Tokyo Literary Masters: Starting from the Late 1980s

Chapter 210 The Madness of European Publishers

The shockwaves caused by "The Long Road" in Japan have yet to subside, but its influence has already crossed oceans and landed on the desks of top publishers in London, Paris, and New York.

In London, Robert Finley, CEO of Penguin Random House, was one of the first to receive the complete translation.

That morning, it was raining heavily in London. The hazy sunlight filtered into the office, and the glass windows were covered with a layer of cold, misty fog.

Robert Finley leaned back in his large leather chair, a stack of faxes that had just arrived from Tokyo in front of him.

The title is just a few words: Kitahara Iwao's new book, "The Long Road".

As the publisher who published "Never Let Me Go" and "The Collapsing Tower" and personally voiced his support for Kitahara Iwao in European media, Robert Finley knew better than anyone how shrewd Kitahara's writing style was.

He originally thought that after the sensation caused by "The Collapsed Tower", Kitahara Iwao would follow this momentum and deliver an ambitious work that would continue to delve into the pathology of the system, criticize the Japanese bureaucratic system, or showcase grand narrative skills.

But after only a dozen or so pages, Finley's preconceived literary expectations were dashed.

The fax paper contained no sophisticated sociological analysis, nor any angry denunciation of the bureaucracy.

The opening scene features only ashes filling the sky, biting cold, and an unnamed father and son struggling through an unknown wasteland.

There are no complicated clues, nor any deliberately created suspense.

But it is precisely this desolation and roughness stripped of all embellishment that creates a tremendous attraction that leaves one breathless.

Finley was completely dragged into the ashes.

He didn't stop until he read about the father sharing the last bit of food with his children in the cold, abandoned house. He took off his glasses and gently pressed his temples.

As a seasoned publisher, he was keenly aware of the fundamental differences between this manuscript and his previous work.

"The Collapsed Tower" is a sharp form of realism.

It dissects the debt chain of Japan's bubble economy, and European readers are largely shocked by the devastation of a foreign economic collapse.

But "The Long Road" transcends this cognitive threshold.

It doesn't require readers to understand the operation of the Ministry of Finance, to know what "housing and property bad debts" are, or to care how many families in Tokyo were going bankrupt in 1991.

It eliminates all the complicated labels of the times.

All that remained was a father, a child, a road covered in ashes, and a faint voice that stubbornly told the child, "We cannot eat people," even as civilized order crumbled.

It is this purity, stripped of national borders and cultural barriers, that gives it a pain that is unhindered.

Finley took a deep breath, picked up the slightly disheveled translation, gently tapped it to straighten it on the table, and then turned back to the first page.

After reading it a second time, Finley resisted the urge to immediately call Kitahara Iwao and Shinchosha.

Having been in this industry for many years, he knew all too well what this fax meant.

A work destined to enter the history of contemporary literature would never be distributed solely to Penguin Random House by Shinchosha.

At this very moment, at Faber Publishing, just a few streets away, Editor-in-Chief Margaret is likely also lost in a long silence as she looks at this sample chapter.

Meanwhile, at HarperCollins, James, the literary editor known for his rationality and restraint, has probably already sensed the approaching storm.

With that in mind, Finley pressed the intercom on the table and said, "Please have the copyright director and the CFO come over now."

Less than two minutes later, two Penguin Random House executives walked into the office.

Finley skipped all the usual pleasantries, lightly pressing his fingertips on the fax paper, and said in an unquestionable tone, "Notify the legal department to immediately draft a pre-authorization agreement of the highest level."

The copyright director paused, somewhat bewildered: "Which author's manuscript is this? If it's a key project, according to regulations, at least a profit and loss calculation and royalty tier assessment should be prepared first—along with notification of the editorial board's review process."

"It's Kitahara Iwao's new book!"

Upon hearing this, Finley replied directly, "It's a dozen or so pages of sample chapters from a new work that just arrived from Tokyo."

As Finley finished speaking, the office fell silent.

The two executives were well aware of the weight of this name.

Because "Never Let Me Go" and "The Collapsing Tower" not only brought Penguin Random House an astonishing return on profits, but also allowed the group to carve out a large core market share in the fiercely competitive European publishing landscape.

At this very moment, Kitahara Iwao, who is on the shortlist for the Nobel Prize, is the most sought-after name in the entire European literary world.

But after a brief moment of surprise, the CFO frowned.

Reason prompted him to remind the usually prudent CEO, "Mr. Finley, even if it's Kitahara Iwa, without the editorial board having collectively reviewed the entire manuscript and without any market assessment, your initial reading alone bypassed risk assessment and directly offered the maximum price, which seriously violates the group's acquisition procedures."

"Discard all those conventional business calculations."

Finley interrupted him directly, saying, "I need you to draft an advance payment figure that Shincho-sha and Kitahara Iwao can't refuse!"

"This number must be so large that when Faber's Margaret and HarperCollins' James see it, they will completely abandon the idea of ​​asking the board for additional funding."

The two executives exchanged a glance, their faces filled with astonishment.

Penguin Random House rarely makes such a radical decision, regardless of cost, without full evaluation by the editorial board.

Before the two could say anything more, Finley continued, "If we follow the procedure, we'll lose this novel completely at the auction table next week."

"Get ready right away. 'Never Let Me Go' and 'The Collapsing Tower' have brought us enough money and attention, but this one on the table today is different."

"What we're buying now isn't a bestselling book to boost quarterly earnings reports, but rather the pre-purchase of the next fifty years of literary history."

As Finley had predicted, Margaret Hughes of Faber Publishing and James Wharton of HarperCollins UK realized almost simultaneously after reading the full translation of "The Long Road" that the novel could no longer be judged by the standards of ordinary imported books.

This is no longer just an ordinary translation of Japanese literature; it is a spark that Kitahara Iwa handed to the world from the ruins of Japan's bubble economy.

Whoever can conquer it will occupy the most prominent position on the literary map of Europe and even the English-speaking world for a long time to come.

Margaret stood in the Faber Publishing conference room, facing a table of board members intently watching the profit and loss statements, and felt a clear resistance.

As editor-in-chief, she was well aware of Faber's strengths and weaknesses.

They have an excellent literary reputation and a loyal audience of serious literature readers, but this also means that they do not have the financial resources of multinational publishing groups when facing upcoming bidding wars.

"Although this novel strips away all commercial elements that can be immediately monetized."

Margaret looked at the executives across the long table, trying to keep her tone steady: "There are no suspenseful plot twists, nor any social realism spectacles. The whole story revolves around a father, a child, and ashes everywhere. But I assure you, this is an absolute classic that will be unforgettable for decades to come."

The finance director frowned as she looked at the report in her hand. "But these 'ashes' can't be assessed using our usual market evaluation models, Margaret. You're going to use the second half of the core budget for a project whose royalty expectations are difficult to quantify?"

Faced with such sharp questioning, Margaret did not back down. Instead, she spent most of the morning reciting "The Long Road."

The astonishing literary depth was forcibly translated into long-term market potential and brand value that conservative executives could understand.

Ultimately, at Margaret's insistence, the board reluctantly conceded and signed the special authorization letter.

£550,000 in advance payment.

Margaret walked out of the conference room, looking down at the thin document in her hand.

This is an exceptional number for Faber, a long-established institution that has always sought stability.

It's enough to buy the full copyrights of several established authors, and it's bound to cause controversy at the year-end financial settlement meeting.

But her steps did not become lighter as a result.

Having worked in this industry for many years, Margaret is all too aware of Kitahara Iwa's market popularity at this stage.

"The Long Road" is sure to be a hot commodity across Europe, with the huge sum of £550,000 barely enough to secure Faber a ticket to participate in this round of bidding.

When facing publishing giants like HarperCollins or Penguin Random House, this amount of leverage seems far too weak.

At HarperCollins UK, James Wharton is experiencing similar internal resistance.

Known for his rationality and restraint, he did not slam his fist on the table with the CFO in the conference room, but the atmosphere of confrontation at both ends of the long table dropped to freezing point.

"You're still using the conventional import book model to do profit and loss projections."

James pushed the entire translated manuscript to the center of the table, tapped his knuckles twice on the paper, and said in a cold, hard tone, "This is not a book whose value is measured by its first print run. It will follow Kitahara Iwa's name into university classrooms, into literary history, and into the international classics list for the next twenty years."

Upon hearing this, the CFO's expression stiffened somewhat. "James, we certainly understand Kitahara Iwa's potential. But a 1.2 million pound advance?"

"This exceeds our total budget for all our overseas literature projects this year. The board is unlikely to approve this level of expenditure so easily just because of this one book."

Upon hearing this, James interrupted immediately, saying, "If we miss out on this work today because of a slight delay in the evaluation process, every time Kitahara Iwao makes it onto the world literary map in the future, the industry will question HarperCollins about why he lacked the courage at crucial moments."

After James finished speaking, a brief silence fell over the conference room.

The executives were unable to refute this question, which concerned the group's long-term reputation.

But literary ambitions ultimately require real money to support them, and a huge financial gap won't disappear just because of a brilliant speech.

After this silence came hours of intense pressure and reallocation of budgets from various departments.

After a long and tedious day of intense internal strife and maneuvering, James finally managed to obtain the maximum authorization HarperCollins could offer.

£1.2 million.

This is an unprecedented figure that would shake the London publishing world for any foreign writer whose native language is not English.

After James received the authorization documents, he didn't hesitate for a second and immediately returned to his office to call the overseas copyright department of Shinchosha, a Japanese publishing company.

As a seasoned copyright operator, he had even mentally rehearsed the bidding strategies for the next few rounds.

However, the response on the other end of the phone completely froze him in place.

"I'm very sorry, Mr. James."

The voice of the copyright manager at Shinchosha was filled with barely concealed excitement, as well as a hint of businesslike apology: "Just two hours ago, the core European and American copyrights for 'The Long Road' were officially signed."

James gripped the receiver, his brow furrowing slightly.

"Two hours ago?"

He glanced down at his watch.

This was the perfect time for him to storm into the meeting room and open fire on the finance department.

In other words, while you were still struggling to stay within the budget, everything was already over.

Suppressing his shock, James asked in a deep voice, "You signed without even listening to Faber's and our offers? Who are they, and what price did they quote?"

"It's Mr. Robert Finley of Penguin Random House."

There was a pause on the other end of the phone.

Subsequently, the person in charge of Shinchosha reported the number truthfully.

£3.5 million, paid in advance.

An additional £1 million budget is allocated for promotional activities in the European and American markets.

Finley also stipulated in the contract that Kitahara Iwa would retain the film and television adaptation rights, the right to confirm secondary authorization, and a share of high-level royalties after exceeding the initial print run target.

Most importantly, Penguin Random House promised a simultaneous release in the UK, US, Canada, and Australia, and listed "The Long Road" as the group's highest-level literary project of the year, rather than as an ordinary imported foreign literature book.

For Shinchosha, this was no longer a simple copyright transaction, but a global distribution plan to push Kitahara Iwa to the core readers of the English-speaking world.

Upon hearing the offer, James, who was standing in front of the floor-to-ceiling window on the banks of the Thames, fell completely silent.

Three and a half million pounds.

In the European publishing industry in 1991, this was no longer considered a high price in the ordinary sense.

It is a figure that would leave any serious literary editorial department speechless, even exceeding the cumulative advance payments made by many Nobel laureates over many years of copyright management in the European market.

Not to mention, "The Long Road" was just a newly published work in Japan at that time.

James held the receiver, feeling a deep sense of powerlessness.

While Margaret was still struggling to persuade him in Faber's meeting room, and while he was still grappling with the finance department over a £1.2 million contract, Finley had already used his CEO authority to bypass all the usual editorial board procedures and directly put a sky-high contract that Tokyo could not refuse on the table.

This is not a bidding process at all.

This is a unilateral table-closing.

With an advance payment of £3.5 million and a marketing guarantee of £1 million, Finn effectively cut off Long Road from the sight of all competitors, leaving them no chance to even pull out a chair or sit down to play.

The news caused an uproar in London's publishing world that afternoon.

Although everyone in the industry knew that Finley favored Kitahara Iwa, no one expected that he would use such an almost table-flipping bidding method to lock up the copyright directly.

Rumors are swirling in the public sphere.

Many in the industry see this as an irrational gamble.

Some jokingly said he was betting Penguin Random House's financial statements on Kitahara Iwao's Nobel Prize, while others mocked him for choosing a path leading to a precipice between literary glory and commercial failure.

At this point, James and Margaret, the two losers, dialed Finley's private line one after the other.