Exciting 1979!

Chapter 233: The Darkest Hour of Science Fiction Literature

"Because I have caught them with Xizi before, I know a place where there are a lot of cicada monkeys." Wei Ming's mind worked quickly and he fooled Zhu Lin into believing he was doing something wrong.

Wei Ming breathed a sigh of relief. He decided to avoid using words like "again" and "again" in his future life, and try to make sure Sister Xue and Sister Lin also use the same words to avoid confusion.

It's too difficult to have the same thing with two people. I wonder if it would be easier to have three.

It is still the same small forest, but it is already August and there are not so many cicada monkeys. Many of them have completed their molting and flew away a few days ago. However, there are quite a few cicada shells on the tree trunks and under the trees.

However, Wei Ming was not interested in the cicada monkeys. It was late at night and there was no one around. Soon, Zhu Lin was pinned down by Wei Ming under the tree. The two of them leaned against the tree and hugged each other and chewed on the cicada monkeys.

Maybe the tree was under great pressure, and suddenly something fell from the tree and landed on Zhu Lin's head.

"Ah!" she was startled.

"Don't be afraid," Wei Ming took the thing off her head, "Congratulations, we're open!"

It was an unlucky cicada monkey. It was lying on a tree, but the two of them crashed into the tree and shook itself down.

But in the end they only caught more than 20 of them. One reason was that the number was reduced, but the more important reason was that most of the time was spent kissing.

Zhu Lin would not allow anyone to do anything more extreme. After all, they were outdoors and her ideas were not that advanced, although she wanted to.

This made Wei Ming more eager to buy another house.

In addition, they also talked about the casting of "The Death of a Poet". Upon learning that Da Shichang would play the male lead, Wei Ming felt that he was still a good fit. Moreover, Teacher Da was a well-known good husband with excellent character and professional level. Wei Ming was not worried about things like falling in love over time.

"Then are you still going to apply for the amateur acting class at Beijing Film Academy?" Wei Ming asked Zhu Lin on the way home.

There seems to be some conflict between the filming schedule and this class.

"I sought advice from the director and Director Wang Yang, and they both encouraged me to further my studies so that I could portray more types of roles in the future, and they also said that they would give me time during the exams."

"It's better this way. You can't always rely on your true self in acting. There aren't that many educated young women left for you to play." Wei Ming said with a smile.

Sister Xue is much better in this aspect. She looks like a little white flower, but now she has begun to challenge the role of a prostitute. She is forcing herself to make things difficult and has great ambitions in acting.

But they are both very outstanding women, and I really hope that one day they can become good friends wearing the same pants.

When Zhu Lin returned home, it was still early. Her parents were still awake and watching TV. In fact, they were waiting for her.

Recently, her parents have taken a new look at her. Their daughter has become the heroine of a new film directed by the director of "White-Haired Girl", which is adapted from the work of Mr. Lu Xun.

Even though they don't particularly like their daughter pursuing a career in acting, they feel honored that she can work with such industry bigwigs and perform in the works of masters, and it is not at all embarrassing to tell others about it.

Zhu Lin greeted him and was about to go into her room, but was stopped by her sharp-eyed father. He pointed at his daughter's hair and asked, "What's that on your hair?"

"Is there anything?"

The mother walked over and picked a cicada skin from her daughter's short hair.

Zhu Lin immediately thought that it must have been hung when she and Xiao Wei were kissing against the tree trunk.

"I guess it fell from the tree when I was walking." Zhu Lin took it back and hurried into the house. She felt it was so exciting that she even put it on the table as a decoration.

When the parents looked at each other, the word popped into their minds: "go into the woods"!
~
Wei Ming's mother was also waiting for him to come home. When Xu Shufen saw him catching cicada monkeys, she didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

"You're already a great writer, but you're still so naughty."

"Mom, please help me fry it. My grandma and the others are awake, right? Let's eat together."

There were only a few of them, and each person took a few bites and they were gone. However, Xiaohong said that this was the most delicious cicada monkey she had ever eaten.

Xu Shufen thought, of course, a lot of oil was used this time, so she was willing to use more oil now. Although Wei Ming only had a fixed amount of oil for one person, he could buy extra tickets, which would be enough for the whole family to use.

But then Xu Shufen suddenly thought of a problem. If she contracted to cook for the employees of Xintiandi, what would she do with the extra oil and meat? Would she have to exchange them with people? How high would the cost be?
Xu Shufen, who didn't know the ins and outs of this, decided to take some time to learn from Sister Liu from Yuebin Restaurant.

In the next few days, Wei Ming continued to create, and sometimes he would go to the Peking University Library to create, and also to familiarize himself with his future working environment.

As for the task of accompanying my mother and grandmother, it was given to Xiaohong.

Only on Sunday, because Xintiandi was too busy, Xiaohong ran over in her regular clothes to provide reinforcements, and even Xu Shufen and her grandmother went over.

Xu Shufen could help maintain order, while grandma would find a place outside to sit on a small stool, staring intently at people coming in and out to prevent anyone from stealing anything.

This was a business between her grandson and her grandson-in-law, and she kept a very close eye on it.

No one cared about Wei Ming that day, so he had lunch with Zhu Lin at the Yuebin Restaurant they had been to before.

Xu Shufen also made the garlic pork elbow for him these two days. After comparing them, Wei Ming could hardly tell the difference. It seemed that she really had some talent.

The next day, Oriental Plaza was finally not so busy, but in order to take care of business, Mei Wenhua still chose the nearby Hongbinlou in Xidan for the parents of both parties to meet.

Hongbinlou is known as the "No. 55 Islamic Restaurant in Yanjing". It originated in Tianjin and was invited to Beijing by the Prime Minister in . It is one of the important venues for the country to entertain Islamic heads of state.

Wei Ming and his friends first rushed to Oriental New World and asked Mei Wenhua and Yunyun to walk to Hongbin Building together.

On the way, Mei Wenhua deliberately walked behind Wei Ming and couldn't help but excitedly tell him about the store's sales yesterday.

"Brother Ming, it's over ten thousand! This is the first time it's over ten thousand!"

Yesterday's sales were 11,080 yuan. We sold several hundred pieces of clothing. We have been constantly replenishing the stock and the inventory is almost sold out.

Moreover, even without any discounts, the profits are frighteningly high. Now Xintiandi has entered a runaway mode.

Mei Wenhua told Wei Ming: "Even if I am sentenced tomorrow, as long as the money I earned is not confiscated, I will accept it!"

"It seems that we should thank China Youth Daily for taking the lead. But now there should be people imitating our model, right?" Wei Ming asked.

"Yes, recently a lot of people who look like managers of state-owned clothing stores have come here. They don't buy anything, they just browse and look. They also ask me about their income. I also heard that several state-owned stores have ideas for reforming their models, but they have to hold meetings to discuss and report to their leaders first. Then they have to remove the counters that block customers and clothes. This set of procedures will take at least one or two months to complete." Mei Wenhua analyzed.

State-owned units are notoriously inefficient, but if it is a private shop, it can be improved easily.

However, there are not many individual clothing stores in Yanjing now. Oriental Plaza is one of the first and also the largest one.

And even if they wanted to imitate it, unless they could find a location of comparable size in Wangfujing, they would not be able to replicate the popularity of Oriental Plaza due to insufficient customer flow.

Mei Wenhua’s first choice was actually Wangfujing, but there were no suitable shops for rent there, so they decided on Xidan.

They also have a moat, which is the signboard of "Oriental New World". It has been reported by so many media outlets. These five words are very well-known in Beijing and even in the whole country, forming a brand effect.

"I hope that the business license can be issued to us as soon as possible, so that we can at least have a legitimate business license," Mei Wenhua said, "otherwise I'm always worried that it will be banned the next day."

Wei Ming thought it wouldn't be that fast. Zhang Huamei from Wenzhou claimed to have obtained the first individual business license after the reform and opening up. She applied for it for a year and it was only issued at the end of this year.

As they were talking, they arrived at Hongbinlou. There were many inscriptions by famous people in the restaurant, among which Guo Moruo was naturally one of them. Wei Ming had eaten at many time-honored restaurants in Yanjing, and there were not many that did not have an inscription by Guo Moruo.

Mei Wenhua booked a private room a few days ago. All the guests are from the same neighborhood and Manager Mei’s words are effective.

Not long after, Mei Wenhua's parents and elder brother and sister-in-law also arrived.

Now there are five people from the men's family and five from the women's family, a total of ten people. Mei Wenhua has arranged twelve dishes, showing his rich character.

Mei Wenhua's father Mei Heping and elder brother Mei Shengli are both taciturn. When Mei Wenhua introduced them and heard their names, Wei Ming knew that the naming style of their family was inherited from their roots.

At this moment, he firmly believed that he must name the child he gave birth to himself.

As for Mei Wenhua's mother and sister-in-law, they have very active personalities, and it can be seen that both of them are strong women. Normally, there should be some conflicts between them, but today they held back and did not explode.

They are both small leaders in their respective units. Sister-in-law Mei Wenhua's background is even more noble. Her father is a general, and Mei Heping is only a major. Therefore, this sister-in-law is inevitably strong, which makes the mother-in-law, who had a sense of superiority before, very uncomfortable.

However, Uncle Mei is in charge of logistics in the army. When the army relaxes restrictions on business in the future, people like him will become popular. Of course, they are also easily corrupted.

Mei Wenhua was very glad that he never boasted about Wei Ming in front of his family and rarely mentioned things about his unit, so when he introduced Yunyun's cousin as the writer Wei Ming, the effect was very significant.

The taciturn father and eldest brother were obviously stunned. They had never expected that a rural girl from the southwestern mountainous area would have such a powerful background.

My sister-in-law Han Chunchun's performance was even more exaggerated, her eyes were shining.

"Comrade Wei Ming, I am a fan of your books, especially The Shepherd Class. I heard that The Horse Herder and Er Niu have been made into movies. When will this one be made?"

Mei Wenhua felt relieved when he saw his sister-in-law's reaction. He gently held Yunyun's hand under the table. With this relationship, he should not be afraid of his sister-in-law bullying Yunyun.

Wei Ming also smiled and said: "Not yet. This is my most proud work, so I don't want to give it away easily."

"It's right to be cautious. I don't want to see my favorite works being changed arbitrarily."

In order to chat with Wei Ming, Han Chunchun even switched seats with her husband, and Brother Mei Shengli didn't say anything.

Afterwards, Mei Wenhua focused on introducing the 14-year-old champion of the Hebei College Entrance Examination in science, allowing the Mei family to make a new judgment on the strength of their in-laws.

Although they are only cousins, the Wei brothers and sisters are so outstanding, which shows that Yunyun is not bad either. The children she will give birth to for the Mei family in the future will naturally not be bad either. Mei Heping also showed a rare satisfied smile.

At this time, the food was served one after another, and everyone ate and chatted. The roasted tendons, braised oxtail, golden shrimp and halal roast duck were all the main dishes. There was also the signature dish of the restaurant, the fish tofu, which was made into tofu. Not only was the cooking method novel, but the taste was also soft, tender and smooth, which was wonderful.

Wei Ming had come here to eat once before, but because there were only two of them, the dishes they ordered were limited. So today he tried several of the restaurant's famous dishes.

Uncle Mei Heping knew that Yunyun was from Sichuan and Chongqing, so he specially brought two bottles of Wuliangye. Wei Ming didn't ride a motorcycle today, so he also drank some with her, but the main force on their side was grandma.

Xu Shufen said that when they were in Gouzitun, it was always her grandmother and Lao Wei who had a drink together, and her grandmother could drink a lot.

My grandmother's Mandarin is not very good, so she doesn't say much and can only express her respect for her in-laws in this way. Mei Heping is in that position, so his drinking capacity cannot be underestimated.

So two bottles of wine were not enough, so Mei Wenhua ordered two bottles of Luzhou Laojiao, which is also a famous wine from Sichuan and Chongqing.

When they were drunk, Mei Heping took the initiative to talk to his aunt about the wedding date.

"Why not just get it done next year?"

This attitude made Wei Ming's grandmother very happy and she filled the glass again. But Mei's mother suddenly said, "Maybe it won't work next year."

Everyone was stunned, and she said, "Why not do it this year?"

"Hiss!" Mei Wenhua was a little excited. Could it be possible this year? In fact, he was a little impatient.

Mei's mother explained: "Have you seen the news? The marriage law is going to be revised. It will probably be officially launched next year. Do you think the legal age for marriage will be moved forward or backward by then?"

The eldest sister-in-law said directly: "Of course it will be postponed. Now our company is advocating late marriage and late childbearing."

She is a typical example. She is now 25 or 26 years old and still has no children. This is also one of the conflicts between her and her mother-in-law.

The 50 version of the Marriage Law stipulates that men should marry no earlier than 20 years old, and women no earlier than 18 years old. This set of rules has been used for more than 25 years. However, with the increase in population pressure in recent years, late marriage and late childbearing have begun to be advocated. Some radical places or units even require marriage after the age of .

Therefore, the revision of the Marriage Law will inevitably lower the legal age. Mei Wenhua is 20 years old and Yunyun is 18 years old. If they don't get married this year, they may have to wait for several more years next year.

So after a discussion, a few parents decided to get married before the New Year!
Grandma had no objection either. In her hometown, people would meet once for a blind date and then plan a wedding banquet in one or two months. Yunyun and Xiaomei had been friends for more than a month and usually went out together. She was afraid that someone would get killed if they didn't get married.

Only Wei Ming was filled with emotion. Xiaomei was going to start a family? So soon?
At the end of the meal, Wei Ming took a group photo of everyone, and also took a photo of Mei Wenhua and Yunyun. He would show these photos to his uncle when he returned to his hometown in Sichuan and Chongqing.

Xiaomei actually wanted to go back to her hometown to let her father-in-law see her in person, and at the same time she also wanted to experience what it felt like to be considered tall at just over 1.7 meters.

Unfortunately, Oriental Plaza is at a critical moment now, and conditions do not allow him to leave for several days. He can only wait until his wedding to go there again.

Getting married requires a house, and he basically lives at his parents' or grandmother's house now, which is not convenient.

No, I have to buy a house myself!

~
Wei Ming originally wanted to set up a darkroom in the courtyard, and he had the confidence to do so since he had just received dividends.

But now he wants to buy another house, so this idea has to be put on hold for the time being.

The photos taken in Hongbin Building that day were eventually returned to the school magazine of my original unit to be developed.

Then, thinking that Uncle Ping An was about to get off work, I went to ask him about the plane tickets.

Uncle Ping An not only wrote them a note, he also asked his men to buy plane tickets for them, saving Wei Ming a lot of trouble. Of course, money could not be saved.

After knocking on Uncle Ping'an's door, Wei Ming first heard the chirping of cicadas. This was naturally done by Xizi. Not only did he eat cicadas, but he also raised cicadas at home, which made Aunt Xiaoyan very angry.

Xizi also had something to say to her: "Who told me not to keep a cat? I can only keep this."

But when he saw Wei Ming coming, Xizi immediately put down his pet cicada and pestered him, "Brother Ming, have you really seen a lion?"

“I’ve seen it in the zoo.”

"What about the flat-headed brother?"

"There is no such thing in this zoo. I saw it in a book."

Although Xizi and Lele are not very literate, Lu Xiaoyan will tell them stories. The most recent one that left a deep impression on them was "The Lion King".

Lv Xiaoyan also praised it highly. She did not expect that "Hamlet" could be adapted into a fairy tale and it was so interesting and witty, especially the theory of natural cycles that the old king told Simba, which felt very high-level.

This novel did boost the sales of "Youth Literature and Art", increasing by at least 30% over the previous issue.

Currently, "Youth Literature and Art" has only been serialized to one-third of the novel. At this time, Simba's father, King Mufasa, is still alive. It is basically a panoramic display of the African animal kingdom and the story of the naughty mischief of little Simba and his friends, but with some hidden lines.

The second part is about the father being killed, the mother being imprisoned, and the little prince leaving his hometown to prepare for revenge.

"Lele isn't at home?"

Lv Xiaoyan brought a fruit plate to Wei Ming: "Your uncle went to Teacher Gu's house to pick her up. Teacher Gu recently asked you why you don't release new songs."

"I actually wrote a few songs for Hong Kong recently, but they haven't been released yet. I'll give them to her to listen to when the tape comes out."

Wei Ming waited until Uncle Ping'an brought Lele back before he took the plane tickets back. There were three tickets in total, and Xiaohong stayed at home.

Then a few days later, Wei Ming received a remittance slip from Amin in Hong Kong, saying that "She" had achieved gold record status and sold 25,000 copies in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

This is his songwriter dividend, 3000 Hong Kong dollars!

A few days later, Amin's package arrived. In her last letter, Wei Ming thanked her for the fashion magazines, saying they were very useful. This time, she bought some more.

And this time, two boxes of "Flowers in Water" albums are also included.

After more than two months of preparation, Tan Yonglin's first Mandarin album was finally officially released. The original name was not this, but because Wei Ming's songs were too hard, especially "Flower in the Water", the album was named after this song. The other main songs were all written by Wei Ming.

Tan Yonglin attached great importance to the song "Flower in Water" and even gave two copies of the song fee, intending to change "Flower in Water" into a Cantonese version.

So Amin told him on the tape: "Alan's agent came to me and asked if you could change it into a Cantonese song. There is still more time."

Wei Ming decided to take the job. He wrote back directly, attached the Cantonese version of the lyrics, and then left to catch a plane.

Xu Shufen and her mother were both excited and nervous, but Xiaohong was just disappointed because she also wanted to take a plane!

But she also knew that a round trip would cost more than a hundred yuan, and she would lose a bicycle. It was too extravagant, so she didn't force it.

But after seeing them off, Wei Hong did not leave for a long time until she saw a plane take off and fly over her head.

In order to avoid being bored on the plane, Wei Ming bought several newspapers, among which the Yanjing Evening News mentioned the grand occasion of the Second Stars Art Exhibition that was being held.

This time, the Stars Art Exhibition finally officially entered the National Art Museum of China and was admitted, but this is also the last one.

Wei Ming saw some news about the recently held National Publishing Workers Conference in the China Youth Daily.

There is a long paragraph that Wei Ming read in great detail, which talks about Qian's views on science fiction novels, which can be said to be very direct and express his aversion to them.

Wei Ming knew that science fiction novels would have a hard time in the future because this person's words carried too much weight.

In fact, since last year, popular science writers represented by Zhao Zhi, Lu Bing, Zhen Shuonan and Tao Shilong have begun to use the "Popular Science Discussions" column in China Youth Daily as a platform to systematically criticize the major science fiction writers and works of the time.

Because these people adhere to the theory of "artistic truth", most of the criticism revolves around whether the scientific fiction in the novel is valid, such as "whether selfishness can be inherited", "whether dinosaurs can be resurrected", "whether clones have the psychological structure of their fathers", etc.

The theory of popular science writers is: If you can't prove that these are true, how can you write them? Isn't this misleading readers?

Wei Ming also paid attention to the long debate between science fiction writers and popular science writers at the time. Because they were confined to the atmosphere of popular science discourse, science fiction writers could only stay away from literature and refute the rationality of these fictions one by one, which would inevitably put them at a disadvantage.

Later, this debate developed into a debate about whether science fiction literature is "science" or "literature", that is, whether it is a literary genre or a part of popular science creation.

Almost all the authors who were engaged in science fiction creation at the time agreed that science fiction was a literary style. Wei Ming also held the same view. If you don't dare to fantasize about science fiction, then there is no point in writing it.

However, science critics, scientists and relevant leaders believe that science fiction is part of popular science creation.

Taking this as a starting point, these people demand that science fiction novels revolve more around scientific content and compress literary and artistic elements such as plot, background description, and character portrayal. In essence, this is denying the literary nature of science fiction novels.

In this context, Ye Yonglie's "Black Shadow", Jin Tao's "Moonlight Island" and Wei Yahua's "Dream of the Gentle Land" were all severely criticized.

Ye Yonglie, who participated in the editing of "One Hundred Thousand Whys" and wrote "Little Smart Travels Around the World", turned to writing biographies at this time.

In the great literary revival of the 80s, science fiction was only a small category. This great debate was not important to the mainstream of the literary world, and its overall voice might not be as loud as Wei Ming's "The Sheep Class" published at the beginning of the year.

However, Wei Ming sighed after watching it. In a dozen years, when Hollywood opens up the global market with one imaginative science fiction special effects blockbuster after another, will the Chinese people regret that China does not have world-class science fiction works?

And when we have world-class science fiction works 30 years later, will it be a little late by then?

At this time in Yangquan, Shanxi, a 17-year-old boy named Liu Cixin from Yangquan No. 2001 Middle School was secretly reading a foreign science fiction novel called ": A Space Odyssey".

After reading this book, he felt that the starry sky in his eyes was completely different from before...

~
(Yesterday's guaranteed two-in-one)

(End of this chapter)