hooligan case" had a significant impact on Gong Xue. Before that, she was quite naive and romantic, but afterwards, she only trusted a select few. It is said that in the original timeline, Gong Xue suddenly became very skilled at social interaction and interpersonal relationships.

Later generations had a saying, "Nangong Xue" and "Bei Zhu Lin," referring to Gong Xue, the leading actress of the Shanghai Film Studio, and Zhu Lin, who grew up in Beijing and later played the Queen of the Women's Kingdom.

Based on their impressions from the drama, people generally perceive Gong Xue as innocent and romantic, while Zhu Lin is dignified and poised. However, their friends offer completely different opinions. Gong Xue is the leader among her group and later enjoys organizing parties, while Zhu Lin rarely meets with people, has only a few friends, and prefers to stay at home.

Yes, how could the real Queen of the Women's Kingdom be a romantic?

After finishing the novel "Subway", Yu Qie took it to the editor of the publishing house to read.

The manuscript first went to Carmen, then to the eager Márquez... Everyone thought this novel would be a huge hit.

"2666" is a literary novel, so literary that its plot cannot be explained in just a few words; while "Subway" has a clear main objective and resonates with the public's fear of "nuclear war," which will be the novel that allows Yu Qie to establish himself.

It even has literary qualities!
It is a story of the future, but in reality, it is a story of the past. Western readers themselves are "earth-dwelling beings," while the protagonists are Native Americans who were persecuted by their ancestors.

The two major American publishers, Harper and McGraw-Hill, were locked in a fierce battle for the novel's publication, with Harper offering the higher price and pulling out all the stops:
I pay two dollars per word for publication fees, with royalties to be calculated separately.

Subsequently, Carmen negotiated a 15% share for Yu Qie, which is slightly higher than the share usually given to American authors.

This contract is nothing unusual to the Chinese; they are simply shocked by the nearly $300,000 in royalties. But Americans know exactly what this means.

Harper had Yu Qie's old classmate Lucy announce the news. Lucy actually organized a signing ceremony, inviting several prominent Chinese Americans to attend. Lucy proudly stated:

“Yu, we’ve offered you two dollars a word. Two dollars a word.”

Lucy repeated it several times.

As soon as Lucy finished speaking, the Chinese people were so excited that their faces turned red.

As a result, none of the CCTV production crew members knew why they were so proud.

While the phrase "two dollars" is somewhat excessive, for an author like Yu Qie, who has fans all over the world, it's hardly necessary to emphasize it specifically! It's making it sound as exaggerated as Fan Jin passing the imperial examination.

Shao Qi asked Liu Xiangcheng, a Chinese photographer accompanying him, "Why are you so excited? Yu Qie received this payment before in Japan, so it's not surprising."

Liu Xiangcheng laughed loudly: "I'm going to write an article right away. You'll know why after my article is published."

Liu Xiangcheng of Time magazine had been following Yu Qie closely, and he did not disappoint, finally getting his first big news story.

In a recent issue of Time magazine, Liu Xiangcheng wrote: "Yu Qie has in fact become a first-rate writer in the United States!"

The headline may seem sensational, but readers will know it's true once they open the page.

"Harper offered two dollars per word for Yu Qie's new book. In terms of royalties, Mr. Yu is already one of the top writers in the United States. According to statistics, there are only a few hundred people in the entire United States who earn more than $200,000 through their own labor, and Chinese writer Yu Qie is one of them."

“Some writers receive millions or even tens of millions of dollars in royalties, but that is the total income after calculating royalties. What we are talking about here is the initial royalty payment for the first edition, which refers to the royalty that is paid to the writer immediately and unconditionally after the article is written. To explain why the term two dollars is so powerful, we need to trace back to the history of the publishing industry in the Americas.”

"The earliest instance in American history of royalties exceeding one dollar occurred at the beginning of this century. President Theodore Roosevelt, after leaving office, prepared to go hunting in Africa and write some travelogues. Several publishers offered him exorbitant prices for his travelogues. The Newspaper reported that President Roosevelt earned more from writing travelogues than he did during his four years as president. The New York World even published a satirical poem containing only the English word 'one dollar.'"

"Thus, $1 per word became the de facto fee exclusively for celebrities. This indirectly became a symbol of status. In the 1940s, fascist Mussolini and a shampoo boy were invited to write articles. They were not short of money, yet they demanded at least $1 per word because they believed they were no less important than the President of the United States." "Subsequently, this phenomenon of extremely high fees subsided across the United States for a period. In the early 1980s, a group of fashion magazine writers suddenly demanded $2 per word, causing fear among the magazines, who fought back... but ultimately, due to the writers' enormous influence and the large number of followers they had enough to establish their own publications, the magazines eventually yielded. To this day, $2 per word remains one of the highest fees in the United States."

"So, if you know what level Yu Qie's royalties are at, you should know what kind of celebrity he is right now. This news was written by a Pulitzer-level reporter, and my royalty is $0.70 per word. This article is about 600 words long, which is equivalent to 0.14% of Yu Qie's royalties for this book."

This witty news report clearly illustrates Yu Qie's current popularity in the United States.

His popularity among readers rivals that of the President of the United States.

Since the Chernobyl disaster in the first half of the year, Yu Che has been almost constantly in the news in the United States. Even in Iowa, the most conservative western agricultural state, there are Yu Che's supporters, and a writer named Gu Hua who offended him has been forced to wander around.

At first, wherever there were Chinese people, Gu Hua had to leave; later, wherever there were Latinos, Gu Hua had to leave; then there were white people, Native Americans... what other race in the world could accommodate him?

Clearly, Liu Xiangcheng believes that Yu Qie's exorbitant royalties were influenced by his "Adventures in Columbia," much like Hemingway's crazy act of accidentally killing a German field marshal while working as a war correspondent for the Marines, especially since it happened right after he wrote an anti-war novel like "Why the Bell Tolls."

This incident briefly elevated Yu Qie's status in the Western world.

The Chinese film crew was quite frustrated when they saw it.

This is yet another press release that uses allusions and tells a story.

This time, instead of the legendary "handshake of the century" photo, there was an American joke about "one-thousandth of a point".

Americans love this kind of self-deprecating humor about not being able to compare with the big shots. Because Yu Qie is here, Boston University often organizes gatherings for Chinese people, and this Time magazine article had such a good effect that for a time, Chinese masters like I.M. Pei would talk about "one-thousandth and four-thousandths" when they came to visit, and then laugh heartily.

Then they asked, "How did we report it?"

Shao Qi and the others were speechless.

The gap between the news industry and Western journalists seems to be all-encompassing. Shao Qi stated in an internal meeting, "This is a warning shot from American journalists. Why can't we write articles like this? Because we don't understand American culture."

"It's not shameful to not know about America; we just need to know what the Chinese look at."

"Moreover, some things in the world are interconnected, and we will certainly be able to create reports that have an impact worldwide."

"Professor Yu is Chinese, so we have more space to create. We spend much more time with Professor Yu than Time magazine does. Keep it up, comrades!"

Shao Qi said that, but he was actually confused inside.

Their report sent to China on the same day was titled "Yu Qie Receives Another $300,000 in Royalties," written in a simple and straightforward style, with nothing particularly moving. The system was terrible, and the only thing that stood out was the high figure of "$300,000."

China's per capita GDP last year, in US dollar terms, was $286, only one-thousandth of Yuqie's. How could the Chinese not be shocked?

But there are already thousands of Chinese students studying in the United States.

In the future, more and more people will go abroad. How embarrassing would it be to see two sides competing in the media on the same topic?

Shao Qi then went to Liu Xiangcheng to get close to him and asked him how he created his works.

Liu Xiangcheng admired this Chinese female journalist and felt sorry for her. Both of them were born in 1951 and are 35 years old this year.

Why are the weapon arsenals created so different?

Because Liu Xiangcheng got his first camera after high school, while Shao Qi, despite being the child of a cadre, spent seven years working as a civil engineer and learning Serbian—a language that, from a news perspective, is basically not good for making headlines.

Unless the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, to which Serbia belongs, explodes one day, this might cause some excitement for a while.

Liu Xiangcheng said, "I have photographed the Los Angeles and Seoul Olympics, where the presidents of the two countries stood in the center of the stadium to give speeches. I have photographed the assassination of Indira Gandhi. I have photographed the war in Afghanistan. After that, I stayed in Yanjing for a long time. I felt that the next great news would be born."

"Then why did you come to Columbia University, to Boston?"

Shao Qi couldn't help but ask.

Liu Xiangcheng really wanted to give her some advice: "Because news needs to be focused. Although an era is created by countless people, we can't possibly film all five billion people on Earth. In our news, there are some focused figures and moments that are enough to represent this era! We should follow these kinds of people."

"Although Yu Qie is not in China, he is now a part of China."

Shao Qi seemed to be deep in thought.

Is it because they're following the leader's lead?

Where is the leader? Where am I?

Liu Xiangcheng, unaware of her thoughts, continued, "One day I saw some university students from Yenching University come to buy Time magazine; they pooled their money to buy it. I knew all too well how much money they spent on the book, but they were genuinely happy."

"So Yu Qie is that kind of person. We need to film people like that."

Liu Xiangcheng's explanation did not completely satisfy Shao Qi.

She felt that the two cultures were different, and there were indeed some differences. Moreover, Liu Xiangcheng's filming style was religious, meaning that he would film each protagonist as if it were predetermined by the times, like some kind of fatalism.

Chinese people don't believe in fatalism. Is there a more suitable storytelling method?
Shao Qi racked her brains, and she followed Yu Qie around every day.

(End of this chapter)