The letter was just delivered, and the sender was Lu Wenfu, whom I met at the National Outstanding Novella Award Ceremony.
After the award ceremony, Lin Chaoyang invited the award-winning writers to have a meal. His craftsmanship won unanimous praise from everyone.
Some time ago, Liu Xinwu came to Lin Chaoyang to help write a preface to "Longing for Life" and also mentioned Lu Wenfu. I don't know what the reason for this letter was.
"Brother Chaoyang Wen: Zhan Xinjia. I received a letter from Xinwu a few days ago, saying that you will treat me grandly when I come to Beijing next time. I haven't thanked you for the hospitality last time. I really appreciate it.
After thinking about it, I don’t know what to say in return. I wanted to send you some tea, but then I thought that mid-spring has passed and it’s not the right time. I will definitely send two pounds of newly roasted Biluochun to you in the beginning of next spring.
…”
Lu Wenfu had the traditional literati ethos, which was deeply implemented into his behavior. In his letter, he talked about treating guests to dinner and sending tea, and then stated the purpose of writing this letter.
It turned out that the dinner party he had at the end of March gave him some inspiration. He also loves food and wanted to write a novel about food.
Of course, writing about food cannot just be about food, it must involve social changes, historical development and the pulse of human nature. Lin Chaoyang understands both novels and food, so after having this idea, Lu Wenfu wanted to write to Lin Chaoyang to communicate.
After reading Lu Wenfu's design and ideas about the novel, Lin Chaoyang immediately thought of his most famous masterpiece "Gourmet".
"Gourmet" is a novella. The timeline of the novel runs from before liberation to after reform and opening up. However, it is not a grand masterpiece that reflects the historical struggle. Instead, it starts from the details. The protagonist Zhu Ziye is busy in his life.
How to eat, how to make your food satisfying.
In the old society, he could rely on his ancestral inheritance to live happily, because he did not smoke opium, gamble, or go whoring, and only had a special liking for delicious food. On the contrary, he was not greatly affected by the buzz.
After the reform and opening up, times changed, and Zhu Ziye turned from an ignorant eater into a celebrity gourmet.
On the surface, this novel talks about "Eating Sutras", but there are very profound ideological themes hidden in a lot of colorful descriptions of eating and drinking, showing the changeable nature of human nature, historical changes and social development.
After it was published, it was quickly praised by the literary world and caused a great response.
The plot described by Lu Wenfu in his letter has many similarities with "The Gourmet" that Lin Chaoyang had read. It seems that it is the same novel.
Lin Chaoyang did not expect that a meal would enable Lu Wenfu to write his masterpiece in advance. He happily wrote back a letter to Lu Wenfu, confirming his idea in the letter and encouraging Lu Wenfu to write this novel.
Two days later, the final exams in major universities in Yanjing came to an end. The two sisters Tao Yushu and Tao Yumo no longer had study tasks, and the atmosphere at home became more relaxed.
Tao Yumo was planning to take advantage of this summer vacation to go to Beidaihe. Lin Chaoyang asked: "It seems that you have saved a lot of money?"
Tao Yumo immediately looked at him warily, like a little squirrel guarding his food, "I haven't saved much money."
"I'm just as obsessed with money as your sister."
"Do you believe I told my sister?"
"You little traitor! Do you still want to make money?"
Hearing Lin Chaoyang's words, Tao Yumo's eyes lit up, "Have you heard anything again?"
In January this year, "The Death of Van Gogh" was published as a special issue in "Contemporary". After the novel was published, it was warmly welcomed by readers. The final sales volume of the current issue of "Contemporary" in which the novel was published reached 1.15 million copies.
In terms of pure numbers, literary magazines such as "People's Literature" and "Harvest" can sell more than one million copies from time to time, but the difference with this issue of "Contemporary" is that the original sales volume of the magazine is not high.
"Contemporary" was founded in 1979. The first issue sold 70,000 copies and the second issue 130,000 copies. The sales volume increased steadily, but there was still a big gap compared with other well-known literary magazines.
In 1980, "Contemporary" published Lin Chaoyang's novel "Lai Zi's Summer", and its sales exceeded 500,000 copies. Since then, the magazine's sales have been hovering between 3 and 50 million copies.
In recent years, literary magazines have sprung up like mushrooms after a rain. It is certainly worthy of recognition that "Contemporary" has achieved such results in just one year since its first publication.
But the problem is that this publication is backed by the behemoth Humanities Society. Since its preparation, "Contemporary" has been targeting top literary magazines such as "People's Literature" and "Harvest".
Such results are ultimately more than one step behind the two.
Not to mention compared with "People's Literature" and "Harvest", even compared with "October" and "Yenjing Literature" both in Yanjing, it is slightly inferior.
"October" sold 550,000 copies in its first issue. "Yenjing Literature" is not as influential as the first-line literary magazines, but the magazine's sales have always been good.
As a result, starting from January this year, with a thunderous thunder, "The Death of Van Gogh" was published, which quickly triggered a reading craze among readers, bringing the sales of "Contemporary" to more than one million copies in one fell swoop.
After this issue, although the magazine's sales dropped, it still reached 7.8 million copies, which was comparable to the two top magazines "People's Literature" and "Harvest".
The horrific sales have brought powerful influence. "The Death of Van Gogh" has won a good reputation among readers and also achieved good reviews in the literary circle.
If it weren't for a small group of people who went online to make pan-political criticism of some of the contents of "The Death of Van Gogh", the evaluation of this novel by readers and the literary community could be said to be perfect.
Due to its extremely high reputation, the editorial department has sent packages of letters from readers at regular intervals over the past six months. Calculating carefully, there are at least fifteen or six thousand letters.
Of course, Lin Chaoyang could not handle such a large amount of letters by himself. Most of them were handled by his sister-in-law, a cheap labor force.
In the past six months, Tao Yumo made forty or fifty yuan by helping Lin Chaoyang handle letters.
Tao Yumo stared at Lin Chaoyang with bright eyes, and he smiled, "Come on, the next novel will be released soon!"
"There's no rush. Even if it's published, it will take more than half a month to get widespread feedback. By then I'm done."
Tao Yumo asked again: "By the way, didn't my sister say some time ago that you two would also go to the PEN Club during the summer vacation?"
Lin Chaoyang looked unconcerned, "Zhang Dening is not sure what he says. I don't know when."
Lin Chaoyang's words were a bit arbitrary. The day after he said this to his sister-in-law, Zhang Dening ran to the Overseas Chinese Apartment and said that "Yenjing Literature" was planning to hold a pen conference next week, and the venue was set to be in Huangdao.
"Where is Huangdao?" Tao Yumo couldn't help but ask after hearing the name from Zhang Dening.
"Huangdao is located in Qingdao. It used to be Jiaonan County, but now it has become Huangdao District of Qingdao."
"Oh, it's Qingdao."
Zhang Dening added, "This PEN conference will last about half a month. We will first stay in Huangdao for a few days, and then go to Jinan and Tai'an."
"Half a month!" Tao Yushu pondered for a moment. She was on summer vacation now, so she had plenty of time. She spent half a month on the pen meeting, and she also rushed to learn how to drive a motorcycle when she came back.
Zhang Dening asked Lin Chaoyang: "Is it okay for you to take half a month off?"
"Can."
Now when something happens in the gym, he is brought out as the mascot. This is the case when the men's volleyball team comes, and it is also the case when the delegation from the Chinese University of Hong Kong comes. He now takes leave without any burden. I am not the mascot for nothing.
"Then let's get ready these days. We will meet at the train station at 9:30 next Monday morning."
"good."
After Zhang Dening left, Tao Yushu was busy packing up his things. Lin Chaoyang said: "There are still a few days, why are you in such a hurry?"
"I'll see if there's anything I'm missing first, and I'll buy some while I have time."
Women always have a lot more trouble than men when going out.
Tao Yumo saw that her sister and brother-in-law were going out soon, so she quickly planned her itinerary. Since she couldn't afford a meal, she might as well go out in style.
Before Lin Chaoyang and his wife could attend the PEN conference, she had already rushed to the train station with her luggage.
"Jianmei!"
From a distance, Tao Yumo saw his classmate and shouted excitedly.
Guo Jianmei, who heard the sound, also waved to Tao Yumo. Tao Yumo ran up to him with his luggage and greeted everyone one by one.
This trip to Beidaihe, they were four women and two men. Three of the six were from the 79th-level law department, namely Tao Yumo, Guo Jianmei and a girl named Yu Hui.
There are two other people, Wang Zhiyong and Li Junling, who graduated from the 77-level law department. They are boyfriend and girlfriend. The last person, Liu Zhenyun, came here with his girlfriend Guo Jianmei.
The six people gathered together and everyone walked towards the station.
Summer vacation has just begun these days, and Yanjing Station is crowded. After checking in, a few people finally squeezed into the bus, and after putting their luggage away, they sat down panting.
"Ouch, there are too many people!" Tao Yumo complained.
Guo Jianmei said: "You don't often take the train. Every winter and summer vacation, we take the train home like this. We are used to it."
There were seven people in their party, only Tao Yumo and Yu Hui were from Yanjing, and the other five were from other places.
"It's so hot!" Yu Hui fanned herself with her hands.
Tao Yumo took out a magazine from her bag and used it as a fan to fan the wind, which was much more convenient than Yu Hui's hand. When she was feeling proud, she saw Liu Zhenyun take out a fan and hand it to Guo Jianmei.
"Zhenyun is really thoughtful!" Tao Yumo joked.
When she said this, Guo Jianmei and Liu Zhenyun were a little embarrassed. Another couple, Wang Zhiyong and Li Junling, were much more generous than them. They not only wiped each other's sweat, but also shared a glass of water.
The weather was hot, the carriage was full of people, and the temperature was even higher. Everyone was sweating profusely, so they drank a few gulps of the cold water that had been poured in advance to quench their thirst.
As the train slowly started to move, the breeze came slowly, and finally a cool breeze came from the open window, and Tao Yumo let out a sigh of relief.
"Oh, it's finally a little cooler."
The six people were riding in a green hard-seater car with adjacent seats. After the car stabilized, Wang Zhiyong invited everyone to play poker together. Playing poker is now the best entertainment activity to pass the time on the train.
Several others agreed, but Yu Hui didn't want to play. She picked up the "Yenjing Literature" that Tao Yumo used to fan herself in the car and said, "I'll read the magazine, and you guys can play."
"You are really disappointing. How can five people play together?"
Tao Yumo complained to her and voluntarily quit, letting the other two couples play.
"Hey, Yumo, your brother-in-law has another new work?"
Yu Hui glanced at the catalog and found that this issue of "Yanjing Literature" actually contained Lin Chaoyang's works.
"yes."
"Yanjing Literature" is a monthly magazine, and this issue has been on the market for two days. Tao Yumo bought this copy at a newsstand when she went out, intending to use it to pass the time on the train.
Now that the magazine has been borrowed by Yu Hui, she can only watch the other people playing poker.
The train was noisy. Tao Yumo's eyes were looking at the playing cards, but his ears received all kinds of sounds.
"Good! This novel is really refreshing!"
"What novel?"
"Have you read "The Master of Chess"? Xu Lingjun's new novel published in this issue of "Yenjing Literature" is really well written."
"That novel, I just finished reading it yesterday, and I didn't feel very good about it."
"Not good? Why not? It looks good to me!"
"You don't play Go, do you? What's said there is so nonsense. The protagonist Jiang Nansheng defeated nine Japanese national players in a row by playing Go. It's simply nonsense. If we in China had this level of Go, would we have been suppressed by the Japanese for so many years?
?”
"As for novels, the plots are quite fictitious. Besides, I remember that Wu Qingyuan, who played Go, swept the Japanese chess world back then?"
"Wu Qingyuan won the chess game in Japan, but in this novel it was in China."
"What happened?"
Tao Yumo listened to the two voices arguing. She was no stranger to the content of their argument. It was the plot of her brother-in-law Lin Chaoyang's new novel.
My brother-in-law was right. It had only been two days since it was published, and there was already controversy about the plot of the novel.
Chapter completed!