China Entertainment Mythology 2004

Chapter 104 Hugo Award

On August 2007, 8, Qin Li, president of Science Fiction World Magazine, Yao Haijun, deputy editor-in-chief, science fiction writers Li Mu, Han Song, Wu Yan, Tintin Chong and others went to RB Yokohama to participate in the 29th World Science Fiction Convention.

This is the first time that the World Science Fiction Convention has been held in an Asian country since its inception, and it is also the first time that the Chinese science fiction community has organized to participate in the World Science Fiction Convention.

On August 8, the three-day conference officially opened, and more than 30 science fiction fans from all over the world participated in the conference.

On the morning of the 30th, Li Mu, president Qin Li, deputy editor-in-chief Yao Haijun and others walked into the huge exhibition hall, and were immediately attracted by the various exhibits inside.

There are all sorts of strange sci-fi characters in the exhibition hall, including static ornaments, moving dolls, and even suspended astronauts.

Li Mu stopped in front of a glider with a weird shape. The owner of the glider was a RB. At this moment, he was concentrating on playing with the glider model he had carefully crafted, and turned a blind eye to the arrival of Li Mu and others.

"Is this the glider from the cartoon "Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind?" Li Mu asked, pointing at the model.

The owner of the glider immediately showed a bright smile when he heard the words, and even asked Li Mu to discuss it, but it was obvious that Li Mu refused him.

After several people left the glider booth, President Qin Li couldn't help but sigh with emotion: "I didn't expect you to even recognize the shape of the airplane in the cartoon."

Li Mu said with a smile: "This is the animation of the famous Hayao Miyazaki, I know it's normal."

Qin Li nodded: "This incident is indeed normal, so let's talk about something abnormal now. You told me half a year ago that you were going to write another novel with a sales volume of tens of millions. The manuscript of "Maze Runner" was sent to me, and now the sales volume of "Maze Runner" in the first month has been counted, 110 million copies..."

Qin Li looked at Li Mu: "Sure enough, it's another novel with a sales volume of tens of millions. What makes the entire editorial department very curious is how do you judge whether it is a novel with a sales volume of tens of millions before it is released?" A million-selling novel?"

Li Mudao: "Intuition."

Qin Li smiled and said, "I believe in market research more than intuition."

After speaking, Qin Li left early, saying that she was going to find out what the probability of Li Mu winning the award was.

The Hugo Awards adopt a two-round voting system, the first round of nominations and the second round of finals. All members of the World Science Fiction Association can participate in voting.

Although the World Science Fiction Association uses the word "world", the number of members is actually not many, about 5000 in total.If a work can get more than 2000 votes, it is very likely to win the prize.

Before becoming the president of Science Fiction World Magazine, Qin Li was in charge of the magazine's foreign exchange work for a long time, and it is for this reason that Li Mu's overseas publication of English works was finally handed over to her.

Due to her work, Qin Li is very familiar with many sci-fi writers in the world. If you inquire about the attitudes of members of the Sci-Fi Association in private, you can roughly see Li Mu's chances of winning the award. After all, there are only so many people who are eligible to vote.

As a result, she asked more than [-] people in a row, but the answers she got were all surprisingly similar.

Among the most important and most influential best feature awards, "The Martian" almost has a crushing advantage.

At least 40 of the more than [-] interviewees said that other works could not be compared with "The Martian", and only a small part mentioned a work called "The End of the Rainbow".

In the Best Novelette Award, "Gravity" also has a large number of fans, and about two-thirds of the members of the association said they would vote for this work.

In the Best Short Novella Award, Li Mu's first work "Moon" also won nearly half of the approval rate.

It turns out that all three awards have a chance of winning, especially the book "The Martian", which has almost formed a dimensionality reduction strike advantage over other candidate works.

A few months ago, these three works were far from the advantages they have today. It seems that as the sales of the three works are getting higher and higher, and as Li Mu's personal reputation in the Western world is getting bigger and bigger, Li Mu's three works The number of candidate works has also risen accordingly.

Back at the hotel where we stayed, all the members of the Huaxia Group are in the room of Deputy Editor-in-Chief Yao Haijun, but it is obvious that Li Mu has already occupied the absolute C position. At this moment, he is being surrounded by everyone asking about "Inception" Space" movie.

"It's alright, it's alright, everyone, stop surrounding Li Mu, you're all fine, Li Mu still has things to do."

"What can I do?" Li Muqi asked.

Qin Li smiled and said, "The day after tomorrow is the Hugo Awards Ceremony, have you written your acceptance speech yet?"

"That's not true, I'll write it right away." After speaking, Li Mu really stood up and went back to his room.

Qin Li was right, the acceptance speech really had to be prepared in advance, although he was sure whether he could win the award or not, but it didn't take much to write a speech.

In his previous life, Liu Cixin didn't attend the conference because he felt that he had no hope of winning the prize. As a result, this incident became his great regret.

After returning to the room, Li Mu began to seriously conceive the acceptance speech. Since time travel, he has copied novels from movies, so he can't even copy the acceptance speech now, can he?
……

In this way, the time soon came to September 9, and today, the winners of the 1th Hugo Awards will be officially announced.

At this time, the room of Qin Li, the president of Science Fiction World Magazine, kept laughing and laughing, and all the members of the Huaxia group looked extremely excited, and everyone was looking forward to the arrival of that historic moment.

Perhaps around 6 o'clock tonight, Huaxia's first Hugo Award-winning work, and also the first Hugo Award-winning work of an Asian country, will be officially born.

"Excited, I don't know if I can witness history!"

"Although I know that "The Martian" has a very high probability of winning, I still feel a little unbelievable. Huaxia's first Hugo award work is really about to be born?"

"The sci-fi circle is too small. Except for Li Mu, Liu Cixin already belongs to the ceiling of domestic sci-fi, right? But how many people in the country have heard of Da Liu? I don't think there are many! I don't know when Li Mu really wins the Hugo Can the status quo of domestic sci-fi circles be improved after the award?"

"Xuan, isn't Li Mu popular enough now? But what should the sci-fi circle be like?"

At this time, President Qin Li's cell phone rang suddenly, and she first hissed to silence everyone, and then answered the call with a smile on her face.

"hello."

"Uh-huh."

"what?"

"sure?"

"I see, thank you."

Qin Li answered the call for more than half an hour, and her face gradually developed from a smile at the beginning to a coldness at the end.

"President Qin, what happened?" Yao Haijun asked seriously.

Seeing that everyone was looking at her with concern, Qin Li sighed and said, "Just now a friend told me that there is a group of writers headed by Vaxdale who are aggressively attacking Li Mu and Li Mu's works. The Hugo Awards are being dominated by more and more foreign writers, ethnic minorities, women, and young writers, and this situation does not come from the fact that the works of these foreign writers, ethnic minorities, women, and young writers are better , but it is entirely because the jury pays too much attention to the so-called political correctness, and the rise of foreign writers and ethnic minority groups in the Hugo Awards is completely the result of political manipulation."

"And this situation reached its peak this year. There was an unprecedented and absurd result where the same person was nominated for three times at the same time, and this person happened to be a yellow race from China."

"Is the problem serious?" Yao Haijun asked.

Qin Li nodded:

"They listed a nomination form for works that conform to their own aesthetics, and called on members of the World Science Fiction Association with similar political views to vote with reference to this list. It is said that they have already obtained almost half of the support."

For a moment the whole room fell silent.

"Sister Li, can you help me see how my acceptance speech is?" At this moment, Li Mu pushed the door open cheerfully, and immediately realized that the atmosphere in the room was not right.

"What's wrong?" Li Mu asked in surprise.

Qin Li glanced at the acceptance speech written by Li Mu, and then smiled reluctantly:
"Actually, we don't need to pay too much attention to the Hugo Awards. The fairness of awards for foreigners is just that. They are also full of various political manipulations. The biggest and most important thing for a work is the outstanding sales performance. Precious award."

Li Mu nodded and said: "I know that, by the way, Miss Li, do you think I need to change my acceptance speech?"

"No need." Qin Li shook her head.

How could she be in the mood to study her acceptance speech now?
……

Qin Li is not the only one who has noticed the undercurrent behind this science fiction conference. In recent years, the Hugo Awards have indeed become more diversified. Foreign writers, ethnic minorities, women, and young writers have indeed appeared more and more in the sci-fi conference. In the list of winners.

Because this phenomenon fit the overall politically correct atmosphere at the time, when writers headed by Voxday united to attack Li Mu’s works, they were actually attacking the politically correct values ​​that were becoming more and more mainstream.

Because sometimes dislike is hard to hide, especially when you're expressing political leanings, and these people's extreme distaste for other minorities is quickly picked up.

And then it develops to the stage of complete opposition where we will fully support any author you object to, and we will completely negate any works you support.

Immediately after Voxdale and others became more and more disgusted with people of color, the radical remarks of minorities, women, young writers, and foreign writers were widely exposed, which finally aroused the extreme anger of most science fiction writers. Resentment, including many writers who also previously supported not choosing Li Mu.

To be honest, everyone felt that Li Mu had won three nominations at the same time, but when they saw the more and more radical remarks of Workersday and others, they felt that Workersday and others were more disgusted.

As a result, the results of this year's Hugo Awards are bound to be full of suspense.

The time finally came at 9:1 pm on September 6st, and the Hugo Awards of this year's World Science Fiction Convention officially began.

　I'm sorry, I said last night that there was a chapter that I didn't write in the end, and I deleted it after writing thousands of words. I didn't feel very satisfied, so I didn't force it.

　
(End of this chapter)