My era, 1979!

Chapter 151 Meeting the Nobel Laureate in Literature
“Without approval from higher authorities, signing contracts privately is considered ‘speculation and profiteering’; some veteran workers are also worried, ‘If something goes wrong when they find materials themselves, who will take responsibility?’ Why is this reform so difficult? Every time we try to take a step forward, someone is always holding us back.”

Xu Chengjun put down the report: "Director Zhao, you've taken the right step. Future regulations will definitely change according to demand—"

Now that the household contract responsibility system is in place in rural areas, farmers have extra money and want to buy sewing machines to make new clothes; even small tailors in the city need butterfly sewing machines to do their work.

The demand is there; if we continue to cling to the old habit of 'waiting for allocation,' we'll eventually be left behind by the market.

He paused, then added, "Just like Xu Chunsheng in my novel 'The Granary,' he tried planting wheat from the leaky wheat at the bottom of the granary. At first, some people said he was 'not following the rules,' but later, when the harvest was good, everyone followed suit."

The same applies to our factory reform; someone has to blaze a trail first. If your cooperation with the textile factory succeeds, it will not only guarantee production but also set an example for other state-owned factories—that state-owned factories don't have to rely solely on the state; they can find their own way to survive.”

Director Zhao nodded repeatedly, grabbed a pen from the table, and drew an arrow in the blank space of the report: "Your words have enlightened me! The leaders of the Light Industry Bureau also said last time, 'To revitalize the economy, we must dare to take risks and try new things.' I was hesitant before, but now I understand."

Next week I'll take the supply and marketing department to the No. 2 textile factory to discuss things. Even if something goes wrong, I, as the factory manager, will take responsibility!

He suddenly remembered something, pulled out a copy of "Shanghai Industrial Communications" from the filing cabinet, and pointed to a short article: "Look at this, it says that there is a state-owned factory in Guangdong that started to implement 'piece-rate wages' for its workers, the more they do, the more they earn, and the factory's output has suddenly increased."

I was thinking that our factory could try this too—it's still the same old 'iron rice bowl' system, where everyone gets paid the same regardless of how much they work. Some of the younger workers lack motivation. If we could calculate wages based on the number of units installed, I guarantee it would boost their enthusiasm.”

Xu Chengjun's heart skipped a beat; Director Zhao's idea was a key step in the later reform of state-owned factories.

Ripples rise gently, and the wind stirs the duckweed.

There are always those who sing before the spring breeze even arrives.

In his previous life, Xu Guangtou's film "The Ducks Know When the Spring River Warms" also told the story of the reform of state-owned factories during this period.

Some people will benefit from the dividends of reform, while others will not.

He smiled and said, "Director Zhao, your idea is even more advanced than mine. Piece-rate wages can not only increase output, but also allow skilled workers to earn more money—skilled workers like Lao Zhou, who assemble more machines than others in a month, should receive more bonuses. This way, everyone will be more willing to learn technology and improve their skills."

If the factory really does this in the future, I'll definitely write a report so more people know that Butterfly brand workers are not only highly skilled but also well-paid.

"You've got some nerve, Comrade Chengjun!"

Director Zhao smiled so hard his eyes crinkled, picked up his enamel mug and took a sip of tea: "I took the liberty of calling you Chengjun. Before, I was wondering how you, this young comrade, could write such a moving article."

"Now that I see it, you are truly remarkable. You dare to speak, think, and act. You are much more capable than me, the factory manager."

Xu Chengjun: "The onlooker sees more of the game than the player. Besides, the real challenge of reform is implementation. I'm just talking the talk."

Factory Director Zhao laughed heartily: "In the future, come work for me more often if you have the chance. As long as I'm here, the gates of Factory No. 2 will be open for you."

As he was leaving, the workers saw him off at the factory gate. Old Zhou handed him a polished steel file, saying, "Comrade Xu, I've used this file for ten years. The shuttle I've polished could circle the factory three times."

"Take this with you, just think of it as a worker from the Shanghai No. 2 Sewing Machine Factory, giving your creations a boost!"

Factory Director Zhao realized something was wrong: "Hey, Lao Zhou, why did we have to send something so bad? We can't send something worthless!"

Old Zhou was displeased: "You're lecturing me now? Back in the day, your dad and I were like brothers. What do you know about becoming stronger after setbacks!"

Factory Director Zhao:
It was already four or five o'clock when I got back from the No. 2 factory.

Xu Chengjun returned to his dormitory and immediately revised his music box.

The plot of "The Music Box" is actually very simple.

The key is how to establish a compelling plot and well-developed characters to make the story exciting and captivating.

seven thirty.

Xu Chengjun went to substitute for Huang Lin's class as usual.

The course was about "The Evolution of Tang and Song Literature," and it was an elective.

The students were not surprised to see Xu Chengjun.

Most of them were still staring at Xu Chengjun with interest, hoping that this great writer could bring them some different course content.

After all, this one!
However, he is known for making surprising and shocking statements.

Since Xu Chengjun started teaching the elective course "The Evolution of Tang and Song Literature," even the teaching aids have become more down-to-earth.
Chemistry students brought copies of "Three Hundred Tang Poems" to audit the class, saying, "Listening to Professor Xu's lectures is more interesting than memorizing the periodic table."

Of course, this is just a suggestion; it's an elective course that all students in the school can attend.

Besides, you were able to get in touch with Xu Chengjun, right?
"Professor Xu, has Professor Huang been detained by the department?"

The first to speak was Li Wanqiu, a third-year student majoring in Chinese literature. She had her hair tied in a high ponytail and was quite stubborn. Last time, Xu Chengjun talked about "Li Bai's unrestrained nature".

He argued heatedly with history students on the spot, but in the end, Xu Chengjun smoothed things over by quoting Li Bai's "Letter to Prefect Pei of Anzhou".

They still won't let go of this.

It nearly made the history major's eyes turn red from biting.

"Yes, where did Teacher Huang go?"

"You want to see Teacher Huang?"

Many students nodded.

Xu Chengjun put his lesson plan on the podium, picked up the chalk and turned around to write. As soon as the four big characters "I also want to see" appeared on the blackboard, the whole class burst into laughter.

"Let's just say that Professor Huang went to the Beijing Library to look up a rare copy of 'Complete Prose of the Song Dynasty',"

He dusted off his hands with chalk dust. "But if you want to visit the antique book market, I can go with you next week."

The prerequisite is that for this week's "Life in Tang Poetry" assignment, no one should write something as nonsensical as "Li Bai drank sorghum wine."

"What kind of wine did Li Bai drink?"

Suddenly someone in the back row called out. It was Zhou Mingyuan from the Chemistry Department. He was holding an Organic Chemistry textbook in his arms, with notes on "Estimation of Alcohol Content in Tang Poetry" written in his notebook. He had almost stumped Xu Chengjun last time.

Can someone who studies chemistry do anything serious?

"You'd have to ask a biology major,"

Xu Chengjun smiled and pointed at Zhou Mingyuan, "But I know that what he drank was definitely not the bulk liquor we have now."

The alcohol content of wine in the Tang Dynasty was low, similar to modern rice wine; otherwise, he would have suffered alcohol poisoning long ago after drinking three hundred cups.

As soon as she finished speaking, Zhao Xiaoya from the Economics Department pushed up her glasses and took out a small notebook from her bag: "Professor Xu, I did some calculations. Li Bai wrote 'A thousand pieces of gold scattered will return again.' According to current prices, 'a thousand pieces of gold' is a thousand yuan, which can buy five hundred catties of pork or two thousand fried dough sticks."

He distributed the gifts readily, but how could ordinary families afford to do so? Isn't this a bit 'out of touch with the masses'?

"You're obsessed with money!"

Li Wanqiu immediately retorted, slamming the "Complete Tang Poems" on the table. "Tang poetry is about spirit, not pork! Li Bai wrote this to express the spirit of 'not being bound by money,' but you, you're calculating how many fried dough sticks you can buy every day!"

"But bravado can't put food on the table!"

Zhao Xiaoya wouldn't back down either, "Last time you said the fee was eight yuan per thousand words, enough to buy forty fried dough sticks, that's real money. If learning Tang poetry is just about shouting slogans, then you might as well learn accounting."

The classroom immediately erupted in noise, with Zhou Mingyuan adding fuel to the fire: "I think we can calculate the cost of the alcohol! Let's assume Li Bai drank rice wine with an alcohol content of 5 degrees. Three hundred cups would be thirty jin (15 kg). At the current price of rice wine, that would cost twenty yuan, enough to buy ten jin (5 kg) of pork!"

Xu Chengjun didn't stop them. After they had argued enough, he tapped the blackboard and said, "They're all right. Zhao Xiaoya is calculating the 'real-world cost,' Li Wanqiu is calculating the 'psychological cost,' and Zhou Mingyuan is calculating the 'chemical cost.'"

When we read Tang and Song literature, isn't the point to glean something from these different perspectives? Li Bai dared to spend lavishly, yet he also dared to write, "How can I bow and scrape before the powerful and wealthy?" That's what makes him remarkable: he understood the weight of reality, but he wasn't crushed by it.

Just like when we write, we need to be able to calculate the 'eight yuan per thousand words' fee, but we also need to dare to write sentences that 'a little sincerity is worth a thousand chapters.'

These words silenced the classroom.

Lin Yimin: "Teacher Xu, do you mean you're now making eight yuan per thousand words?"

Xu Chengjun glanced at the troublemaker: "Eight yuan and forty cents taller than you." "Alright, get out of class dismissed!"

There are still ten minutes left.
Xu Chengjun: "Since Teacher Huang is slacking off, it's reasonable for me to give you all a holiday, right?"

Zhou Haibo: "Could we put in two more sections?"

Xu Chengjun: "Fine, you've lost your credits, let's go~"

Everyone burst into laughter.

Li Wanqiu was the first to react, and pulled out her homework to hand over: "Teacher Xu, this time I wrote about 'Du Fu's "Three Officials and Three Separations" and the present-day countryside.' Could you please take a look and see if I have clearly calculated both the 'real-world accounts' and the 'spiritual accounts'?"

"I have it too!"

Zhao Xiaoya also handed over her notebook. "What I wrote is an analysis of prices in Bai Juyi's 'The Charcoal Seller.' I calculated that the charcoal seller earned enough in a day to buy two fried dough sticks, which is less than what a temporary worker earns now."

Just as Xu Chengjun was about to answer, Zhou Mingyuan raised his hand again: "Teacher Xu, could I write an article titled 'Physical Phenomena in Tang Poetry'?"
For example, the phrase "a waterfall plunging three thousand feet" – according to the free-fall formula, the waterfall's speed could reach seventy meters per second, faster than the water flow in our laboratory!

"Of course!"

Xu Chengjun nodded with a smile, "But you have to hide the formula in the poem, don't write it as an experimental report—if it can be understood by physics students and liked by Chinese literature students, I'll reserve a page for 'The Wave'."

The school bell rang and fell, but when the bell rang to signal the end of get out of class, no one wanted to leave.

Li Wanqiu kept pestering Xu Chengjun to ask, "Can Du Fu's 'thousands of mansions' be realized?" Zhao Xiaoya calculated, "How many kilograms of pork can be bought with writing a good poem?" Zhou Mingyuan wrote "the conservation of energy in Tang poetry" on the blackboard.

Students these days are frighteningly naive, and the questions they ask are a bit...
Even Zhou Yutong, a history professor who was passing by, poked his head in and asked, "Professor Xu, do you still accept auditors for this class? I'd like to hear about 'Li Bai's alcohol content' too."

Upon seeing the old gentleman approaching, Xu Chengjun dared not be sarcastic anymore.

"Mr. Zhou is joking. Even if you were here to listen in, I wouldn't dare stand up there!"

The old man quickly waved his hand: "Last time I heard Zhu Dongrun say that he had taken on a new apprentice, but I never expected that this apprentice would now be teaching on the podium at Fudan University!"

Upon hearing this, Xu Chengjun refused to continue!
"Mr. Zhou, I'm just filling in for a class! This is Professor Huang Lin's class! I'm a student too!"

The old man ignored him, waved his hand, and walked away, but left a message: "Come visit me next time. I live next to your teacher."

Who was Zhou Yu?
A renowned historian, he had a deep understanding of the two major schools of classical studies in the late Qing Dynasty, and also conducted considerable research on "Song Learning," especially Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism.

In 1928, he published "Classic Literature: Ancient and Modern Times," which attracted the attention of the academic community and left behind many profound works in the history of Chinese classical studies.

In 1959, he established the only course in China, "History of Chinese Classics," at Fudan University, and also took the lead in editing the national textbook "Selected Readings in Chinese History."

Grandmaster.

While Xu Chengjun was tidying up his lesson plans, Zhao Xiaoya suddenly said, "Teacher Xu, I used to think that learning Tang poetry was useless, but today I realized that you can actually read 'how to live' from it. Not calculating how to live, nor shouting empty slogans, isn't that what you mean by 'sincerity'?"

"You're smart."

Xu Chengjun patted her on the shoulder, "Next time you hand in your homework, don't just write about the fried dough sticks, write about the 'bright moon' in your eyes too."

As they left the classroom, the setting sun cast its light on the sycamore leaves. Li Wanqiu and Zhao Xiaoya were still arguing about whether Du Fu could do accounting, when Zhou Mingyuan caught up with them, notebook in hand: "Teacher Xu, if I write a poem about 'waterfall speed,' will you really publish it in 'The Wave'?"

"Publish them! Publish them all if they're good! Everyone at Fudan University knows I'm short of manuscripts!"

After class, I stayed up late for another half hour to finally finish revising "The Music Box".

Submitting this to "Shanghai Literature" tomorrow will be a huge task.

Remembering that Fujii had given him a partial translation of "Red Silk" that morning, he took it out and flipped through it.

He doesn't understand Japanese.

However, you can tell from the dense handwriting that Fujii put a lot of effort into it.

I'll take it to an old professor who understands Japanese and ask him to take a look.

However, he was also wondering if he could use Fujii's connections to open up some opportunities to expand his influence in the world of literature.

Yes, it's a side quest.

This thing is no different from leveling up in a game; the mainland literary scene and Chinese literature are still its roots.

But why not take advantage of any opportunity to earn foreign exchange?

However, it is too early to do all of this. It would be more logical to do these things after the Japanese version of "Red Silk" has gained a certain influence.

He has plenty of creative ideas in his head that are suitable for the world literary scene of this era.

Publishing it directly in the Chinese literary world might not be suitable for everyone.

But exporting and then selling domestically is very convenient. Only your national football team can pull this off, right?
The next morning, Xu Chengjun was squatting downstairs in the dormitory building patching a bicycle tire when he didn't expect that Fujii, whom he had just seen the day before, would come again.

And there was a blonde girl.

Upon closer inspection, it suddenly dawned on me—wasn't this Alice, the one he had highly praised for her "very American accent" in the international student cafeteria?

"Mr. Xu, would you be interested in attending a literary salon?" Fujii spoke first, his tone slightly tentative.

"A literary salon? Organized by you international students?" Xu Chengjun stopped what he was doing with the wrench and looked up to ask.

Fujii shook his head. "No, it was handled by the German ambassador to Shanghai, because Günther Grass is coming."

Xu Chengjun was puzzled upon hearing this. "Glas? The Nobel laureate in Literature? What would a Chinese student like me do at his salon?"

He was actually a little puzzled: in this day and age, are there still Nobel laureates who can come to China?

However, this actually happened in history.

In November 1979, Günter Grass, the renowned German writer and 1999 Nobel laureate in Literature, visited China at the invitation of German Ambassador to China, Johann Wirk.

He gave a lecture at Shanghai International Studies University, read his work "Flounder" aloud, and also exchanged ideas with faculty and students from relevant majors at Fudan University and Shanghai Normal University.

Alice leaned forward, her face showing some urgency, and said, "You don't know, I've been helping the embassy prepare for the salon, coming here twice a week to coordinate, and each time it takes up an entire afternoon..."

Foreigners are fans of celebrities too!
Moreover, she had the opportunity to meet a writer like Glass, which many international students envied.

This kind of opportunity is like a Chinese student getting to know Bálás.

Who can bear it?

“Yesterday I went to the embassy to make arrangements. The ambassador said that the salon would like to invite people from the Chinese and foreign cultural circles, including both senior scholars and young writers. I talked to Fujii about your book, Red Silk. The ambassador said that he had heard of you before and asked me to make sure to invite you.”

After Alice finished speaking, she took out an invitation from the brown paper bag in her arms and said with a bit of pride, "Look, the invitation has been prepared for you, and it even has the ambassador's signature on it."

After listening to Alice's words, Xu Chengjun was a little puzzled: Why did the German embassy suddenly contact him?
Seeing that Xu Chengjun didn't agree immediately, Fujii asked, "Mr. Xu, don't you want to go?"

These days, when famous figures from the foreign literary world come to China, everyone wants to join in the fun, so neither Fujii nor Alice understands his hesitation.

Xu Chengjun wasn't particularly interested in the "Celebrity Salon," but since Alice had brought the invitation and mentioned "Red Silk," he felt that if he didn't go, the two of them would have a hard time explaining it to the ambassador.

"If I don't go, you two won't be able to explain yourselves to the embassy, ​​will you?" Xu Chengjun joked.

Hearing Xu Chengjun's words, Alice quickly nodded, "Mr. Xu, please do go, Glass still wants to talk to you about 'Red Silk'!"

Xu Chengjun nodded. "Alright. Going to the salon is fine. Consider this a favor you two owe me."

“No problem! We’ll definitely consider it a debt we owe you!” Alice and Fujii replied in unison.

Go ahead and meet the Nobel laureate in literature!
I only saw Mo Yan, the author of "Big Breasts and Wide Hips," once in my past life.

(End of this chapter)