Chapter 19 postscript

I was twenty-seven years old when I finished writing, and my youth also came to an end. Now that I am in my early thirties, looking back at the book I wrote a few years ago, I am more or less emotional. If words still have some meaning, I think one of its meanings is that words can record certain things, and those things will Lost completely from someone as the years go by, I mean things that don't come back when lost, like virginity and things like that, they tend to only come once in a person- So, I think, whatever the book may be called, for me there is always something ineffable in it, and on this point, and only on this point, I think it took me a lot of time to write The text is valid.

As for the book itself, I don't think I can say much here. My job is to finish it and publish it, that's all.But I still; hope -- as petty as a personal wish is, I can't help but think that, for whatever reason, if anyone can have fun with this book, then I can subjectively I can conjecture that the pleasures of these people are somehow related to me, and thinking about it this way also gives me a certain pleasure and satisfaction. Of course, I have my own evaluation of my book, and this evaluation has nothing to do with the readers. After the book is in the hands of the readers, it will be completely broken with me. Although I admit that I also have a kind of curiosity about the readers, and I want to know how the readers feel , but at the same time, based on my own reading experience, I believe that everyone has their own reading taste, and this mysterious taste is beyond the author's guess.

When I wrote this book, I was called "Angry Youth" by my friends. I was disgusted with everything, and I had to gossip about everything. After all, I was young and stupid. , imprudent and full of vigor, after writing, I didn't even accept the opinions of people who didn't like this book, in fact, I was not ready to accept any opinions or suggestions at that time, I felt that the facts speak louder than words, threatened " Anyone who thinks my writing is not good, whoever writes a good book and read it." Moreover, it is ridiculous to say that my original intention of writing this book at that time was that since "I didn't see any good books in my field of vision. ", I don't want to go any further, I'm really ashamed of myself at the age of twenty-seven, when everything about me, including my vanity, was so funny--

But now it seems that I was able to do that kind of thing only at that age. At that time, I never thought about such things as quitting in the face of difficulties-at that time, I was so young that I thought that being a writer It’s a breeze—fortunately, I couldn’t publish it for three years after it was written, which made me re-understand writing. Looking back now, if I had published it after I finished writing it, then, I dare say I would definitely not hesitate to publish it. Write the second book, the third book - such a rash result, I still feel a little scared when I think about it. What's more scary is that maybe I will regard writing as the whole of my life, thus compressing my life in a small corner --I do a lot of ridiculous stupid things without knowing it--who knows, who knows what will happen to me at twenty-seven?

The first edition was published by Writers Press, which I call a revised edition. The responsible editor was my friend Yang Kui. In order for this book to be published, he fought hard for me time and time again. This process lasted for three years. In the end, I was desperate and finally stopped insisting, so Yang Kui and I revised it one night. Yang Kui proposed a set of revision suggestions from the professional perspective of publishing. For the same purpose, I accepted it, although I was extremely reluctant. (I could only comfort myself in this way: a book without readers' participation can only be said to be a half-finished book, and it is meaningless to put it in my own hands.) I sat next to Yang Kui and watched him distressedly write a line. I feel extremely uncomfortable when I write or delete or modify the words I wrote one by one.

So, the book was finally published after it was revised to look like the first edition. In fact, I was very dissatisfied with the revised edition. There were many things in it that I could not agree with. I have complained to Yang Kui several times in private, because I think my original creative intentions have been more or less distorted-- In fact, however, it was that revised edition that paved the way for my novel to be published, and a year later its meaning finally came to light—things are so wonderful in the world. Perhaps, the modified version actually works better than the original.Maybe, many readers are more willing to read the revised version, maybe, some readers can't see the difference between the revised version and the original version, maybe - but, from my point of view, as an author, I have many reasons to think that if the publishing conditions permit, For things like novels, it is best to be able to show people their original colors.

For this reason, I would like to thank Zhang Jing, Shi Tao and others here. They not only helped to publish mine, but also decided to plan to publish the original version, which made my wish four years ago come true. Shi Kang October 15, 1999