The Rise of the Writers of the Republic of China

Compared with the Pacific Ocean, it is much faster to cross the Atlantic Ocean.

This time, Zhou Hexuan arrived on the west coast of France in less than half a month on the latest fast boat.

Port of Le Havre.

Zhou Hexuan walked down the ship's hanging ladder and couldn't help but look at the nearby beach.

More than 10 years later, the beach here will be full of bombs and bullets. The Allied soldiers who landed nearby continued to attack the city, and the entire city of Le Havre was beaten to pieces, leaving more than 80,000 citizens homeless.

Well, D-Day.

Zhou Hexuan did not stay in this city, took Sun Yongzhen straight to the train station, and then hurriedly headed for Paris.

The winner of the Goncourt Literature Prize is about to be announced and awarded. Zhou Hexuan has great hopes of winning the award, so they hurriedly called him over there.

In fact, the process setting of this award is unreasonable. Judging from the traffic situation at this time, if an Asian or American writer wins an award, he will not have time to attend the awards ceremony in Paris.

The Nobel Prize in Literature is much more thoughtful, announcing the selection results early, leaving more than a month for the winners to hurry slowly—the results will be announced in October, and the awards will be presented in mid-December.

But this year's situation seems to be a bit special. It dragged on until November, and the Swedish Academy was still arguing.

As early as August, when the five final candidates were supposed to be screened out, the members of the Swedish Academy suddenly went into a fit and selected a full list of 27 people. Until October, the winner was supposed to be selected, but four consecutive rounds of voting failed.

The problem lies in the voting rules for the Nobel Prize in Literature. Only writers who receive more than half of the votes are eligible to win the prize.

Then a funny scene appeared...

Results of the first round of voting: 4 votes for Thomas Mann (German novelist), 4 votes for Stephen George (German poet), 5 votes for Zhou Hexuan. void.

Results of the second round of voting: 5 votes for Thomas Mann, 3 votes for Stephen George, and 5 votes for Zhou Hexuan. void.

The results of the third round of voting: 6 votes for Thomas Mann, 2 votes for Stephen George, and 5 votes for Zhou Hexuan. void.

In the fourth round of voting, the Swedish Academy excluded other candidates and voted separately for Thomas Mann and Zhou Hexuan. The result: 6 votes for Thomas Mann, 6 votes for Zhou Hexuan, and 1 abstention.

God damn abstaining from voting, this has never happened in the selection of the Nobel Prize for Literature. As for the guy who abstained, he had a good reason, that is, he couldn't judge which of the two candidates was better.

When Li Shizeng sent a telegram to Zhou Hexuan, the Swedish Academy finally conducted the fifth round of voting: Thomas Mann had 7 votes and Zhou Hexuan 6 votes.

With more than half of the votes, this time there is finally a result.

While China was touting Zhou Hexuan overwhelmingly, the Swedish Academy had actually revealed the answer, but the news had not been passed on.

Winner: German novelist, Paul Thomas Mann.

Citation: For his great novel The Buddenbrooks, which has an increasingly solid status as a classic in contemporary literature.

Although Thomas Mann won the award, he publicly expressed his displeasure. Because he thinks his best novel is "The Magic Mountain", the jury actually said that he won the award for "The Buddenbrooks", which is an insult to a great writer!

Several academicians of the Swedish Academy of Letters were also unhappy, because they liked "The Goddess" very much and thought it was an epoch-making work. But because of the stubbornness of some people, Zhou Hexuan could not be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, which is really a pity.

People in later generations often joke that the Nobel Prize is a lifetime achievement award, and you are too embarrassed to receive it if you are not very old.

Today's Nobel Prizes are slightly better, often awarded to young people, but the qualifications and influence of candidates are still considered.

Thomas Mann started literary creation more than 30 years ago, and his award-winning work is a novel that has been published for ten years. He is very famous in Europe, and his influence is also very terrifying. Several people who participated in the voting knew him well, and he couldn't win compared to Zhou Hexuan, who is well-connected.

In addition, "The Buddenbrooks" is a novel about the bourgeoisie, which is easier for Western judges to accept and understand. The Chinese society shown in "The Goddess" is not so attractive.

Therefore, after the announcement of the results of the Nobel Prize in Literature, no one questioned its fairness. Instead, it was considered very normal, and Thomas Mann deserved the award.

As for Zhou Hexuan, although he did not win the final award, he has achieved great fame in the European literary world. Because the gossip had spread long ago, a young Chinese writer delayed the announcement of the results of the Nobel Prize for Literature by one month.

It is said that there are still two judges who are aggrieved by this, thinking that "Goddess" is far better than "The Buddenbrooks".

...

December 6, Gare de Paris.

Before Zhou Hexuan walked out of the station hall, he saw hundreds of Chinese people standing outside. They held up the sign "Welcome Mr. Zhou" and each of them held a French version of "The Goddess", waiting patiently in the bitter cold wind.

Seeing this, Zhou Hexuan quickly walked over.

Li Shizeng was standing at the very front of the crowd. When he saw Zhou Hexuan appearing, he immediately came over to shake hands enthusiastically and said, "Mingcheng, you have made us Chinese look good this time."

"It's not worthy of everyone's love." Zhou Hexuan said.

Li Shizeng introduced several people to Zhou Hexuan, all of whom were well-known Chinese in France. As for those who held signs to welcome Zhou Hexuan, most of them were members of the Student Union in France.

Zhou Hexuan didn't dare to be arrogant and negligent. After exchanging greetings with Li Shizeng and the others, he immediately walked into the crowd to shake hands with everyone, and said repeatedly: "Thank you for your hard work, let everyone wait here in the cold."

"Mr. Zhou, sign your name!" A boy wearing glasses said holding up "Goddess".

Zhou Hexuan took the pen, opened the title page and asked, "What's your name?"

The boy replied: "My name is Fu Lei. I audit literature courses at the University of Paris, and I am studying art theory and art criticism at the same time. I especially like Mr. "The Goddess". This time I will definitely win the Goncourt Literature Prize!"

"I hope so." Zhou Hexuan took a second look at the student in front of him, took a pen and wrote on the title page: Benefits from Fu Lei's classmate——Zhou Hexuan.

Seeing that Fu Leisuo succeeded in signing, the students studying in France next to him followed suit, and Zhou Hexuan instantly fell into the wave of signing.

Li Shi watched it for a while with a smile, then came over and said, "Leave Mr. Zhou alone, he probably hasn't had lunch yet."

While signing his name, Zhou Hexuan said: "Mr. Shi Zeng, is there any good restaurant nearby? I'll treat everyone to it."

"It probably won't be able to sit down, there are too many people," Li Shizeng said with a smile, "I know there is a Chinese restaurant opened by the Chinese workers who went to France during the war in Europe, we can go there."