Writer 1978: I Need to Give the Literary World a Lesson

Chapter 166 Taking Everything and Making Nothing
Spring has arrived, the rainy season is over, spring is here, flowers are blooming, and all things are reviving.
Liu Yimin shook the noise in his head and looked at Zhu Lin, who was leaning against the wall. Zhu Lin was supporting himself on the edge of the desk with his left hand, his toes lightly kicking the desk leg, and his eyes were fixed on Liu Yimin.

His lips trembled slightly with nervousness.

Liu Yimin slowly stood up from the table without saying a word.

Zhu Lin gave a bitter laugh, let out a wail, and prepared to run away. In the end, it was all because he was too sentimental.

Liu Yimin grabbed Zhu Lin's wrist, pulled her back, and grinned, "What's wrong? Are you leaving already?"

Zhu Lin stammered, "Teacher Liu, I was just joking."

"I took it seriously!"

"Huh?" Zhu Lin looked up at Liu Yimin's serious face, and after a long while, she realized it was true. Overjoyed, she burst into tears: "Actually, I was serious just now too!"

Liu Yimin gently wiped away the tears from the corners of Zhu Lin's eyes and said in a smug tone, "Comrade Zhu Lin, would you like to be my Zhou Yun!"

Zhu Lin pretended to be angry and shoved Liu Yimin, then awkwardly tried to find a gap to stuff Liu Yimin in.

She tilted her head, slipped out of Liu Yimin's shadow, blushed, and pretended to be busy. After a while, she turned back and gave Liu Yimin a big smile.

She said, "I thought you were going to reject me, and I was about to run away. I finally mustered up the courage. I wanted to tell you this when I came back from Lushan. I had already decided to say it in Shanghai, but after a year, I lost my courage again."

Chu Hong has been encouraging me for the past few days.

Liu Yimin laughed loudly, "Then we should thank Comrade Chu Hong!"

Zhu Lin continued, seemingly to himself, "We're going to Hong Kong in a few days, and it might be another month or two before we're gone. So I don't want to wait any longer; that feeling is too unbearable!"

"What does it feel like?"

Zhu Lin stopped talking, glared at him angrily a few times, and started cleaning the room. Actually, the study had been cleaned for so long that it was already spotless.

Seeing that there was really nothing else to do, she went to Liu Yimin's bedroom to air out his quilts.

"You've already gotten into character so quickly?" Liu Yimin joked.

Zhu Lin didn't react at first, and it took her a few seconds to realize what it meant. She angrily threw the quilt she was holding onto the bed: "Teacher Liu, you can air it yourself!"

After a while, he obediently took the quilt and draped it in the middle of the yard.

Zhu Lin had plenty of energy, as if she had inexhaustible strength; she wasn't a delicate queen at all. Liu Yimin pointed to the dust on her chest, and she quickly ran over to gently wipe it off with water.

He did wash himself clean, but his chest was still damp, making Liu Yimin look pale and sickly.

Seeing her embarrassment, Liu Yimin told her to stay in the yard while he went out to buy some things and cook lunch.

Zhu Lin lay on the rocking chair in the middle of the yard, resting her head on her arms and gazing at the sky, her eyes filled with happiness. Every now and then, she would proudly shake her leg, causing the rocking chair to sway back and forth.

The flower of happiness blooms in my heart

Love songs drift on the wind

Our hearts fly to the distance.

Yearning for that beautiful revolutionary ideal

In the courtyard, I softly hummed the song "Our Life Is Full of Sunshine".

Liu Yimin bought some vegetables outside. At the corner of the alley, he ran into a commune member from the nearby commune who had secretly come to sell eggs. He bought some eggs but couldn't buy any meat.

He couldn't get meat through legitimate channels, since he didn't have a meat and egg ration coupon for the city. He could only get it through illegitimate means, but unfortunately, there weren't any illegitimate options available today. Last time, he had to go through several rounds of trouble to get the beef and mutton from the salesperson at a high price.

"Now we don't have to sneak around anymore, right?" Liu Yimin asked as he picked up the eggs.

"We're used to it!" a commune member said with a smile as he packed eggs. "The regulations are looser now, but it's still not easy to get caught. So, we'll only dare to sell them boldly when things are completely deregulated!"

Liu Yimin was about to leave with his bag of eggs. A commune member boldly sized him up, and seeing that he seemed wealthy, asked in a low voice, "Want some chicken?"

"Chickens? You're willing to sell chickens?"

In this day and age, chickens hold a very important position in the family. There's a saying that goes, "There's a bank in the chicken's rear end; chickens lay eggs, and you sell the eggs. You wouldn't trade them for a bank!"

"Wild chicken! Who would sell a real chicken? If you want one, come with me!"

"Is it far?" Liu Yimin asked warily.

Seeing that Liu Yimin was unwilling to go, the commune member said, "I think you're an honest man, you can wait a moment!"

Honest man, pshaw, that's a really dirty insult.

The commune member walked to the corner, whistled, and after a while, someone ran over and handed him a burlap sack. He walked over and quietly opened the sack a little, letting Liu Yimin take a look.

"How much!"

"Four yuan! Don't think it's too expensive. I don't need the meat ration coupon. I'll give you this sack anyway, and I'll even compensate you for the sack!"

Back in the courtyard, Zhu Lin and Liu Yimin were stumped by the pheasant; it was still alive. Liu Yimin had no experience killing chickens either, and the pheasant struggled several times before dying a miserable death.

They scalded the pheasant in hot water, removed the feathers, and after discussing it for a while, decided to make pheasant soup. A few pheasant feathers were particularly beautiful, so Zhu Lin collected them and placed them in his study as decoration.

Simmering chicken soup takes a very long time, but it's incredibly delicious once it's done.

The aroma of chicken soup wafted throughout the courtyard, while the faint scent of oil in the air was keenly detected by the children's noses. They swallowed hard and ran home to find their mothers.

"Teacher Liu, this is the first time I've ever had pheasant soup, it's so delicious!"

Liu Yimin finished the chicken soup and chicken in his bowl, letting out a satisfied burp. That afternoon, Liu Yimin took Zhu Lin to the Beijing People's Art Theatre.

Lan Tianye encountered the two men and, with just a glance, understood what had happened. After Zhu Lin went up to perform, Lan Tianye said to Liu Yimin, "Well done! Our People's Art Theatre's most beautiful flower has been snatched away by you!"

"What are you saying? I'm also a member of the Beijing People's Art Theatre. Teacher Lan, I've shed blood for the Beijing People's Art Theatre, I've been wounded for the Beijing People's Art Theatre!"

"Alright, stop there. If you keep talking, the Beijing People's Art Theatre will have to pay you back!"

As Liu Yimin left the rehearsal room, he greeted Cao Yu, who said with a hint of reproach, "You haven't been to the Beijing People's Art Theatre in a while!"

"I've been busy tidying up the house, so I came to see you as soon as I had a spare moment!"

Cao Yu gave Liu Yimin a half-smile and then asked, "Is there anything else I can help you with?"

Seeing that Liu Yimin did not speak, Cao Yu did not ask any further questions.

When Liu Yimin saw Xu Chi again, Xu Chi was thin and his eyes were slightly red. Liu Yimin asked him and learned that after arriving in Yanjing, Xu Chi first went to visit Li Ji at the Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery.

Xu Chi used to work at the Poetry Journal and had a lot of dealings with Li Ji. Liu Yimin comforted Xu Chi, who smiled and said, "I'm getting old, and it's a bit sad to see old friends passing away."

After speaking, Xu Chi took out his translation from his black briefcase and handed it to Liu Yimin: "Several months have passed, and I have successfully completed the task."

Starting from last year's National Congress of Writers and Artists, Xu Chi has been translating for more than half a year. A novel of just over 40,000 words shouldn't be this difficult for Xu Chi to translate.

However, he put in a lot of effort to translate it into an authentic English novel, rather than a clearly translated one.

Looking at the gaunt Xu Chi, Liu Yimin said apologetically, "Comrade Xu, I'm sorry to have troubled you!"

“Not at all. For me, translating a good work is a pleasure. I have translated Thoreau’s Walden, Tolstoy’s biography, Shelley’s Tomorrow, and so on. I haven’t translated any Chinese works into English yet. You’re giving me this opportunity.”

Xu Chi sat at his desk, sipping his tea, and urged Liu Yimin to quickly check how the translation was going: "Your English is also quite good. Actually, if you were even better, you could just write it as an English novel!"

As Liu Yimin read, he shook his head and said, "There are still differences. It's hard to change the writing mindset and word choice habits of Chinese people. I tried my best to use concise vocabulary in the Chinese version of 'Green Book' and avoid using overly Chinese idioms and philosophical sentences."

Xu Chi's translation is really good; he proved himself in France!
"Comrade Xu, your translation is excellent, just like reading the original English text. I think you're simply the best translator in the country!"

Xu Chi looked at Liu Yimin and stroked his beard, laughing heartily. Liu Yimin's praise had hit his sweet spot. For a translator, the greatest compliment is nothing more than being exactly like the original work.

"The number one translator? Hahaha, Yimin, I don't know how many people I've praised as the number one translator in my life, but this is the first time someone has said that I am the number one translator. I am unworthy of such praise, I am truly unworthy of such praise."

Seeing that Liu Yimin was satisfied, Xu Chi finally felt relieved.

Aside from matters at the Writers' Association, the most important thing about his visit was this novel. He had been translating it for over half a year, and it was finally time to put the results to the test.

How do you plan to send it to the United States?

Liu Yimin said, "Professor Wan knows editors of relevant magazines in the United States. He also knows some international students, so we can ask them to help submit the papers."

The best one was Cao Yu; he got his manuscript published quickly through connections.

"I forgot, you're Dean Cao's student. Isn't Dean Cao going to visit the United States in a few months? We can take care of this matter then!"

Cao Yu has a very busy schedule this year, with trips to the UK, France, and the US. The US is the last stop, which will further delay the publication of the Green Book.

After Xu Chi finished speaking, he discussed the "reform literature" that everyone was talking about. Xu Chi deeply agreed with Liu Yimin's views, believing that literature should focus on the material life of reality.

"Literature is not stagnant water; its content and themes are constantly changing, which is how literature demonstrates its vitality. Your report has not only sparked heated discussions in Beijing, a city teeming with writers, but has also generated intense debate in literary circles in Hubei Province."

Some argue that shifting the literary battleground to reform too early is detrimental and that criticism should continue. I scoff, "That's bullshit! Besides, Comrade Liu Yimin didn't force you to write; write whatever you want!"

Xu Chi's words made Liu Yimin laugh heartily. Xu Chi also published several commentaries in Hubei Province newspapers to support Liu Yimin.

"I believe that our literary style needs a rapid transformation, and my last trip to France left a deep impression on me. Our previous works focused on the times, not the individual. Our writing needs to change; it needs to turn to the individual, focusing on their fate in the face of the times."

The impact of changes in his personal material life on him.

Xu Chi talked about the latter half of the film "The PLA Occupies Paris," which he had seen in France, about the corrupting influence of capitalism. He believed that this was extremely thought-provoking for us, as changes in material life can have various effects on people.

Liu Yimin was amazed by the old man's foresight. Wasn't this precisely the series of impacts on the money values ​​and perspectives of social groups caused by the increasing affluence of people's lives after the opening up, under the impact of money-oriented values?
However, he hasn't quite grasped the exact nature of the serious impact this will have. This explains the sense of desolation Xu Chi felt in his later years when he witnessed the literary market being eroded by all sorts of trashy and obscene works.

“I also talked to Gao Xingjian, and I found that he paid great attention to the writing techniques used in French avant-garde literature, believing that techniques represent the direction of literary development. I disagree with this. I still agree with what you said: content determines form, and it is not good to focus on the surface and not the content.”

Xu Chi's enthusiasm grew as he talked, and as he spoke, his poetic inspiration surged, and he picked up a brush and began to write.

Putting away his own manuscript, Xu Chi's gaze fell on Liu Yimin's manuscript. He picked it up with great interest and quickly began reading.

When Xu Chi looked up again, he saw through the window that the last rays of sunlight disappeared on the roof tiles of the west wing, the golden light giving the blue tiles a shimmering glow.

"Time flies so fast?" Xu Chi twisted his neck, his tired expression easing slightly.

Liu Yimin closed the manuscript of "The Green Book," glanced at his watch, and said, "It's been four hours. I've read 'The Green Book' from beginning to end."

I didn't find a single spelling error after going through it once.

"When will you finish writing this? I think it's similar to the storytelling style of Green Book. Both are about redemption, but the background and development are different," Xu Chi commented.

"I initially planned to write it as a novella, but I enriched the main plot and decided to turn it into a full-length novel. I've only written 100,000 words so far, but it still needs at least another 60,000 to 70,000 words."

"Is this your first full-length novel?"

Liu Yimin nodded.

“A long novel really tests a storyteller’s ability; it’ll definitely be great when it’s written.” After saying that, Xu Chi regretted it and said, “I shouldn’t have come today?”

"what happened?"

"After reading half of it, do you think I'll be able to sleep well when I get back? Tell me how you came up with this story and how you incorporated so many important events of this era into it."

(End of this chapter)