1978 Synthetic Writers

Chapter 190 Children's Literature Loved by Adults and Children
Jin Jin was very surprised.

There are several students in the Institute of Literature who are famous for writing children's literature, such as Wang Anyi's "Who is the Future Squadron Leader" and Qu Xiaowei's "Little Weiwei".
On May 5 this year, at the "National Children's Literature and Art Creation Award Ceremony" held in the Great Hall of the People, these two works by Wang Anyi and Qu Xiaowei both won the "Second Prize in the National Second Children's Literature and Art Creation".

In addition to the two of them, there is also Guo Yudao, who is also an expert in writing children's literature.

"What kind of article are you going to write?" Jin Jin couldn't help asking. He was from Jiangsu and Zhejiang and spoke Mandarin with a strong local accent.

As for Jiang Xian, he had already completed the synthesis in his mind, and the result was exactly the same as expected.

He was in high spirits and smiling.

“I want to write a piece of children’s literature that both adults and children will enjoy reading.”

"." Jin Jin thought it sounded absurd.

He knew that Jiang Xian was a good novelist and that he produced many excellent works.

But he was not very optimistic that Jiang Xian could write good children's literature. The idea he just mentioned was a bit absurd.

"There is a huge gap between children's literature and adult literature. The content, language and style are all different. There is a dividing line between them, and that dividing line is called childishness."

Jin Jin briefly explained the difference to Jiang Xian, and then advised:
"I have read most of your works. They all deeply analyze and explore the complexity and multifaceted nature of human nature. You have developed such a habit when writing. Children's literature may not be a suitable field for you.

You should not think of children's literature as something too simple or easy. I have always believed that children's literature is a high-level literary genre, at least comparable to Brodsky's poetry and surpassing other novels and essays.

As an author, we are already far away from our childhood. There is a gap between our age and psychology. When writing, we are required to return to our childhood, which is as difficult as rejuvenation and almost impossible. Therefore, how to recognize and adjust to shorten this gap is a big problem.

I'm not worried about your writing ability, I'm wondering how much of your childishness you still have.

Jin Jin speaks with an inherent elegance: quietly, gently, and calmly.

He knew that Jiang Xian was the treasure of the Institute of Literature, so he naturally didn't want him to waste time on a detour that was not suitable for him.

Jiang Xian continued to insist, "Teacher Jin, I still want to give it a try. I have already prepared a draft."

Jiang Xian had heard of this book, but had never read it seriously, so he couldn't explain it to Jin Jin for the time being.

Hearing this, Jin Jin smiled helplessly.

"In that case, let's write it down."

He was not very talkative and couldn't help feeling anxious. What if Jiang Xian's children's literature was not good? How should he deal with this matter?
As he thought about it, he found it very interesting. If he told his colleagues at Children's Literature that he and Jiang Xian had agreed on a manuscript for children's literature, they would surely find it extremely incredible.

"This book is printed beautifully, isn't it?" Li Jingfeng called the Wenjiang Institute and brought a thick, brand new book to Jiang Xian.

"Rice" is finally released!
On the black back cover, in the upper right corner, it only says: Mi, Jiang Xian.

The cover design was created by Zhang Leping. A mouse lies next to a rice jar shaped like half a rice grain, tasting the water in the jar. A goldfish watches from a distance, shedding a tear of its home being invaded.

The metaphor is very obvious. The mice are the five dragons that have occupied the rice shop, and the goldfish that originally lived in the rice shop can only sob helplessly.

As I turned the pages of the book, the wind with the fragrance of ink blew on my face, and the title page had the inscription of the book written on it.

"He sinks, he falls, and you laugh at him again and again. You must know that he falls from a place higher than you, his joy turns to sorrow, but his bright light is followed by your darkness. - Nietzsche"

After flipping through it briefly, Jiang Xian closed the book with a satisfied look on his face, "It's printed really well!"

"Of course, we are a humanities society." Li Jingfeng smiled with a hint of pride.

Jiang Xian grinned and nodded in agreement, "The quality of the books produced by Renwen Press is so high, can you give me a few more?"

Hearing this, the smile on Li Jingfeng's face froze.

"Why do you want so much?"

"I have a lot of friends, so I have to give away a few copies."

"You can't even bear to spend money on your own books?" Li Jingfeng spat, "I'll give you two more, but don't ask me for more. You're really making me make a mistake."

He returned to No. 15 Hufang Road quite late. Zhu Lin was lying on the table, still reviewing for the exam for the amateur training class. She was surprised to see the book "Rice" in Jiang Xian's hand. "This book was published so soon?"

"Humanities Press and I are old friends. My work helped me get it tighter."

Zhu Lin's white fingers stroked the pages of paper, "Mr. Zhang Leping's paintings are really good."

"What about the writing? It's just average?" Jiang Xian picked up a chair and sat down beside her.

"Comrade Xiao Jiang, you are such a child."

Zhu Lin burst out laughing, her almond-shaped eyes full of tenderness, "You wrote very well, too. That's enough."

After placing the books on the table, Jiang Xian thought about getting some furniture, such as a bookshelf, a sofa, and a bed.

Nowadays, it is popular to make furniture by yourself. People buy wooden boards and ask others to make them. Even for sofas, people buy springs and straw mats and make them by themselves. However, the quality of the springs is unstable, and it won't take long for the sofa to become warped and uneven.

Jiang Xian certainly didn't want to go through this trouble, so he planned to buy directly from the furniture factory. At that moment, the most famous furniture factory in Beijing was called Long Shuncheng, which was later recognized as a time-honored brand. It was formed in 1956 by merging public-private furniture factories of various sizes. It sold both old and new furniture, and had the task of earning foreign exchange, so some furniture had to be purchased with foreign exchange coupons.

The Institute of Literature has been in operation for a long time, and students have begun to publish their works in July.

Everyone gathered in the small information room, digging through every issue and every publication to see which student had published what new work.

After the novel "Rice" was published, it was quickly included in the small information room of the Institute of Literature.

Kong Jiesheng came to the small information room that day, walked around the small room, and quickly found a new book on the bookshelf.

--"rice"

He took it down from the bookshelf and was immediately attracted by its slightly bizarre cover. What caught his attention even more was the signature on the back, which read "Jiang Xian".

Kong Jiesheng suddenly felt dizzy.

Is this kid really making a fortune in silence?

Last time, he published an article titled "A Letter from an Unknown Woman" without saying a word, and was unanimously recognized by the students as the student who published the fastest since the establishment of the Institute of Literature.

How long has it been since another novel was published?
The students at the Institute of Literature liked to read each other's articles. Kong Jiesheng also read several articles written by Jiang Xian, so he was very sure that this was a novel that Jiang Xian had never published in a magazine.

After another quick look, I saw the extremely eye-catching row of "People's Literature Publishing House".

"You're a piece of shit!" Kong Jiesheng couldn't help but curse angrily, feeling sour from head to toe.

Renwen Press, just like People's Literature, Chaoyang 166, is a holy place in the minds of many writers.

If one of his works could be published by Renwen Press, he would really want to beat drums and gongs and notify everyone from Beijing all the way to his hometown in Guangdong.

Kong Jiesheng quickly found a place to sit down and began to read the novel "Rice".

At the very front, I saw a preface written by Wang Meng.

Wang Meng is a popular writer in the literary world and the most famous writer in China today. She is also a teacher at the Institute of Literature and Art and Kong Jiesheng's instructor at the Institute of Literature and Art. He takes some free time every week to go to Wang Meng's home to listen to lectures and learn.

So I couldn't help but read the preface written by Wang Meng. The first part roughly talks about the development of "stream of consciousness" in China.

In Wang Meng's opinion, the earliest Chinese novel with "stream of consciousness" characteristics was "Diary of a Madman" published by Lu Xun in 1918. The early stream of consciousness literature of "5" came from "Freud's Theory" and Kuchikawa Hakumura's "The Symbol of Anguish", and was also influenced by Japan's "private novel".

Mr. Lu Xun once studied in Japan, and the novel "The Symbol of Anguish" was translated by him.

Later, a large number of writers such as Yu Dafu, Guo Moruo, Xu Zhimo, Mao Dun and Lin Huiyin followed suit to carry forward and expand this tradition.

The timeline is blank for thirty years.

The story of a wrongly edited film written by Wang Anyi's mother Ru Zhijuan is regarded as the first stream-of-consciousness novel in New China. In the application of stream-of-consciousness characteristics in the novel Rice, written by Jiang Xian, he has surpassed Ru Zhijuan, Wang Meng herself, and all the predecessors.

Seeing this, Kong Jiesheng's heart began to beat faster.

Wang Meng's comment is truly shocking!

Has the novel "Rice" surpassed its predecessors?
Wang Meng has already written very clearly in the previous article about who these predecessors are. They are the shining stars in the hall of literature.

Although the antecedent condition is "the application of stream-of-consciousness characteristics", it is still horrifying enough.

Kong Jiesheng quickly continued to look down:
Wang Meng called Jiang Xian's writing style in "Rice" an exercise in "Eastern stream of consciousness."

He said Jiang Xian does not reject "tradition" with "modernity", but is actively looking for their common ground.

After reading the preface written by Wang Meng, Kong Jiesheng could no longer suppress his curiosity.

Wang Meng simply elevated this article "Rice" to a pedestal.

Kong Jiesheng himself is very interested in "stream of consciousness" exercises.

He wrote an article called "The Sea and the Lighthouse". Although it was not as good as Wang Anyi's "Rain, Rustling", it was enough to make him proud. Among the 33 students, he was considered a leader in the application of "stream of consciousness".

At this moment, seeing Wang Meng's evaluation of Jiang Xian, who is also a student, it is inevitable that he will feel a little dissatisfied.

With such emotions, he opened the text and plunged into the novel "Rice":
Wulong is a refugee from Fengyangshu Village who fled from the countryside to the city because of a flood.

He was starving at the dock, but was humiliated by the dock gang member Abao. He was forced to call someone "Dad" like a dog just for food, and was forced to drink five large bowls of liquor.

After waking up from his drunken stupor, he followed a rice cart to a rice shop by accident. Due to his special attachment to rice, he became a clerk in the rice shop on the condition that he did not ask for money but only received food.

The owner of the rice shop is surnamed Feng and he has only two daughters. The eldest daughter, Zhiyun, is dissolute by nature. She climbed into the bed of Master Liu when she was a teenager and became his exclusive lover. She treated Wulong as a tool to satisfy her carnal desires.

The second lady Qiyun was mean and exploitative, and Wulong worked diligently, but he ate too much, which she regarded as a thorn in her eyes and scolded.

“There’s not a single good person here.”

In this age of desire and hatred, Wu Long became a part of the distorted human nature.

He reported Abao and Zhiyun's affair to Liu Ye, the most powerful force in the city. Abao, who had bullied him, was drowned in the river by Liu Ye.

Before Wulong could be happy, he was arranged by the rice shop owner Feng to marry Zhiyun, who was pregnant with Liu Ye's child. Wulong became a son-in-law to cover up the Feng family's shame.

On the wedding day, Wulong didn't drink a sip of wine. Liu Ye brought him a gift, or rather a gift.

——Abao’s thing.

After the marriage, Wu Long, who had been used, became a thorn in Boss Feng's side. He secretly spent two taels of gold to bribe the pirates and prepared to kill Wu Long.

Boss Feng, who had been stingy all his life, never imagined that the money he gave was too little and the pirates only took one of Wulong's toes as a price.

Wu Long, who had managed to escape with his life, felt hatred spreading like wildfire in his heart.

Boss Feng suffered a stroke. On the night of Zhiyun's delivery, Wulong raped Qiyun, who treated him as lowly as a wild dog. Before Boss Feng died of anger, he gouged out one of Wulong's eyes. With only one eye left, Wulong became the new owner of the rice shop.

Yet the hatred was not yet fully satisfied.

Zhiyun and his newborn son were taken away by Liu Ye, and his wife was also taken away by someone else. Wu Long didn't dare to say a word on the surface, but he was already gritting his teeth with hatred in his heart.

"He was afraid that others would detect conspiracy and delusion in his eyes. There was a dark fire hidden deep in his heart, which burned secretly in his eyes."

He joined the dock brotherhood, accumulated strength for a period of time, climbed to the position of leader, and finally secretly blew up Liu Ye's entire family, including Zhiyun.

He climbed to the top of the city, forcibly married Qiyun who looked down on him, and gave himself a set of gold teeth, becoming the greatest evil.

Just like how Abao bullied him before, he stepped on the head of a poor man named Guiqi, humiliated him, and made him call him "Dad". He was even worse than Abao, because Abao at least gave him food, but Wulong beat that man with a stick.

"I hate you bastards the most. Can you just call someone daddy just for a piece of meat?"

Wu Long, just like Boss Feng back then, took the poor Gui Qi as his employee and vented the humiliation he had suffered on Gui Qi in an even more severe way.

He enjoyed it all to his heart's content, but being young and strong, he did not expect that he would be infected with syphilis. He soon became so weak that he was unable to get out of bed.

Wulong understood that Guiqi would be the next him.

He went to the Dock Brotherhood and asked them to get rid of Ghost Seven for him.

However, the Dock Brotherhood already had other ideas. They could only get a little benefit from Wu Long, but they could divide the entire rice shop with Gui Qi.

The surviving Gui Qi sneered at him, just like when he saved his life from the pirates.

That very night, Wu Long heard Qiyun's screams of grief and anger. He suddenly realized something, and lay on the bed with his fists clenched. His thoughts went through the past few years, just like Boss Feng who had a stroke and was lying in bed. He gritted his teeth in anger, his whole body trembling, but he had to pretend that he knew nothing in order to survive the next day.

But Qiyun would not let him go. She coldly stuffed a handful of rice into Wulong's eyes and let him scream in pain. Guiqi watched with a sneer.

Wu Long was completely blind.

Boss Feng blinded one of his eyes, and Qiyun blinded one of his eyes.

From then on, Wu Long was tired of everything in the city. He hated this city, the city air, and the endless tug-of-war between appetite, sexual desire, and revenge.

He told Gui Qi that he wanted a carriage and a load of the best white rice to bring back to his Fengyangshu Village. He faintly heard Gui Qi's laughter.

But Wulong also had the land deed and money hidden in his hands. Qiyun said they were all in a box. Wulong was very good at hiding things, so Guiqi could only fulfill his wish.

After the first rain in autumn, Guiqi set out with Wulong and a sealed cart loaded with freshly harvested rice.

The two of them were lying in a pile of rice, with Wu Long lying quietly on his back.

"Is the train heading north? Why do I feel like it's heading south?" Wu Long suddenly asked doubtfully in his sleep.

"It's heading north." Gui Qi was playing with some rice grains. He glanced at Wu Long with disdain, "You still don't trust others even when you are about to die."

The Southern Railway stretched endlessly forward under the rainy and foggy sky, and the roadbeds on both sides were covered with rustling bushes.

Gui Qi smelled a strong, fishy odor of death.

He thought of the wooden box that Qiyun mentioned, which had not been found yet, and he couldn't help but feel worried. "Where is the box? Tell me where is it hidden?"

Wu Long's face floated in the dark carriage like a piece of white paper, and his limbs were like some dead branches placed on the rice pile.

Wulong's body curled up strangely, like a leaf drifting in the wind, "Mi——"

At the end of his life, he uttered his last word clearly.

"Hidden in the rice pile?" Gui Qi shouted anxiously. He dug everywhere in the rice pile looking for the wooden box and found a heavy wooden box in the deepest part of the rice pile.

What surprised him was that there was no land deed or coins in the box. Instead, he saw a full box of rice, which glowed a mysterious light blue under the light from the window.

"You are still lying until your death!" Gui Qi screamed frantically, threw himself on Wulong's body, and desperately grabbed rice grains and threw them at his face.

Finally, he decisively opened Wu Long's cold lips and teeth and knocked out the row of gold teeth that he had hammered in one by one.

Wu Long did not hear the sound of Jin Ya leaving his body. The last thing Wu Long heard was the clanging sound of the wheels rolling over the rails, and he knew that he was lying on the train again.

Wu Long finally saw the vast expanse of water. He saw himself floating on the waves, gradually moving away, like an ear of rice, or a cotton ball.

(The second half of the original text of "Rice" is not written like this, it has been revised.)
(End of this chapter)