Chapter 161 Grand Death
The smoke of "Great Harvest" curled up, and the lampshade covered it, turning the light into a retro style. The drizzle outside the window was hazy and desolate, and the autumn thickening could not be seen in my eyes. I thought it should be a pool of broken bones, and the window glass also cried along with it, crying quietly.
On a rainy day and on the weekend, he locked himself indoors and put the final polish on the work that had been modified 22 times.
There was a faint thunder. He got up and drew the blinds as if it would help. Then he rubbed his forehead and sat back in front of the computer, his fingers hanging on the keyboard and thinking.
——He traveled across mountains and rivers, not knowing that old age was coming. Ten years later, wind and frost would stain his hair, and his belly would also have fat. All in all, his life would become more and more miserable. In ten years, he wrote 3,700 emails, all of which were stored in the mailbox and never sent out. The letters used all his talents and were filled with the passionate desire and pathos in his body. The recipient was the same girl who looked at him with a smile on her hand ten years ago.
Grandma died in a rocking chair. According to the last person who saw her, she was enjoying the afternoon sun as usual, with a smile on her golden face. No one found her dead until the evening. On the day of her burial, more than 5,000 people came to see her off, filling the small village with holes.
The staff refused to believe that she was born in 1900, "Then she is 125 years old this year!" He replied firmly: "Yes, she was born in 1900."
At his insistence, this line was engraved on her monument: "A vivid and true history is buried here."
Then, after ten years, he finally saw the girl again. She had changed, and he found it difficult to overlap her image with that of ten years ago, but looking at her facial features, he was extremely sure that it was her, because the separation sorrow dormant in his blood broke out at once, making noise in all the chambers of his heart. He will always remember her, because he can see her as long as he closes his eyes, and he can hear her breathing on cloudy days when the clouds and thunder are stirring. He closed his eyes and opened them again, it was her. It was undoubtedly her.
Jiang Baishi said that it would be sad to see the world apart for a long time. The question is how long does it take? 125 years must be a long time. The memories from 1900 have just been buried. Some stories are not yet cold, just like the yellow flag of the Boxer Rebellion is still placed under the urn of grandma’s ashes. Ten years of waiting did not turn the wine into water, but instead brewed more sadness. He just stood there in the crowd, looking at her alone.
But she saw him at a glance and walked straight to him and said, I have been thinking about you for the past ten years.
For the first time in his life, he experienced that all his wishes came true. But he couldn't express his excitement, so he could only say with trembling lips, "Me too."
“I think it should be celebrated,” she said. "How to celebrate?"
He said: "Then let's have sex."
So she stared at him and said, is this what you think? today? Here? I think it’s not good to discuss this kind of thing in front of my grandma’s tombstone, right?
Ten years of questioning has turned him into a philosopher, and no problem can trouble him. He said, I have thought about why I lost you countless times. Maybe it was because of the stock market crash in 2007, maybe because of the housing prices in 2015, or maybe it was the various opportunities and crises of this era. But that's not the real reason. I once wanted to be a person who knew everything, and my plans were watertight, but I never considered the true voice in my heart. I never said I love you.
So in the past ten years, I have been learning how to be a fool, say whatever comes to my mind, and live only for myself. I told myself that if I see you again, I will never lie to you again, and never deceive myself. When I was at my stupidest, when I was hopelessly stupid, I finally saw you again.
She looked at him blankly and said, okay. I apologize. In fact, your thoughts coincide with mine.
The gentle night enveloped the earth. The history hovering on this land has not disappeared and will never disappear. Part of it is buried deep in the earth, and the other part follows the light waves and flies to the sky. This light carries countless evidences of human existence, traveling through the netherworld and reaching the end of the universe.
…
After reading this, Wang Zixu stopped and rubbed his eyes vigorously.
He is not good at endings. The ending he can think of is always a grand death, such as Marquez's "One Hundred Years of Solitude", where death buries everything equally. He is more loving and adds a grand sex scene to the end. This was the only ending he could think of.
After struggling for a long time, he finally slapped the keyboard: "Fuck, no more changes! That's it! Whoever wants to change can change it!"
Save, rename, package and send.
After doing this, he slumped in the chair, as if his soul had been drained out.
In the end, he only revised it 22 times. Although it was perfect, it was still a little short of the "most perfect" novel in his mind.
It was this little bit that made him feel empty. The novel is like his child. His former children cried and complained that they didn't want to go to school. He was like a devil parent forcing his children to learn well little by little. He worked hard to revise it bit by bit, coaxing and coaxing to make the story more complete.
But this novel is different. This article is basically a prodigy. It doesn’t need anyone to push it, it wants to learn on its own. This time he is not the devilish parent of the chicken baby, but is being dragged away by the baby. When he began to revise this work, he could almost hear the work silently shouting to him: If I keep revising, I can get better!
“I’m sorry.”
He said to the file on the computer titled "Final Draft (22)".
“I didn’t let you reach the extreme. I’m sorry.”
He felt very guilty.
The chat message informed Editor Yang that he had received the file. Wang Zixu considered the words and entered in the chat box:
"Editor Yang, look, this is the new work I told you before."
Editor Yang replied with an OK expression.
Wang Zixu rubbed his hands and typed: "The number of words is a little too much."
It took a long time for the other side to reply: "You are not 'a bit'."
Wang Zixu said: "If you are not satisfied with anything, I will change it. If there are too many words and you cannot post it, please tell me earlier."
Editor Yang replied: "It's okay, I just scanned it. It can be said that your eyes are bright. The number of words will indeed affect publication, but to be honest, as long as the quality is good, everything is easy to say. "
He also said: "We will take your manuscript seriously. I will go through it myself. If it is really good, I will apply to the editor to start a long series for you. "
Wang Zixu raised his head and shouted silently. This is what a fucking professional editor would say! What kind of bullshit was that before? He experienced all-round what smooth communication and candid communication mean. They are both editors, so why is there such a big gap?
He shouted after typing: "Thank you for your hard work."
"It's okay, I'll take a look first. It's definitely impossible to finish it, so I'll read part of it first. I'll try to get back to you today."
Wang Zixu shouted silently again. He felt great again.
In the next four or five hours, he experienced what it means to be restless and what it means to be hesitant. He wanted to review for the postgraduate entrance examination, but he couldn't concentrate at all and couldn't study at all. I simply turned off the computer and set off for Nanda University.
…
Yang Yin stared at the computer screen with a smile on his face. He then sorted out the document content, adjusted the format, and printed out the first few chapters.
After binding it, he took the manuscript in his hand and couldn't help but read it again, then got up and walked to the editor's office.
"Editor Shen, there is a manuscript here that I would like you to take a look at."
Editor Shen checked the manuscript and squinted: "Whose manuscript is it?"
"Wang Zixu."
Seeing the confusion on Editor Shen's face, Yang Yin added: "It's the newcomer who made the front page last time, "Wild Mane Grass"."
“Oh.”
Editor Shen’s expression became clear, and he was very impressed by this person: “That manuscript was 30,000 words long, the first time After publishing it, I just wrote a short story, and it was still on the front page. I heard that he won some other awards later. "
Yang Yin nodded: "Yes, he won the award from the Xihe Literary Society. First place, the award given to him by Li Tingfang. This is also considered a writer trained by our magazine. Editor Shen asked: "How old is he?"
"I think I'm 30."
"Post-90s." Editor-in-Chief Shen nodded, "Unfortunately, it would be nice to be born in the 00s, but the post-90s are not bad. There is a gap in the new generation of writers in our literary world, and the number of authors born in the 1990s is very small."
Yang Yin agreed. Editor-in-Chief Shen’s thinking is very high-dimensional. He not only considers the development of this magazine, but also considers the replacement of new and old issues from the perspective of the entire literary world.
Editor Shen put on his glasses and said: "You put it here first, I will read it later."
Yang Yin said: "How about you read it now, I have something to say about this manuscript."
"Then you say it."
"I can only speak after you read it."
Editor Shen looked at him and said, "Hehe," and said, "You kid, what are you planning?"
Yang Yin kept silent and rolled his eyes. Of course he has his reasons.
Chief Editor Shen lowered his head to read. He read faster at first, then slower as he read later. In the end, he even read it word for word and sentence for sentence.
Yang Yin’s lips curved into a smile, which was exactly the effect he wanted.
He did not type out all of Wang Zixu’s manuscript, only the first 20,000 words or so. So Editor Shen finished reading it quickly. After reading, he looked up and asked:
"Is this all? Haven't you finished writing the rest yet?"
Yang Yin said: "It's finished. There are a lot of words. I only typed out a small part to show you first."
“I’ve finished reading it. It’s very good.” Editor Shen took off his glasses and said, “This author is really good!”
Speaking of the second half of the sentence, he couldn’t help but raise his tone. He rarely praised people so openly.
He looked at Yang Yin as if he was still unsatisfied: "Don't put this manuscript in other magazines, just keep it in our house. This time, we want to shock the literary world."
Yang Yin said: "I have the same idea after reading it. This kind of work should stay in our family, not to mention that it is our own author, and it should not be let go."
Editor Shen looked up and looked at him slightly annoyed: "Since you think so, you should submit it directly to the review committee, why are you coming to me? "
Yang Yin said with a smile: "The main thing is that this manuscript has a lot of words."
Editor Shen said: "Is the full text finished?"
"It's finished."
"Isn't that better?" Editor Shen said, "You can publish 30,000 words, and you can publish 50,000 words. If it's too much, then divide it into top and bottom. If it doesn't work, divide it into top, middle and bottom. What's all the fuss about? How many words does this manuscript have?"
Yang Yin said: "600,000 words."
"600,000 words?!" Editor Shen exploded, "You collected this copy of "Don Quixote" and came back?"
"Don Quixote" is also 600,000 words.
Yang Yin forced out a forced smile. He had been laying the groundwork for so long, just expecting such an explosion.
"Editor-in-Chief Shen, I just received the manuscript today and haven't read it all. I took a quick glance at it later and found that the text quality is always online. Because the author is a newcomer, it is likely to be rejected at the review meeting, so I want to discuss it with you in advance."
Editor-in-Chief Shen was silent. He thought about it seriously and said, "Write a few more chapters."
"Okay."
"I'll show it to the editor-in-chief."
"Huh?"
Yang Yin became nervous. This is about to stab the sky with a stick.
The editor-in-chief is the boss of the editorial department and is generally not responsible for specifically participating in the decision of whether to publish a certain article, unless the article is very important and important enough to affect the overall situation. Editor-in-chief Shen went directly to the editor-in-chief, which showed that he valued this manuscript more deeply than Yang Yin.
There are 5 editors-in-chief in the editorial department: Shen, Wu, Luo, Wang, and Xu. Editor-in-chief Shen does not have the final say alone. He obviously felt that he was not prudent enough in making the decision alone, and might not be able to keep the manuscript at the review meeting, so he went directly to the editor-in-chief.
Yang Yin knew the importance of this, so he quickly printed it out, sorted it out and gave it to Editor Shen, and then watched Editor Shen enter the chief editor's office.
About 20 minutes later, Editor Shen poked his head out of the chief editor’s office and called Editor Wu in.
Seeing Editor Wu, Yang Yin suddenly had an ominous premonition.
This guy is notoriously harsh and has no mercy when it comes to writing. How could it happen that this article hit Editor Wu?
About 20 minutes later, when Yang Yin began to feel torment, Editor Wu poked his head out:
"Yang Yin! Come in!"
Yang Yin quickly got up and walked towards the editor's office.
As soon as he entered the chief editor's office, Yang Yin felt a sense of oppression coming towards him.
The editor-in-chief was sitting in his seat, and the manuscript he had just typed was spread out in front of the table. The papers were scattered, and it seemed that he had read it carefully.
Yang Yin nodded and stood aside submissively. The editor-in-chief spoke:
"Yang Yin, the author Wang Zixu submitted the manuscript directly to you, right?"
Yang Yin nodded quickly: "Yes. His last work "Wild Weeds" was drafted by me."
"Tell me what you think." The editor-in-chief leaned on the chair and folded his hands.
“Uh...”
Yang Yin was speechless for a moment and felt sweating on his back.
“He is an author... very practical and serious.”
He secretly cried in his heart: What is the problem? He is not familiar with the author, so how does he know what kind of person the author is?
The editor-in-chief seemed to be very satisfied with his answer: "It's good to be practical, but I'm afraid of not being practical."
Next to him, editor-in-chief Wu said: "The editor-in-chief asked you this, in the final analysis, it is still a matter of word count, Yang Yin, take it It’s quite brave to find a new work worth 600,000 yuan. Let me ask you, where did you get the courage? ”
(End of this chapter)