Chapter 569 Jin Yong's Works
In 1981, Jin Yong's martial arts novels were "unbanned" in the country and quickly became bestsellers.
But in fact, throughout the 1980s, only Baihua Literature and Art Publishing House obtained the authorization to publish Jin Yong's martial arts novels in mainland China in 1985, and the scope of this authorization was only for the novel "The Book and the Sword".
In addition, Jin Yong's martial arts novels that have fascinated countless readers over the years are all pirated.
In the past ten years, more than a dozen domestic publishing houses have published dozens of Jin Yong's works without obtaining Jin Yong's authorization.
After rampant piracy among the public, many counterfeit works using Jin Yong's name became popular in the book market.
Lin Weimin’s second goal was to introduce Jin Yong’s martial arts novels to China.
Jin Yong's martial arts novels have a broad readership base in China. After being introduced, their sales will definitely be good, and they may even have the potential to become bestsellers.
After hearing his opinion, Cheng Zaochun looked gloomy and thought for a long time before asking, "Isn't it a little too common?"
"Liang Fengyi's novels are probably more popular than Jin Yong's, right? Leader, I think you should also be aware that pure literature is on the decline.
The days when a work of pure literature could easily sell tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands or even millions of copies are gone. We cannot expect the Chinese literature society to bet on a "Ordinary World" or "White Deer Plain" every year.
Therefore, the compilation and publishing direction of the publishing house's books must be adjusted.
I am not saying that we should completely take the path of popularization, but we must properly balance the publishing ratio of pure literature and popular literature.
To put it bluntly, in the future, the publication of pure literary works in the publishing house will most likely have to rely on the publication of popular literature to support it.
The introduction of Liang Fengyi’s novels and Jin Yong’s collection of works is an attempt.”
After Lin Weimin said these words, he looked at Cheng Zaochun with firm eyes.
Looking at his expression, Cheng Zaochun naturally knew that this idea must have already formed in his mind.
Cheng Zaochun said slowly, "Well, since Liang Fengyi's works are going to be introduced, and Jin Yong's works are not a big deal, let's give it a try."
After getting his approval, Lin Weimin's face relaxed. Cheng Zaochun then asked, "Jin Yong, did you contact him privately first, or did the publishing house send a letter to him?"
Lin Weimin thought for a moment and said, "Just write the letter directly for official business. I'll call him after he receives it."
Cheng Zaochun nodded slightly, "That's fine."
"Then I'll come back to you to review it."
Guowen Publishing House has a rule that any letters to overseas authors must be reviewed and approved by the responsible leader.
Lin Weimin is the editor-in-chief and should be able to make the decision himself, but in order to avoid suspicion it is safer to let Cheng Zaochun take a look.
After drafting the letter of invitation to write, he gave it to Cheng Zaochun to take a look at, and then signed and stamped it. After the letter was mailed, Lin Weimin temporarily focused his energy on reviewing the manuscript.
As the editor-in-chief, manuscript review is still one of his job responsibilities, but unlike before, he is now only responsible for the final review of the company's key publications.
In addition, grasping the publishing direction and planning publishing topics are also his work focuses. For example, his proposal to Cheng Zaochun to introduce a collection of Jin Yong's works falls into this category.
The work of the editor-in-chief can be summarized as: grasp the publishing direction, be responsible for the quality of books, participate in publishing business management, and lead the editorial team.
The things that Lin Weimin has been doing recently, including the final review of book manuscripts, formulating a performance appraisal system for the editorial department, and advocating the introduction of Jin Yong's collection of works, are all within his scope of responsibilities.
When it was almost time to get off work, Lin Weimin received a call from Yu Hua in Jiaxing.
After the publication of "To Live", it received a good response and its influence continued to expand. Yu Hua was very happy. In addition to expressing his gratitude to Lin Weimin, he called for a more important purpose.
"Teacher Lin, if To Live is published, can I also get royalties?"
It is in line with Yu Hua's personality that he is already thinking about royalties as soon as the novel is published.
"Okay." Lin Weimin said.
Yu Hua was delighted and asked, "When does the publishing house plan to publish my novel?"
Lin Weimin asked, "Are you in urgent need of money?"
"Didn't I tell you before that I plan to settle down in Yanjing? I quit my job in Jiaxing, and the house allocated by the company will be taken back. I want to buy a house in Yanjing. The houses in Yanjing are too expensive, and I may not have enough money. I should have known not to buy a computer first."
When Yu Hua talked about buying a computer, his tone was somewhat regretful, but he did not feel the slightest bit of reluctance when he mentioned that his house was taken back by his company after he resigned. He is now working in the Jiaxing Literary Association, which allocated him a 30-square-meter house.
"It's only been less than a month since To Live was published. It will take at least a few months for it to be published. You don't need to worry about the house for now. When you come to Yanjing, I can have someone find a place for you to live."
Lin Weimin entrusted all the houses he owned to Li Guangfu for rental, so it was easy to find a place for Yu Hua to live.
Lin Weimin's words made Yu Hua feel at ease. Having such an acquaintance in Yanjing would definitely save him a lot of effort in the process of settling down here.
Two days later, sample books of Liang Fengyi's three novels, "Drunken Red Dust", "The Oiran's Robbery" and "The Dream of the Rich Family", were published and delivered to Lin Weimin's desk.
The publication of Liang Fengyi's novels was arranged by New H Publishing House. After the sample copies of the novels came out, Lin Weimin immediately contacted Liang Fengyi and New H Publishing House to inform them that the three novels would be on the shelves of bookstores across the country in half a month.
Guowen Publishing House took subscriptions for the three novels in advance, and the first print run was 50,000 copies each.
Liang Fengyi is completely unknown in the country, so this number is already very impressive.
Lin Weimin called just to inform them, but he didn't expect that the New H Society would attach much more importance to it than he imagined.
Less than an hour after he made the call, the leader of the relevant unit contacted him.
"Comrade Weimin, Ms. Liang Fengyi's new book has been published. We hope that the National Literature Publishing House can hold a grand new book launch conference. We will invite some respected leaders of the Literature Association to attend. What do you think?"
Since they said so, Lin Weimin naturally had no way to refuse.
The matter of introducing Liang Fengyi's works itself has a certain political color, otherwise Lin Weimin would not have personally gone to Hong Kong to discuss this matter with Liang Fengyi a few months ago.
"Holding a new book launch is no problem. We will arrange it and you can just arrange someone to coordinate it."
Holding a new book launch is not a complicated matter. You just need to determine the time and place of the launch, prepare materials, contact guests and the media.
The guests and the media will be contacted by the relevant departments, while the preparations for the press conference will be the responsibility of the Guowen Press.
Lin Weimin informed Cheng Zaochun about the matter, and then handed the matter over to his subordinates in the editor-in-chief's office for preparation.
A week later, the new book launch of the three novels "Drunken Red Dust", "The Oiran" and "The Dream of the Rich" was grandly held at the Yanjing Hotel. Liang Fengyi, the author of the novels, was notified and came to Yanjing from Hong Kong in advance to attend the launch conference.
In addition to her, leaders of relevant units, Chen Huangmei, Feng Mu and Wang Meng from the Literary Association all attended and spoke, congratulating Liang Fengyi.
Cheng Zaochun and Lin Weimin also came to the press conference today. Although they were the organizers of the press conference, they were supporting roles. After the brief press conference, Liang Fengyi and the guests were being interviewed, and the two of them slipped aside to talk in private.
"Today's scene is quite big!" Lin Weimin sighed.
Cheng Zaochun looked at the reporters who were interviewing. Those who came today were all heavyweight national media. There were even reporters from CCTV filming during the press conference. It was said that they were preparing material for the "News Broadcast".
"It should be considered as setting an example." Cheng Zaochun said.
After he finished speaking, he looked at Lin Weimin and said jokingly, "When will your new book release be treated like this?"
Lin Weimin said helplessly: "You are making it difficult for me. I am not worthy of a barrel station!"
Cheng Zaochun glanced at the leaders of the relevant units not far away and said, "Don't talk nonsense."
"You were the one who said that first!"
Lin Weimin added: "You should be happy now, right? This press conference has saved us a lot of publicity expenses!"
Although Liang Fengyi's works introduced by Guowen Publishing House have political overtones, the relevant departments have given Liang Fengyi a lot of support in order to set an example, which has also played a great role in publicity. I believe these novels should be able to achieve good sales.
Cheng Zaochun had a relaxed smile on his face, "It's all about cooperation!"
That evening, the "News Broadcast" reported Liang Fengyi's new book launch. Reporting a new book launch by a Hong Kong writer was probably the first time in the history of the "News Broadcast".
The next morning, all major print media immediately followed up with reports. With the operation of relevant departments, the news that Liang Fengyi's works were introduced into the country for publication became household news among the people across the country within just a few days.
Lin Weimin placed a newspaper on Cheng Zaochun's desk, smiling, "Why do I feel like we should hurry up and print more copies?"
While the books were still on their way to bookstores across the country, Lin Weimin began discussing the issue of reprinting with Cheng Zaochun. Cheng Zaochun also smiled and flipped through the newspaper, saying, "Don't worry, let's wait until they sell for a few days."
"You are just too conservative." Lin Weimin teased.
Cheng Zaochun glared at him and said, "This is called steady and cautious."
After a few words, Lin Weimin said, "Jin Yong sent me a letter, saying he wanted to discuss it in detail."
"Then you should come forward to talk. You have dealt with each other before."
Lin Weimin picked up the phone and said, "Then I'll lend you this phone."
As he spoke, he started to dial the number and after waiting for a long time, the call was connected.
"Mr. Cha, long time no see!"
A few years ago, when Lin Weimin was invited by the Joint Publishing Company in Hong Kong to visit, he had dealt with Jin Yong and also raised money from Jin Yong on behalf of the Chinese Literature Foundation.
Lin Weimin chatted with Jin Yong for a while, and specifically mentioned Liang Fengyi, who has been widely publicized in recent days. "Ms. Liang is not well-known in our country, but her works have been so popular and eye-catching. If your works can be published, they will definitely become the focus of national attention."
"And I think you should also know that there have been countless pirated copies of your novels in China over the years. Not only private pirates, but also many publishing houses have participated in it. If you can give us the authorization for your work in the mainland, I can't say anything else, but what we can guarantee is that piracy by publishing houses will definitely disappear in the future."
It is not new that Jin Yong's martial arts novels are pirated in the mainland. He also knows about it in Hong Kong. Now that Guowen Publishing House has come to him hoping to introduce his novels, it will be beneficial to Jin Yong.
Lin Weimin's words touched his heart, and Jin Yong readily agreed to introduce the work over the phone.
(End of this chapter)
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