The literary giants of the late Ming Dynasty began by copying books

Chapter 126: Strange people in the world
The waterway turned to land and then to water, and the two of them kept going north along the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, and soon they arrived at the mouth of Wujiang River.

Xu Guangqi was about to change ships in Wujiang. The Songjiang Prefecture at this time was in Huating, and the place where Xu Guangqi lived was close to the Nanhui District of Shanghai in later generations. The distance from Songjiang Prefecture was even further than from Songjiang to Jiaxing. It was definitely remote. zone.

Wang Wenlong continued his journey north and soon arrived in Suzhou. He went straight to Xu Shupi’s East Garden. Xu Shupi was very hospitable. Wang Wenlong also regarded Dongyuan as his first place to stay in Suzhou. The environment here is beautiful and it is a pleasure to live there. .

Just after arriving at the East Garden, Wang Wenlong came out of the door and said with a smile: "Go and report to your master that Wang Wenlong is here to cause trouble again."

After a while, Xu Shupi came out with a smile: "Jianyang kept me waiting for a long time."

Xu Shupi pulled Wang Wenlong and walked inside. As he walked, he said, "Today I want to introduce you to a senior."

Wang Wenlong smiled and said: "Wait a minute, I also brought a gift."

He opened the book box he brought and said: "I want to run a Di newspaper in Fuzhou, which will talk about some leisure things in the city. I have written several novels and plan to publish them in the newspaper. This time I brought them here specifically for everyone to see. Tasting.”

He smiled and took out a collection of novels titled "Strange People in the World".

The preparations for the "Xunbao" have been basically completed in the past half month. The people who have just started running the newspaper have not set up a reporter station, and there is no current news to report. Wang Wenlong wants to copy something similar to the "Story Meeting" in his previous life from his memory. I used appropriate articles in similar magazines as examples, and I thought about "Strange People in the World" written by Feng Jicai in my previous life.

"Strange People in the World" is a modern work by Feng Jicai. The text is short and half-literate. It originally imitates the writing style of three words and two beats. At the same time, it is based on the modern novel creation method of later generations. The characters described are vivid, lifelike, and full of charm. Some allegorical qualities.

It can not only describe the local customs and customs, but also promote the ideas of the citizen class. The metaphor is not too strong, which is helpful for promoting new ideas.

"Strange People" are short articles. Although a lot of content needs to be rewritten, adapting this book is much simpler than rewriting "The Wealth of Nations". Wang Wenlong only used his spare time to write this collection, one article a day, for more than half a month. Also compiled into one volume.

"Xunbao" only publishes an edition every ten days. These dozens of chapters of "Strange People in the World", combined with the martial arts novel "Liancheng Jue" he plans to copy, are enough to fill the novel page of "Xunbao" for half a year.

Xu Shupi took over Wang Wenlong's article and said with a smile: "Jianyang is really a sharp writer!"

People in this era are very slow to write books. Xu Shupi is also a writer and is currently writing four books. Take his "Shi Xiao Lu" as an example. After decades of research, he still hasn't felt that he can publish it. History The book on this subject was not published until his death. It was not officially published until the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty. The publication cycle of a book spans 200 years.

Commercial writers in this era can publish a little faster, but writing ten books in a lifetime of 60 to [-] years is considered highly productive.

In comparison, Wang Wenlong's output rate is completely at the level of later writers. He came to the Ming Dynasty just over a year ago and has already published two big books, "The Scholars" and "The History of Portugal", as well as a sensational "Tianyan Lun". Moreover, after writing it, it was immediately put into commercial printing. The text was published all over the country and received good reviews, which made Xu Shupi, a writer who worked slowly and meticulously, quite envious.

Xu Shupi took "Strange People in the World" and didn't have time to open it. He pulled Wang Wenlong and walked to a flower hall in the Liuyuan Garden. Before the two of them entered the flower hall, they met a middle-aged man dressed as a Confucian scholar in the corridor outside the flower hall.

As soon as the middle-aged man saw Wang Wenlong, he looked him up and down and said happily: "It's the famous Wang Jianyang in front of me!"

Wang Wenlong asked: "Dare you ask me, senior?"

Xu Shupi smiled and said: "This gentleman is Hu Yuanrui Gong, Hu Yinglin!"

Wang Wenlong was shocked when he heard this and hurriedly bowed: "You don't know Mr. Yuan Rui's face, please don't blame me."

Even though Hu Yinglin is only in his forties now, he is a leader in Jiangnan literary circles and is an indispensable figure in the history of Ming Dynasty literature.

The rise of poetry in the entire Ming Dynasty went through the restoration movement and reform stages.The retro movement began decades ago during the Chenghua period.

At that time, the Ming Dynasty's poetry articles were still popular in the Guange style, and there were very few poems describing reality. At that time, the retro movement proposed that "literature must be from the Qin and Han Dynasties, and poetry must be from the prosperous Tang Dynasty", believing that poetry should describe the same way as the Qin, Han and Tang Dynasties. Real life, not just used to boast about the prosperity of the palace.

During this period, the first batch of leaders emerged in the retro movement, known as the "First Seven Sons". Later, during the Jiajing period, Wang Shizhen, Wang Daokun and other literati inherited the ideas of the "First Seven Sons" and continued to promote the retro movement against the Guange style, known as As the "last seven sons".

Hu Yinglin was one of the last inheritors of the literary restoration movement in the late Ming Dynasty. Together with five other people, he formed the last group of masters of the literary restoration movement in the Ming Dynasty, known as the "Last Five Sons" in history.

From the development of the retro movement and Wushan Society, we can also see the process of gradual opening up of the cultural atmosphere of the Ming Dynasty over the past few decades.

At that time, the retro movement advocated "literature must be based on the Qin and Han Dynasties, and poetry must be based on the prosperous Tang Dynasty", which was a kind of progress against the flashy style of poetry. However, in the generation of Yuan Hongdao and Feng Menglong, the excessive pursuit of Qin and Han literary styles and the right rhythms of the Tang and Song Dynasties were regarded as a kind of anti-Japanese poetry. Creative limitations.

Therefore, Yuan Hongdao and others took the lead and proposed to create the Ming Dynasty's own literary style. They did not only pursue the poetic style of the Han and Tang Dynasties, but believed that the novels of the late Ming Dynasty were also important literary genres.A new generation replaced the old, and the retro-style ideas that were quite trendy back then have now become the target of criticism by a new generation of writers.

Hu Yinglin said with a smile: "I heard someone said you were coming to Suzhou, so I rushed here just to see you."

Wang Wenlong even said that he did not dare to take it seriously.

At this moment, another visitor was announced outside, and soon Feng Menglong walked in from the outside with a smile.

"Mr. Yuan Rui, Jianyang, Wu Zi, I also said that I came early. I didn't want you to come all the way and arrive first. It would be rude and rude."

Then Feng Menglong specially bowed his hand to Hu Yinglin and said with great respect, "I haven't seen you for a long time, Mr. Yuan Rui. You must be polite."

Hu Yinglin smiled and nodded.

Although Hu Yinglin was the last fifth son of the retro movement and conflicted with the ideas of Wushan Society, the era of the retro movement had passed by now. All the last seven sons had passed away, and only three of the last five sons were alive. Hu Yinglin joined Shi Wen at a young age. He is a sportsman, so he is less than fifty now. He is young but senior. In the literary world, he is actually a generation older than everyone present, and everyone must hold the disciple's ceremony in front of him.

Wang Wenlong asked curiously: "Where did Brother Feng come from? Did he pick up Yuan Zhonglang?"

Feng Menglong smiled and shook his head when he heard this: "I originally planned to wait for his comrade in Jiangbei, but I didn't expect to wait and delay for a few days without seeing him arrive. Most likely, the guy was on the way to visit somewhere else."

"This is in line with Yuan Zhonglang's name." Wang Wenlong couldn't help laughing.

Yuan Hongdao was originally left as an official in the capital by his eldest brother Yuan Zongdao, but despite his laziness, he did have political talents, and with the help of his brother, his official career was prosperous.

In the past few months, Yuan Hongdao had been promoted from an assistant professor at the Imperial College to the head of the Department of Ceremony and Cleaning of Officials of the Ministry of Etiquette.

If you don’t look at Yuan Hongdao’s character and just look at his resume and background, you will find that his background is quite clean: he was born as a Jinshi, served as a local political officer, and then went from being an academic official to being gilded in the clear stream of the Hanlin Academy. The Academy was assigned to the Ministry of Rites, which actually held the power, to be in charge - it was a very standard promotion process from a clean official to an official with real power.

The position in the Department of Cleaning and Officials of the Ministry of Rites can manage the promotion of officials, and Yuan Hongdao will be at the principal level with sole power. Such a position is also an excellent position in the party struggle at this time. If Yuan Hongdao is determined to be an official, he will definitely be able to do so. Great Expectations.

But things are unpredictable. His brother Yuan Zongdao passed away in the capital a few months ago. Yuan Hongdao was on a business trip at the time. He heard the news on the river boat returning to Beijing. He was heartbroken and disheartened, and then decisively went to the hospital. "Gao Bing Shu" prayed for long-term seclusion. Before the edict to resign was approved, others had already returned south.

Not to mention that a wealthy family raised literati, the Yuan family's family background was too strong, and such a good employer could only refuse.Not to mention Feng Menglong, a struggling scholar who failed to pass the examination, even Wang Wenlong was envious.

After everyone chatted for a while, Wang Wenlong turned the conversation to his "Xun Bao".

"At the invitation of Xu Fantai, I am organizing a newspaper in Fuzhou. I am currently soliciting contributions. No matter whether it is novels, poems or essays, there is a shortage of them. If you have good works in recent days, please don't be stingy and I will give you a generous fee."

This was the important purpose of Wang Wenlong's trip north to Suzhou. He wanted to solicit manuscripts for his "Xun Bao", and Wuzhong Society was the home of Jiangnan literati at this time. Naturally, there was no better opportunity to solicit manuscripts than attending a gathering of Wuzhong Society.

Hearing this, Xu Shupi was a little curious: "Does the Di newspaper still ask for novels and poems?"

Wang Wenlong nodded: "Due to the promotion of mimeographed express books in Fuzhou, Di newspapers are now thicker and thicker, with more and more content. It is already an emerging business."

Sanwu has always been the leader in cultural dissemination at this time, but as Wang Wenlong's mimeograph technology was first promoted in Fujian, with Fuzhou as the center, Fujian's book industry actually moved ahead of Sanwu.

At this time, Suzhou did not have as strong a newspaper culture as Fuzhou. After listening to Wang Wenlong's explanation, Hu Yinglin said: "The printing quality of the mimeograph express book is quite low, it is just a quick drawing. I only think it is a new creation of profit-seeking businessmen." The method is to ruin all the originally good books. Now I heard from Jianyang that this mimeographed express book is not completely useless. It is still a good way to print the book to report failure, but it should not be used to print serious books. "

Just like what happened in Fujian, with the popularization of mimeograph technology, Sanwu Small Workshop also began to print a large number of abridged versions of mimeographed bad books.

Hu Yinglin is also a big bibliophile. He has recently been troubled by the flood of inferior mimeographed books on the market, and he still holds a negative attitude towards mimeograph technology.

But after he said this, Wang Wenlong and the three of them couldn't help laughing.

(End of this chapter)