1980 My literary era

Early the next morning, Lin Weimin went to work with a smile on his face, making everyone happy.

Entering the office of Tongwen News Agency, "I got the manuscript, and it's still 100,000 words."

He threw the manuscript on Yu Hua's desk with an arrogant attitude, almost saying "Don't bother me if you have nothing to do".

Yu Hua's face lit up with joy. It's good that the manuscript is in place. With the manuscript in hand, he didn't panic.

"Teacher Lin, isn't this little Zhuanfeng planning to show up?"

"Who knows? You also know that as a pure literary author, if someone knows that he writes martial arts novels, he will have a bad reputation."

Yu Hua thought about the phone call he made to Mo Yan again. The two hadn't seen each other for a long time, and Mo Yan was quite happy to receive his call.

But when he heard him ask about "Little Diamond Wind" and "No. 1 in the World", Mo Yan was confused and didn't know what Yu Hua was talking about.

Unlike Yu Hua, who loves reading martial arts novels, he doesn't even know about the publication "Heroes of Kyushu".

But I heard that Yu Hua was now an editor under Teacher Lin, which made Mo Yan envious.

A few years ago, when he was about to graduate, he had thought about staying in Beijing, but in the end he didn't make up his mind and returned to the army.

Of course, working in the army is not bad, but the atmosphere here is indeed very different from that in school. From time to time, the leader will talk to him and ask him to sing more praises when he creates.

But he was obsessed with writing negative things, which made him increasingly incompatible with the atmosphere of the army.

Hearing the envy in Mo Yan's words, Yu Hua also forgot to ask about the novel and urged Mo Yan to buy a few copies of "Heroes of Kyushu" to read and show off his current work to Mo Yan.

After hanging up the phone, Yu Hua carefully recalled his daily life with Mo Yan in the liberal arts college. He really hadn't read many martial arts novels. He admitted that Mo Yan was very talented, but he hadn't read this stuff before and it wasn't that easy to write. thing.

He had no choice but to exclude Mo Yan from being the object of suspicion.

Lin Weimin came out of the editorial office of Tongwen News and planned to go to the back building to chat with Tong Zhonggui. Halfway there, he met Niu Han.

Although Niu Han is now retired, he is still a consultant for "New Literary Historical Materials" and comes two or three times a month.

The two chatted all the way to the back building. Lin Weimin stood in front of the editorial department of "Contemporary" and said, "Xiao Tong, come here!"

Tong Zhonggui stood up and came to Lin Weimin, "Take a walk with me and have a chat."

The two of them walked out of the back building one after the other.

"Do you know about the new publication?"

"It has been spread in the club for a long time, and everyone has been talking about it recently."

Lin Weimin continued: "Lao He is taking charge of this matter. The company plans to let Comrade Shuguang name it, but he is not in charge. The deputy editor is responsible for the specific affairs. The new publication will have two deputy editors. Contemporary Literature The deputy director of the second editorial office, Rong Peixiang, will be the executive deputy editor, and there is still a shortage of deputy editor positions. Do you want to go over there? "

Tong Zhonggui hesitated after hearing this. He has been following Lin Weimin in "Contemporary" since graduation.

Before, when Lin Weimin became the editor-in-chief, he opened Luotong Wenshe. He had talked with Lin Weimin and wanted to be transferred to Tongwenshe, all because he wanted to follow Lin Weimin.

But he was rejected by Lin Weimin, and Tong Zhonggui understood that Lin Weimin was doing it for his own good.

This new publication is also a purely literary publication, and he can be the deputy editor, which is also a good thing for him.

After thinking for a while, Tong Zhonggui said, "Teacher Lin, I still prefer novels."

"The deputy editor won't consider it either?"

Tong Zhonggui shook his head firmly.

He has achieved very good results in writing in the past few years and is already a leader among young writers in the domestic literary circle, so he does not value such things as position.

I went to Tongwen Society just because I wanted to work with Lin Weimin.

"Okay. If you think so, then just stay at "Contemporary" for two years. We will talk about it when we have the opportunity in the future."

"Thank you, Teacher Lin."

Tong Zhonggui understood what Lin Weimin meant. There were too many qualified and capable seniors in "Contemporary" and they needed to be ranked based on seniority. If he wanted to progress in his position, he could only wait.

But Tong Zhonggui has no regrets. He still prefers novels to prose.

The new publication of the Chinese Literature Society is separated from the prose column of "Contemporary". The content of the publication is mainly prose, and the name has been given.

"Chinese Prose".

This publication should be regarded as a "rich second generation" born with a silver spoon in the Chinese periodical industry. It is based on the fact that Li Shuguang, the deputy editor-in-chief of the Chinese Literature Society who was hired by "Contemporary", is the editor-in-chief, and he cooperates with the various editorial offices of the Chinese Literature Society. Elite Soldiers and Strong Generals is destined to become an important publication in the field of prose in the domestic literary circle.

Tong Zhonggui is one of his own. If something good happens, Lin Weimin will of course think of him first, but he will not force it.

It has many innate advantages, so the preparation process of "Chinese Prose" was much simpler than that of "Heroes of Kyushu".

The only thing worth paying attention to is personnel matters. After all, there is a new publication and a few more seats, so there is not enough room for monks.

Fortunately, after this period of communication, the matter has almost been resolved.

Two days later, the editorial department of "Chinese Prose" was officially established. The office is on the third floor southwest of the Chinese Literature Society.

The newly established editorial department of "Chinese Prose" is headed by Li Shuguang as editor-in-chief, Li Xin, director of the first editorial office of Contemporary Literature, as deputy editor-in-chief, and Rong Peixiang, deputy director of the second editorial office of contemporary literature, as executive deputy editor-in-chief, with four editors in charge.

This lineup is much better than the two or three big cats when "Kyushu Heroes" was first published.

There is no need to worry about other people's manuscripts. "Contemporary" has a steady supply of prose manuscripts. This newly established publication does not even know how to write the word "short of manuscripts."

Yu Qiuyu also specially sent several prose works to the publication "Chinese Prose" at Lin Weimin's invitation.

Last month, Yu Qiuyu's collection of essays "Cultural Journey" was just published, with an initial printing of 20,000 copies. It is mediocre among the hundreds of books published by the Chinese Literature Society every year.

But this collection of essays, which seems ordinary and whose author has no reputation in the literary world, was sold out within half a month of its release. The Chinese Literature Society had to urgently print an additional 30,000 copies. I thought it would be better if I said less. Last for a few months.

Unexpectedly, in just over a week, bookstores across the country were once again running low on inventory.

This time, the Chinese Literature Society finally believed that there seemed to be another big hit in the society.

After the second printing, the printing volume soared to 100,000 copies, which finally alleviated the market and readers' thirst for this collection of essays.

But what puzzles all the editors of the Chinese Literature Society is, why is it?

Several senior editors and reviewers from the manuscript club of "Cultural Journey" have read these prose works. The writing level is very good, but there are also many shortcomings. There are dozens of lexicon errors picked out by the editors and reviewers alone.

The most important thing is that in the domestic book industry for so many years, there has been no precedent for a collection of essays to be a hit!

Since the New Culture Movement, a lot of prose has been published in the domestic literary circle, and many works have become well-known to Chinese people. Some works have even become household names because they have appeared in textbooks.

But no matter how big a famous artist is, after their works are published in a collection, the early sales are usually tepid, but the best thing is that they last forever, so the overall sales are still good. This refers to famous artists.

The collection of essays "Cultural Journey" is different from all the collections of essays published by the Chinese Literature Society before. It started from being unknown but became so popular in the month of its publication.

Book sales have always been a long tail effect before the so-called "bestsellers" became rampant in later generations.

Therefore, according to the current trend, as long as this collection of essays does not misfire later, it will not be too easy to sell 1.8 million copies.

When colleagues from the Chinese Literature Society recently talked about "Cultural Journey", the wonder on their lips and the disbelief on their faces never stopped.

And everyone also knows that this collection of essays was brought to Qiu Yuyue by Lin Wei for the Democratic Movement, which is even more amazing.

If "Cultural Journey" had not been published this time, many editors of the Chinese Literature Society would not have even heard of a person like Yu Qiuyu in the Chinese literary world.

Not only did Lin Weimin know about him, he even asked him to publish a collection of essays.

Now that the sales of essay collections are exploding, who can’t say that Editor-in-Chief Lin has a keen eye and foresight?

No wonder someone can become the editor-in-chief at such a young age!

Therefore, the editorial department of "Chinese Prose" will definitely welcome Yu Qiuyu's new works with both hands.

"If you include the "Heroes of Kyushu" published by Youren News Agency, our Chinese Literature Society now has five publications!"

When Cheng Wuchun said this, he was not only sighing, but also filled with an indescribable pride.

The Chinese Literature Society now owns publications such as "Contemporary", "New Literary Historical Materials", "Literary Stories", "Jiuzhou Heroes", and the newly established "Chinese Prose".

In the early years, "People's Literature" was jointly managed by the Chinese Literature Society and the Chinese Literature Association. In the past two years, it has been separated and became a publication of the Chinese Literature Society, and the publishing house became a writer's publishing house.

"Contemporary" was founded in 1979. It focuses on the field of pure literature and publishes various types of works, including novels, essays, reportage, poetry and other literary styles. It started as a quarterly magazine, and then gradually transformed into a bimonthly and monthly magazine. Its sales have steadily increased over the years, and it has become a leading domestic pure literary publication for many years.

"New Literary Historical Materials" is a quarterly magazine, founded one year earlier than "Contemporary". The main content published is articles and memoirs of important representatives of various periods in the history of modern literature. Because it focuses on the records of modern literary historical materials, its sales have been low. High, between 100,000 and 200,000 copies, but the advantage is stability, and because of the unique positioning of the publication, it has a unique position in the domestic literary world.

"Literary Story News" was founded in 1985. It is a weekly newspaper, mainly focusing on literary and historical abstracts. In the past few years, its sales volume has been stable at between 4 and 5 million copies per issue.

Then there is "Kyushu Heroes", which has only been published for two issues. The first issue sold more than one million copies. It has been half a month since the second issue was released, and the circulation has exceeded 1.4 million. Everyone in the Chinese Literature Society knows that this publication It is only a matter of time before the sales ceiling of Chinese Literature Society publications is broken.

The only suspense everyone has about this publication is whether its sales can surpass "Story Club", the ceiling of domestic popular literary publications.

Taking a detailed look at the several publications owned by the Chinese Literature Society now, they need sales volume, status, and influence, so Cheng Wanchun's pride is justified.

One publisher and five journals are the leading publisher in China’s publishing industry!

After enjoying the afterglow of success for a few seconds, Cheng Wuchun patted Lin Weimin on the shoulder.

"For the people, we must keep up our efforts!"

Lin Weimin glanced at Cheng Wanchun, "Why do you still want to paint a picture for me?"

Sensing Lin Weimin's dissatisfaction, Cheng Wuchun awkwardly changed the topic.

"Yu Qiuyu's collection of essays is selling well. I think we can strike while the iron is hot and produce two more collections of essays."

"Well, planning is already underway."

After failing to change the topic, Cheng Wanchun left the editorial department of "Chinese Prose" in despair.