1978 Synthetic Writers

Chapter 386 Bon voyage

In the next few days, I visited all the representative cities in the United States.

I went to New York, Chicago, Dallas, and even Las Vegas to experience the atmosphere of the gambling city firsthand.

A group of people spent a few dollars playing blackjack for a while.

"Do you remember your novel?" Zhu Lin and Jiang Xian asked, "The one called Supreme."

"Of course I remember what I wrote," Jiang Xian replied.

In order to earn some royalties from "Story Club", he wrote this movie for Wang Jing, changing the original Hong Kong film into the style of old Shanghai.

"It would be great if it could be adapted into a movie." Zhu Lin looked at the casino with flashing neon lights. "That story is suitable for being adapted into a movie, and it's also suitable for being filmed here."

“There will definitely be opportunities in the future.”

Jiang Xian was also thinking about this matter.

The story of "The King's Avatar" definitely cannot be filmed in mainland China.

But if it is abroad, foreigners may be very interested.

Jiang Xian couldn't help but think of the gambling king boss of MGM.

If the script of "The King's Avatar" was given to him, would he be interested?
Compared with New York, the public security in Las Vegas is much better, and behind the madness of the city is an invisible stability.

New York is pure Gotham. Women don't dare to take the subway after 12 o'clock.

After staying in Las Vegas for a few days, Jiang Xian came to Los Angeles again.

The last time they came here was because of the "Creativity Award". Now that the "Creativity Award" has ended for a long time, Jiang Xian and his family came here again, and their mood was completely different from last time.

"I heard that Los Angeles is the most polluted place in the United States," said Wang Anyi.

Ru Zhijuan nodded. "There is electricity everywhere here, so the pollution level is certainly not light."

A group of people first went to Universal Studios, and then went to the famous Disneyland.

Tickets are 13 yuan per person.

Compared with here, the way of playing in Universal Studios is a bit too gentle.

All the moving, turning and flying electric chairs here made Jiang Xian and his group shout and laugh.

The ancient wars, the sacred fire in the palace, the fairy tale world, the robbers' caves, the dance of the female ghosts all gave them a visual impact and shock when they came from China.

"Jiang Xian, what do you think of this?"

Zhu Lin took a fancy to a pink dress on sale. It had a distinct Disney cartoon style and looked very delicate and cute.

"Who did you buy it for?" Jiang Xian asked knowingly.

"Of course it's our daughter. I can't wear it. Although she can't wear it now, she can wear it when she grows up a little bit."

"Quite good looking."

After asking about the price, Zhu Lin immediately backed out when she heard it was several dozen dollars.

But he was buying clothes for his daughter, and with Jiang Xian's persuasion, he finally reluctantly spent a huge amount of money to buy them.

In the evening, Chen Yingzhen told Jiang Xian that his friend in Taiwan had helped contact Eileen Chang and asked Jiang Xian if he wanted to go meet her.

After all, Eileen Chang is a famous female writer in China.

Jiang Xian was immediately attracted and agreed. In the evening, he, Wang Anyi, Ru Zhijuan and Chen Yingzhen met the female writer.

Zhang Ailing arrived very late. She was already in her sixties, very thin, and looked like a little old lady.

After he came, he didn't talk much and didn't eat.

Jiang Xian heard that she didn't eat anything, including Chinese food because it was greasy. She couldn't even drink soy milk. She only ate Western food. Later, she even felt that she couldn't eat Western food and only ate a strange kind of pie.

Chen Yingzhen introduced everyone present.

Judging from Zhang Ailing's reaction, Jiang Xian probably didn't hear anything at all and definitely didn't remember many of them.

She just sat there quietly, listened for a while, said hello, then got up and left.

"What a remarkable woman." Wang Anyi couldn't help but admire her, obviously with some admiration.

Jiang Xian could also understand.

Many people think that Wang Anyi's works are an imitation of Zhang Ailing and that their creations are very similar.

"I heard that she lives a very difficult life." Jiang Xian said.

Everyone has their own unique preferences. Take Eileen Chang for example, she is easily attracted to talented older men who are much older than her.

Hu Lancheng in his first marriage and Lai Ya in his second marriage were both of this type.

Unfortunately, these two talented men have very poor ability to make a living.

Hu Lancheng used the gimmick of a talented man and dressed himself up as a Confucian scholar all day long, but he often needed financial support from Eileen Chang.

The same is true for Lai Ya.

Originally, Eileen Chang had no idea how to make a living and had no concept of financial management. Who knew that Lai Ya was even poorer than her.

Lai Ya himself was once a glorious figure, but unfortunately he squandered all his money, and no one was interested in his works after he entered middle age.

When Eileen Chang first arrived in the United States, she was full of anxiety about her future. For her, marrying an American writer who was qualified to enter the McDowell Literary Camp might be a good way out. No matter how old he was, he should have more financial resources than she did.

How could she know that the 65-year-old Lai Ya had already run out of money and talent.

As for Lai Ya, he also believed that marrying a young Chinese talent whose new book had just been published in the United States would be the solution to all his problems.

As a result, Zhang Ailing's writing career in the United States was not very successful.

"If a magazine in the United States asked her to write an article, do you think she would be happy?" Jiang Xian suddenly said.

"Probably so."

Wang Anyi thought for a moment and said, "It is true that writers have pride, but I have never heard of anyone who would be dissatisfied with the royalties."

The last stop of the journey was back to San Francisco.

The writers visited Stanford University.

"Most American writers are professionally trained, and at the very least have a bachelor's degree. But writers like us in China do not have high academic qualifications," said Jiang Xian.

The Writers Association is still helping to negotiate with the Ministry of Higher Education for the diploma issue for their Institute of Literature, but these decisions are very difficult to get, and Li Qingquan is now focusing all his energy on this matter.

Stanford University was built like a monastery, with a church inside and a row of copper bricks in front of the door.

"Every time a class of students graduates here, one square of floor tiles is replaced with copper ones. Since the first class, there are already about a hundred of them."

After leaving Stanford, we went to Dongfeng Bookstore on Disclosure Street, which is one of the largest Chinese bookstores in North America.

Jiang Xian went in and took a look around, and saw his own novels on the bookshelf. "The Chess King" and "Furong Town", which he published in China, were among them.

The owner's name is Liu Zhenyi. He was very excited when he saw Jiang Xian. He told him that his novels were not only popular in China, but also had many readers among overseas Chinese. Many people who came to his bookstore would specifically ask him if Jiang Xian had published any new works recently.

A reader meeting was held here today. It was actually very simple, with just a table and a few chairs in the store, and readers who came to buy books could join voluntarily.

Jiang Xian and his friends joined the meeting for free with the idea of ​​making a contribution to the Chinese bookstore.

I thought it was just a few people.

But surprisingly, readers lined up in front of Jiang Xian. "I really like your work!"

"I started reading three years ago, and the first one I read was 'The Fierce Animals'."

“When will your books Castaway and The Hunger Games be published in Chinese?”

The readers were chattering and it was very lively.

Many people even heard about Jiang Xian’s work at Dongfeng Bookstore from other places and asked their friends to come and sign his books.

Liu Zhenyi couldn't help but sigh at Jiang Xian's popularity. He was definitely the most popular writer in this event since he opened his shop.

Many people have visited his Dongfeng Bookstore, including physicist Yang Zhenning, writer Wang Meng, and poet Ai Qing. But the best effect and the most lively atmosphere were when Jiang Xian came.

After the meeting, Liu Zhenyi gave Jiang Xian and others a set of four treasures of the study as a thank you.

After everyone left, they went shopping and prepared to buy some gifts to bring back home.

Everyone had limited foreign exchange, so they had to calculate everything they bought, so most people focused on food.

Jawbreaker hard candy, Doritos potato chips, Tab Cola, Capsules
Various artificially flavored fruit snacks are often regarded as junk food in the United States, but they are rare items in the mainland. They are also exquisitely packaged and written entirely in English. Whether you take them home as gifts for relatives or friends, they definitely feel very high-end.

As for Jiang Xian, the wealthy man, he bought things without blinking an eye and even fixed his eyes on the personal computer.

Of course, there were computers by now.

And there are even touch screen computers!
Stephen Chow promoted and sold the touch-screen computer that Apple launched decades later in 1983.

At that time he was still a host in a children's program. He looked very young and his face was full of collagen.

Jiang Xian soon turned his attention to the Commodore 64, named for its 64 kilobytes of memory. It is currently the most successful home computer sold and is also the best-selling single computer model in the Guinness Book of World Records.

The complete machine came with a 1541 single floppy disk drive, a C2N cassette tape drive, a keyboard and seven software disks, supplemented by 7KB of readable RAM and 64KB of read-only memory.

The price is not high, only US$595, which is definitely a conscience price in the United States.

The microprocessors they used were very cheap.

Intel's 8086, 8088 or Motorola's 68000.

They will all become electronic waste in the future.

But right now it's "powerful computing power and low cost."

Although this computer was of no use to his work as a writer, the most important thing for a writer was the emergence of UCDOS and WPS, which had to wait until at least 88, that is, the end of the 80s.

But who buys a computer for work?!

Check your conscience, did you spend a huge amount of money to install a 4090 on your computer for work?
Jiang Xian bought this to try something new, because the main software of Commodore 64 is games.

Of course, commercial applications are also supported.

It is reported that as of 2024, a bakery in Indiana, USA is still using this Commodore 1982 released in 64 as a cash register.

outrageous.

Jiang Xian spent $600 to buy one and also purchased some software, mostly games.

With this computer, he can regain a little feeling of modern life in the country, which is a comfort to him.

After buying the computer, Jiang Xian looked at the electronics area again and soon saw a mobile phone.

Motorola's DynaTAC.

This thing weighs a full 2 ​​pounds, or ounces.

Shaped like a brick.

In fact, it is what later generations commonly call a big brother.

According to the salesperson, the talk time of this thing is half an hour, which is roughly equivalent to five minutes of charging for an OP.

Jiang Xian took a look at the price: $3995.

What about grabbing money?
In later life, with this amount of money he could have made a three-fold fortune!
Jiang Xian didn't touch this thing. After all, he had no other use for it except cracking walnuts. The only use of it was to show off.

Of course, he couldn't just buy things for himself, so he took his family to other places to shop, buying clothes, watches, and more and more things. Most of them were bought for the little Majesty, including a big bag of milk powder, diapers, etc.

After buying things, Jiang Xian saw Ru Zhijuan and thought of going over to ask if they needed some foreign exchange support, just to do them a favor.

Ru Zhijuan almost dropped her jaw when she saw the large and small bags bought by Jiang Xian's family.

This is probably more than all the writers combined.

"Jiang Xian, why are you buying so many things?"

"It's not that there are so many people in the family, it's mainly because there are so many things for the children."

"For the kids?"

Ru Zhijuan glanced at the packaging box with the word "Commodore 64" written on it and a computer pattern drawn on it.

Whose kids use this?
"Teacher Ru, are there any home appliances you want to bring back to China? If you don't have enough foreign exchange, just tell me." Jiang Xian said very generously.

"no need."

Ru Zhijuan smiled and rejected Jiang Xian's kindness, "I will buy it after I return home."

These days, people returning to China can buy one large item duty-free at the duty-free shop for people who have been abroad after returning home. If they have been away for more than half a year, they can buy three large items.

The next day was the day to return home.

Early in the morning, Nie Hualing called Jiang Xian and wished him a safe journey.

"Thank you, please give my regards to Mr. Ingres." Jiang Xian said.

"I give my regards to everyone on your behalf. Please take good care of the child on the way. He is so young and has to take a plane."

"We will."

After hanging up the call with Nie Hualing, Jiang Xian received many phone calls from people asking for his greetings.

Among them was HarperCollins’ Smith.

"Jiang, the story you told me the other day is very interesting. Anti-war novels have a huge market both in the United States and in Europe. When will you write it?"

"Wait until I return home." Jiang Xian said.

The group took a flight from San Francisco, first went to Hong Kong, and then transferred to a flight back home from Hong Kong.

The plane took off and flew above the clouds. Jiang Xian was reminiscing about his trip to the United States.

The release of Drifter, Letter from an Unknown Woman and The Moon and Sixpence, as well as the first two books of The Hunger Games.
Before he came, no one in the world knew his name.

After he left, his legend was everywhere in the world.

The journey was long, so Jiang Xianxian and Zhu Lin coaxed the little emperor to sleep. After dozing for a while, they took out a stack of manuscript paper from their bag, held a ballpoint pen, which was still very rare in the country, and began to write.

"The fields on the hillside, the dark and damp stables, the mice running back and forth along the roof beams, all these have become a blur in the depths of my memory."

“But I remember the day we sold the horse very clearly.”

“That fear haunted me my whole life.”

(End of this chapter)