Literary Master 1978

Zhao Zhenkai asked Chen Kaige to speak in front of everyone. He was proud and excited, but also a little nervous and uneasy.

On the one hand, he had always been a nobody in the group and had never been in the limelight; on the other hand, he was not confident in his own ability.

Although he was passionate and eloquent when he stood up to refute Zhao Zhenkai, it was all "borrowing". If he really let him speak, Chen Kaige would immediately not know what to say.

Because he had never read many works of magic realism, let alone how much he knew about Latin American literature.

Fortunately, after a few seconds of anxiety, Chen Kaige wisely thought of Lin Chaoyang.

At most, he could talk more about Uncle Lin's remarks.

"This Nobel Prize in Literature has made the Chinese people pay attention to the literary genre of 'magical realism', but in fact, many people in the academic community have already noticed it several years ago.

In 1975, the internal publication of Renwen Press, "Foreign Literature Situation", made a special issue of Latin American literature, introducing for the first time the 'Colombian new genre novel "One Hundred Years of Solitude", which is the earliest record of Marquez's masterpiece "One Hundred Years of Solitude" appearing in China.

At that time, the album did not give a high evaluation of this novel. The main reason was that it was based on political struggle at that time, and believed that the realistic tendency of the Latin American literary world in the 1930s and 1940s gradually declined during this period.

Some writers with progressive tendencies were corrupted and invaded by modern revisionism and the Western bourgeoisie, and began to gradually escape reality, deviate from literary traditions, and magicalize and myth the content of the novel.

This view at the time seemed biased, but it also revealed the foundation of magic realism to some extent - realism..."

Chen Kaige felt a little nervous when he first spoke, because he was also afraid that someone like him would suddenly stand out in the crowd and let him end up in the same situation as Zhao Zhenkai.

After all, he really didn't know much about what he was talking about. He just recalled what Uncle Lin had told him and recited it verbatim. He had no confidence!

But as he was talking, Chen Kaige found that everyone seemed to be listening very attentively, and had no intention of finding faults at all.

Not only that, he also caught some admiring glances from the eyes of several female comrades, which immediately made him feel at ease, more confident, and even louder.

After talking for more than 20 minutes, Chen Kaige felt that his reserves were about to be exhausted, and decisively chose to stop while he was ahead.

"The above is my superficial understanding of Latin American literature and the magical realism genre. Thank you for listening!"

After saying these words, Chen Kaige sat down and couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.

Tian Zhuangzhuang, who was standing aside, looked at him with an incredible look in his eyes, "Kaige, great! I didn't expect that your knowledge reserves are so deep now!"

The two grew up naked in the same courtyard. Chen Kaige didn't dare to show too much pride in front of Tian Zhuangzhuang.

He whispered, "I have also learned a lot from others recently."

Tian Zhuangzhuang nodded after listening to Chen Kaige's words. This was unexpected, but also reasonable.

He knew Chen Kaige too well. Although he had some accumulation in literature and his writings were not bad, it was almost impossible for him to talk in front of everyone for more than half an hour like today, and the content was difficult and obscure things that everyone was not familiar with.

"Who did you learn this from? Let me go and listen later, it's too good!" Tian Zhuangzhuang said.

"I'll take you there when I have time later."

Chen Kaige said this, but he was thinking in his heart, Uncle Lin is my uncle, and giving me lessons is friendship, what does it have to do with you?

He made up his mind that he would never take Tian Zhuangzhuang to see Lin Chaoyang.

As the two were talking, the applause around them was thunderous, which made Chen Kaige feel proud.

Zhao Zhenkai, as the host of the meeting, stood up and summarized Chen Kaige's speech, praised him a few words, and finally asked everyone to ask questions actively and take this opportunity to communicate with Chen Kaige.

Hearing this, Chen Kaige suddenly felt nervous. He didn't think he could handle some tricky questions from everyone.

When he was feeling uneasy, everyone looked at each other and found that no one seemed to want to ask questions.

The reason was very simple. In the past discussion meetings, everyone often asked questions actively and communicated with each other. Sometimes they even argued until they were red in the face. The main reason was that everyone had enough understanding of the things being discussed, or they claimed to have understanding.

But what Chen Kaige said just now was a bit too obscure for the enthusiasts who were just beginning to come into contact with Latin American literature and magical realism works. Everyone wanted to ask questions, but didn't know where to start.

Seeing that everyone was sitting quietly, Chen Kaige breathed a sigh of relief, and then a feeling of happiness and joy for successfully pretending to be cool rose up.

In a blink of an eye, the two-hour discussion ended. Everyone was still a little reluctant to leave. After the discussion, they chatted with each other and some talked about some recent hot topics.

"Hey, why hasn't there been any news about the Mao Dun Literature Prize? Didn't they hold a reading class at the beginning of the year? It's been more than a year, right?"

"It should be soon. I heard from my brother that the shortlist will be released in September."

"September is almost three months away from now. This is too slow."

"The judges are all old seniors. They are busy with work and in poor health. Do you still expect them to be fast?"

"Isn't it a waste of time to invite these old guys to judge the award? I think we should invite young people. I can read even a thousand novels, not to mention a hundred."

"Don't brag. With your skills, you still want to be a judge? You can't even get on the "Yanjing Literature"!"

...

The results of the first Mao Dun Literature Award were not only watched by readers and literature lovers, but also by the literary world.

Mao Dun passed away in 1981. The Mao Dun Literature Award, established according to his will, came into being and became the first authoritative literary award in the Chinese literary world to encourage the creation of novels.

Most of the attention of readers and literature lovers is out of a mentality of watching the fun, but for some people in the literary world, this award is actually related to their own interests.

Writers can win awards, editors are rewarded, and publishers are honored. Everyone is on the same boat.

The award took more than a year to complete. Not only readers and literature lovers were anxious, but also those writers who had the hope of winning, novel editors, and publishers were also looking forward to it.

Finally, on December 6, 1982, the People's Daily reported the list of winners of the first Mao Dun Literature Prize without warning.

On the same day, the National Federation of Literary and Art Circles also notified the literary and art associations of provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities directly under the central government of the award results.

In just one day, the Chinese literary world was in turmoil.

"Xu Mao and His Daughters" (Zhou Keqin), "East" (Wei Wei), "General's Song" (Mo Yingfeng), "Li Zicheng" (Yao Xueying), "Chess Saint" (Lin Chaoyang), "Furong Town" (Gu Hua), "Spring in Winter" (Li Guowen).

After more than a year of awards, the first Mao Dun Literature Prize finally decided on seven winning works.

If there are eight works in the shortlist according to folk rumors, then this winning rate is terrible.

While everyone is amazed at these winning works and writers, they are also curious about who will be the only unlucky person who was not selected?

"Oh, I am dying of laughter. Zhang Manling is such a mean mouth. When the award comes out, she doesn't care about others, but only cares about who is the unlucky loser? This girl is really something!"

Shen Jinmei is the deputy editor-in-chief of Tianjin Literature. Last month, Xingang magazine was just restructured into Tianjin Literature, which is in line with the trend of literary association publications in various places being restructured into "Xingang Literature".

She was originally the person in charge of Xingang, an old member of Tianjin Literary Association, and became the deputy editor-in-chief after the publication was restructured.

Tianjin Literature and the Literary Association are in the same office, and the editorial department and the Literary Association are familiar with each other. Shen Jinmei just went to the Literary Association's office and came back and said with a laugh.

Listening to her jokes, there was also a burst of laughter in the editorial department.

Jiang Zilong is now the editor-in-chief of Tianjin Literature. He asked, "Shouldn't she be most concerned about Lin Chaoyang?"

Since Zhang Manling and Wu Ziren worked together to write an article that was unfavorable to Yanying Studio, everyone in the Tianjin Federation of Literary and Art Circles knew that she had a good relationship with Lin Chaoyang to the extent that she was willing to be a pawn.

Some people also spread some unpleasant words in private, but these rumors were not allowed to be made public and could only spread in dark corners.

"Lin Chaoyang has won the award, what else is there to care about? He is only in his twenties and has won the Mao Dun Literature Award. He is too young!" Shen Jinmei said with a sigh.

Hearing this, Jiang Zilong couldn't help but recall his experience studying at the Institute of Literature two years ago, "Yes! He taught us a class that year."

Shen Jinmei teased: "What do you think of this 'little teacher'?"

Jiang Zilong thought about it and said seriously: "The theoretical knowledge is very solid, much better than us amateur writers. And you can hear that he is really talented. Some things I didn't understand until I was in my thirties, but he was only in his early twenties at that time, and he had already explained it clearly."

Shen Jinmei's original intention was to tease, but when she saw Jiang Zilong's attitude was so formal, she put away the joking thoughts.

"Then do you think that "The Chess Master" deserves the award?"

Hearing her question, Jiang Zilong asked back: "What do you mean by deserved? In terms of the quality of the works, the works that won the awards this year are all good. But if you look at it through a magnifying glass, who doesn't have flaws?"

"I remember that when "The Chess Master" was published last year, it was criticized for being "populist", right?

If only the first volume of Yao Xueying's "Li Zicheng" was available, it might have won a more convincing award.

Gu Hua's "Furong Town" We were classmates, and that simple second The design of the contradiction of the meta-opposition is too crude...

In the final analysis, the final evaluation of the award is the strengths, not the weaknesses. We should look at the excellence of a work, not just focus on its minor flaws. "

Jiang Zilong's words drew applause from several colleagues around him, and Shen Jinmei joked: "You are worthy of being the editor-in-chief Jiang, you have a vision!"

Jiang Zilong waved his hand modestly, "What kind of vision is this. But if you want to talk about the problems of this year's awards, it is not without..."

Hearing him say this, several other colleagues showed curious eyes.

"From the results of this year's awards, it is still somewhat ideologically oriented and has not gotten rid of the influence of politics."

Listening to Jiang Zilong's words, the others thought for a while and nodded in agreement.

"The editor-in-chief is right. Didn't everyone say that Lin Chaoyang's "The Death of Van Gogh" was also submitted? In fact, I think the level of "The Death of Van Gogh" is much higher than "The Chess Master" in terms of artistic level.

Comparing the two, the advantage of "The Chess Master" is obviously in ideology. "

"The Chess Master is not bad, but "The Death of Van Gogh" is too amazing. It's a bit far-fetched for "Spring in Winter" to win the award, it's better to give it to "The Death of Van Gogh." "

"How can one person take up two places? It's better to replace "The Chess Master" with "The Death of Van Gogh", which is more convincing. "

Everyone was discussing it enthusiastically.

After all, this is the first long novel award in China, and it is also the first award. Everyone is also a part of the literary world. Naturally, they are excited after the results are announced.

Jiang Zilong looked at everyone's performance, and Lin Chaoyang's face came to his mind unconsciously.

So young!

Speaking of it, Jiang Zilong became famous among writers relatively early, and he also created "Reform Literature", an important school of contemporary Chinese literature.

It's a pity that compared with Lin Chaoyang, he is a little inferior.

I don't know if I will have the chance to win the Mao Dun Literature Award in this life!