Literary Master 1978

Lin Chaoyang went to Hong Kong for a visit and brought back so many things for his family. The total amount was several thousand yuan, which would be several years of income for an ordinary family.

Everyone was very happy to receive the gifts.

But Tao's mother's words made everyone's happiness stagnate. How could they feel good about their son (son-in-law/brother-in-law/brother-in-law) buying such expensive gifts for everyone but not for themselves?

Before Lin Chaoyang could answer, the eldest brother-in-law had already imagined the scene of his brother-in-law eating steamed buns in Hong Kong in order to save money to buy gifts for everyone.

"Chaoyang..." Tao Yucheng patted Lin Chaoyang on the shoulder, his face full of emotion.

Lin Chaoyang smiled and said, "Mom, these things are not attractive to me."

Lin Chaoyang was speaking the truth. He had experienced the Big Bang of matter and had seen all kinds of sophisticated industrial products in later generations. He was really not interested in these things.

But the more he said this, the more uncomfortable his family members felt.

The son (son-in-law/brother-in-law/brother-in-law) has given too much to this family!

When everyone thought about it, the gifts in their hands suddenly became less attractive.

Only the two brothers Tao Xiwen and Tao Xiwu were still tinkering with their toys heartlessly, and then they were dragged to Lin Chaoyang by their eldest brother-in-law.

"Say thank you to your uncle!"

The two brothers immediately said thank you obediently.

Lin Chaoyang looked at his family and felt a little amused and helpless, saying: "I didn't buy a gift for myself, but others gave me a lot of gifts."

He looked at Tao Yushu, and she immediately said: "Yes, he visited so many places in Hong Kong, and people received him and gave him a lot of gifts."

Listening to Tao Yushu's words, the expressions of the family members relaxed, and they felt relieved to receive the gifts.

"Not only did he receive a lot of gifts..." Before Tao Yushu finished speaking, everyone's eyes were on her again.

Lin Chaoyang looked at his wife and shouted in his heart: Here it comes! Here it comes!

"This time when we go to Hong Kong, there is a publishing house that wants to publish his novel, and the contract has been signed!"

When Tao Yushu said this, everyone was immediately happy.

Tao Yumo asked: "I remember that my brother-in-law seemed to have published a book in Hong Kong before?"

"This time it is still the same book, "The Death of Van Gogh", but with a different publishing house.

Last time it was a university publishing house, and the circulation was relatively small. This time the publishing house is Ming Pao Publishing House, the boss is Jin Yong, and the circulation is more than last time." Tao Yushu explained.

"Then my brother-in-law will be famous in Hong Kong?" Tao Yumo asked again.

The two sisters sang in unison, like the funny and the supporting role in a crosstalk, and the audience beside them listened with relish and asked questions.

"Chaoyang, what is royalty?"

"Royalties are the fees that writers charge a certain percentage of the book price as royalties."

"How much money can you make from publishing this time?"

"That's hard to say, it depends on the sales."

...

After happily distributing the gifts, the family sat down for a meal, and Lin Chaoyang had to tell his family about his experiences in Hong Kong as a side dish.

He talked about the welcome banquet he had just attended, and suddenly said to Tao's father: "Dad, do you know Han Suyin?"

When Tao's father heard the name, he didn't seem to think about it, and a bit of nostalgia flashed in his eyes.

"She is two years older than me, studying medicine. At that time, she was a famous beauty in our Yanda..."

"I heard she was a mixed-race."

Tao's father was immersed in the nostalgia of the past and old friends, and Tao's mother suddenly interrupted with a word that calmed him down immediately.

Seeing his wife's calm face, Tao's father couldn't help but reveal a sense of guilt in his eyes.

Lin Chaoyang realized that he seemed to have dug a hole for his father-in-law.

"It's all in the past. There aren't many of our classmates alive now."

It must be said that Tao's father's change of topic was a little abrupt.

Everyone seemed to have noticed something was wrong, and the atmosphere at the table suddenly became subtle. Lin Chaoyang secretly observed Tao's mother's expression and said with a smile: "There were two people from Yan University that night..."

After dinner, the family left, and Tao Yushu complained: "You just eat, what nonsense are you talking about?"

"Can you blame me for this? I didn't know that Dad had such a past when he was young!"

Tao Yushu's beautiful eyes were coquettish, "Stop talking nonsense, be careful I'll complain to Dad."

Lin Chaoyang didn't expect that after returning home, there would be a small episode in the visit to Hong Kong, and he didn't know what kind of treatment his father-in-law would have after returning tonight.

As he thought about it, he couldn't help laughing out loud.

The next day he went to the library to find Xie Daoyuan to cancel his leave.

"What? Bribery?" Xie Daoyuan looked at the beautifully packaged bag Lin Chaoyang put on the table and couldn't help asking.

Lin Chaoyang looked relaxed, "Did anyone use chocolate to bribe officials?"

"My teeth are not good."

"There's nothing good to buy. Just treat it as a taste for your children at home."

Xie Daoyuan smiled and accepted the things, "How did you gain from going to Hong Kong this time?"

"It's nothing more than participating in some activities and meeting some people. The economic construction and material level are much richer than ours. If we want to catch up with them, I'm afraid we still have a long way to go."

"How can you, a writer, visit like an official going on an inspection?" Xie Daoyuan teased.

After chatting for a while and calling it a day, Lin Chaoyang came out of the office and distributed some candy to his colleagues at the library, which made everyone smile.

Du Rong told him that Hong Zicheng had come to the library to find him a few days ago.

After lunch, Lin Chaoyang ran to the Chinese Department office to find Hong Zicheng, "What do you want to talk to me about?"

"Oh, you're back from Hong Kong? How do you feel?"

He was asked about his feelings about Hong Kong by everyone he met, which was also one of the sequelae of this visit.

After Lin Chaoyang made a perfunctory remark, Hong Zicheng got down to business.

"Nothing. Isn't it that "The Ferryman" is very popular recently? Our Chinese students also love this novel.

I want to see if you have time to come to the exchange class."

"What to exchange?"

"What else? Creative ideas and experiences."

"Is there a tuition fee?"

"It's awkward to talk about tuition fees. You took so many classes in our Chinese department in the past few years. Now it's time for you to pay back."

After joking a few words, Lin Chaoyang said: "Okay, then when is the class?"

"How about this Saturday morning?"

"Sure."

On Saturday morning, Lin Chaoyang came to the Chinese department as scheduled to teach students.

The Chinese department specially arranged a lecture hall for today's class, which can accommodate two or three hundred students at the same time.

But when Lin Chaoyang walked in, he saw a classroom that was packed with people. Even the aisles and the area under the podium were crowded with people. It seemed that there were at least four or five hundred students.

Seeing Lin Chaoyang coming in, the originally noisy voices in the classroom immediately quieted down, and the students all saluted him in unison, which inexplicably reminded Lin Chaoyang of the scene when he was attending classes in the Chinese Department a few years ago.

The old gentlemen walked into the classroom calmly, and the originally noisy students immediately quieted down, their eyes full of admiration.

Unknowingly, so much time has passed, and unknowingly, he has become the person standing on the podium.

"When Brother Zicheng invited me, he said that "The Story of the Boat" has been very popular recently, and he wanted me to talk about my creative ideas and experience..."

Lin Chaoyang went up to the podium and started talking directly without saying anything polite.

Among the students who came today, students of various grades in the Chinese Department can account for half, and the rest are students from other colleges and departments. They all came here because they heard that Lin Chaoyang was going to teach the Chinese Department today.

Lin Chaoyang is an employee of Yanda University, and these students all know it. But for students after the 80s, their impression of Lin Chaoyang is distant and vague.

Because when they came to Yanda, Lin Chaoyang had not communicated much with students, so everyone's impression of him was that he was a well-known writer, not a school employee or a friend who could get close to him.

In February, "The Boat" was published in the first issue of "Huacheng" magazine in the new year. In more than two months, it has successfully achieved sales of 2.08 million copies.

This not only set the highest sales since the founding of "Huacheng", but also threw a bombshell to the Chinese literary world in 1983!

The sales of 2.08 million copies in a single issue are not necessarily achieved by pure literary magazines, even comprehensive magazines and those popular literary magazines that are known for their entertainment.

This sales volume will probably become a natural barrier for many well-known literary magazines for a long time in the future, making it difficult for them to cross.

Of course, this premise is that Lin Chaoyang has no new works released.

Behind the huge sales volume are millions of readers, and college students, who are generally literary youths, are one of the main forces among them.

"The Ferry" itself has a strong magical realism color, which is popular nowadays. College students are proud to read such works.

Moreover, this novel adopts a double-layer structure and narrative angle. The plot is confusing and full of various images. The ending is reversed again and again, and the final blank is meaningful and thought-provoking.

Almost all the reading expectations of these college students are met, and naturally they have won their preference.

When Lin Chaoyang was giving a lecture, the audience was silent. Everyone was listening attentively to his thoughts and ideas and regarded them as a guideline.

"I think that domestic realistic creation seems to have fallen into a vicious circle in recent years.

Many people regard realism as realism, and their creations are completely based on reality, which is almost equivalent to reportage.

It can even be said that they write novels as reportage, ignoring the most important factor in novel creation.

Everyone should understand that for a novel, the importance of structure is far greater than other creative skills.

Or we can say that the novel is the art of structure.

I will still take "The Story of the Boat Crossing" as an example. The biggest turning point of this novel occurred when Du Sanjiang told the writer the second story.

This passage is not long in the novel. It is less than a thousand words after cutting off the beginning and the end, and most of it is Du Sanjiang's self-narration.

But it is this one thousand words of self-narration that completes the refinement of the second layer of the novel's structure, and also points out the overall intention of the novel and most of the images that appeared in the previous text..."

During the lecture, Lin Chaoyang constantly used his own work "The Story of the Boat Crossing" as an example. At first glance, it sounds a bit self-promoting, but no one present felt that there was anything wrong.

The excellence of "The Crossing" is recognized by the world, and they would rather have the sharing of Lin Chaoyang than ever before.

The one and a half hour lecture was over, and the students were still not satisfied. When Lin Chaoyang stopped, someone immediately reached out to ask questions.

Even after class, many people were still around Lin Chaoyang.

The students welcomed and loved Lin Chaoyang so much that Hong Zicheng, a senior lecturer in the Chinese Department, couldn't help but feel a little jealous.

Afterwards, he joked with Lin Chaoyang, "It's a pity that you don't come to our Chinese Department to be a lecturer!"

"What's the point of being a lecturer? If you want to be a lecturer, be a professor!"

Hong Zicheng was a lecturer after he was over 40. If Lin Chaoyang became a professor, wouldn't he be living a dog's stomach at his age?

Hong Zicheng felt the deep malice from the young people!