The literary era since 1979

Chapter 18 General Fang's Ambition
On November 11, the National Congress of Writers and Artists officially closed.

Fangyan had stayed in Yenching for more than half a month, and it was time to return to northern Shaanxi, so he went to the editorial office of Yenching Literature and Art to settle the bill.

Wang Jie sat at the table, holding a pen and doing the math for him.

According to the standards for cadres on business trips, he calculated the round-trip travel expenses, gave himself a subsidy of two yuan per day, and bought himself a hard sleeper ticket back to northern Shaanxi, and even made up the difference in the price of the hard sleeper.

All in all, it’s almost forty dollars!
Wang Jie went to the accountant to collect the money for Fang Yan and also gave him a certificate to prove that his revisions to the manuscript of Yenching Literature and Art were true. He said that he would hand this over to the brigade when he returned to northern Shaanxi.

After finishing everything, Fang Yan gave three packs of peach cakes to Wang Jie, asked her to share them with the people in the editorial department, and then left the building.

In those days, snacks such as cakes, peach cakes, sachima, mung bean cakes, glutinous rice noodles and other popular items required both money and food coupons. For example, cakes and glutinous rice noodles were 6 cents per pound, which required 5 taels of food coupons.

Peach cakes are even more expensive, costing 7 yuan per pound.

The Great Unity gift from Yang Xia allowed him to buy eight packs of peach cakes, each weighing one pound. Together with the food coupons bought from the pigeon market, this was enough to cover an average family's food expenses for a month.

I kept 1 pack at home and took the remaining 4 packs back to the team.

On the last night before leaving, Yang Xia gave Fang Yan a bath ticket. Fang Yan went to the bathhouse to take a bath, got a haircut, and came back clean. On the dining table was a luxurious meal of rice mixed with soy sauce and lard.

After this meal, there was actually a midnight snack for the first time.

After making 4 cups of malted milk, the family of four gathered together, chatting and sharing peach cakes, having a great time.

After a good meal and sleep, we set off for the train station the next day.

As a model worker and advanced employee of the noodle factory, Fang Hong took half a day off, which was rare. She and Yang Xia sent Fang Yan to the bus stop together.

"Yanzi, take this money and put it away."

Yang Xia looked around and carefully took out a big unity banknote.

"Mom, I have money myself, you don't need to give me money. Besides, I haven't spent all the money you gave me last time."

Fangyan not only shirked his responsibility, he even wanted to use half of the subsidy given to him by Yenching Literature and Art to supplement his household expenses.

"Whatever money your family needs, just take it." Fang Hong stuffed the money into his hand forcefully.

"Your sister is right. Don't be hard on yourself on the road. Eat something good." Yang Xia said.

Fangyan thought of this money as a payment from his royalties, nodded and said, "Mom, sister, don't worry about me, I will definitely be back before the New Year, and then, our family will celebrate the New Year together."

"Okay, be careful on the road, we'll wait for you to come back for the New Year." Fang Hong supported Yang Xia, and they both watched him get on the bus.

"Mom, sister, let's go back."

Fangyan stuck his head out of the window and waved.

The two sides just waved to each other until they disappeared from each other's sight, and their eyes couldn't help but become red.

As red as the sun in the sky.

There is still a lot of people at Yanjing Railway Station in the morning.

Fangyan was walking on the platform with his luggage, when he saw a hand suddenly raised and waved from side to side among the huge crowd.

"Comrade Xiao Fang, here!"

"what."

Fangyan looked through the gaps in the crowd and saw that the person extending his hand was Lu Yao, and around him was the Shaanxi delegation that had traveled with him.

"Don't call me 'Comrade Xiao Fang' anymore."

Jia Pingwa gave a reminder.

Although there is a big age gap between them, if we count the time of their debut, they are of the same generation in the literary world.

"Of course I know. I was just afraid that if I shouted 'Fangyan', the whole train station would riot and surround Fangyan."

Lu Yao said half-jokingly.

"Exaggerated."

Fangyan raised his hand.

"Maybe there will be a momentary riot at the train station, but seeing how young Fangyan is, it's hard to believe that The Horse Herder was written by him. I just think it's a coincidence that they have the same name."

Jia Pingwa suddenly said, "Yes, who would have thought that it was this young man who wrote The Horse Herder." Hu Cai cast an admiring look, "I read the novel at the Writers' Congress, it's very well written."

Fang Yan said: "It's not entirely my credit. The teachers at Yenching Literature and Art gave me a lot of suggestions."

“But ‘reflective literature’, after all, it was you who came up with it.”

"Yeah, this 'reflective literature', what exactly did you think of it at the time? Did you think of it when you wrote The Shepherd?"

"Tell us about it."

"........."

Everyone in the Shaanxi delegation gathered around him, speaking in dialect, and discussing this new wave of reflective literature.

Lu Yao looked at this writer who emerged out of nowhere at the National Congress of Writers and Artists and became famous in Yenching University with burning eyes. It was impossible for him not to be envious.

The National Congress of Writers is just the beginning, the climax will come next.

Newspapers and periodicals across the country will soon spare no effort to promote him and "The Shepherd", including "Yanhe" of which he is the editor, and the entire Shaanxi-Gansu literary community will cooperate with "Yenching Literature and Art" to launch the "reflective literature" trend he proposed.

By then, everyone in the world will know the dialect!

This is the true meaning of “one article known to the world”!
"beep!"

"Dudududu!"

The whistle sounded, the train wheels turned, and the train headed towards northern Shaanxi through the thick smoke, the body of the train swaying.

In the hard sleeper carriage, Fang Yan, Lu Yao, Hu Cai and others were assigned to the same compartment, and there were exactly three berths: upper, middle and lower.

"My middle bunk."

Lu Yao showed the small card.

"I'll take the lower bunk."

Fang Yan glanced at Hu Cai, who looked embarrassed, and offered, "Teacher Hu, let's switch."

"Why is this so embarrassing?"

Hu Cai shook his head.

"I'd better sleep on the top bunk. Climbing up and down can help me exercise. Just give me this opportunity."

Fangyan put the luggage up without waiting for the other party to refuse.

"Thank you, Iwako."

After Hu Cai and others became familiar with him, they no longer called him "Comrade Xiao Fang". They either called him by his nickname or his full name.

"You're welcome."

Fangyan actually had his own plans in mind.

Just as Wang Jie is proud of discovering a new writer, every editor must have his or her own long-term cooperative writers to facilitate commissioning and compiling articles for literary journals.

Over time, a relatively large and stable group of authors will be formed. There is a saying that "the editorial department is the headquarters."

The literary circles in various places were the local armies. For example, the one in northern Shaanxi was called the "Shaanxi Army", the one in western Shanxi was called the "Shanxi Army", and the one in Yanjing was called the "Imperial Guards".

Fang Yan himself was considered a young general of the Imperial Guard.

General Fang!
The more troops a headquarters has, the larger their size and the stronger their combat effectiveness, the higher the status of its own journals and publishing houses will be.

It would be a disaster if an editor had an extremely loyal private army that would follow him or her wherever he or she moved to.

A true warlord!
The entire province of northern Shaanxi is an important stronghold of Chinese literary circles, and the Shaanxi Army is the elite among the elite in Chinese literary circles.

Lu Yao, Jia Pingwa, Mo Shen and others in the delegation will be the backbone of the future. Although others have never heard of them, they can feel their strong passion for creation when they come into contact with them on the platform. Everyone is holding back their energy and wants to write good works.

These people are rare resources.

While he was thinking, Hu Cai smiled and said, "Yanzi, you said that your other novel will be published in the next issue of Yanjing Literature and Art. Have you ever thought about what your next work will be after Loess Plateau?"

As soon as these words were spoken, Lu Yao, Jia Pingwa, Mo Shen and the other four people all looked at Fang Yan, waiting for his answer.

(End of this chapter)