Yangzhou young writers won the 5th Mao Dun Newcomer Award.
Long essay "One Man's Plain".
The long ** "Single".
A collection of essays, "The Village Keeps My Mouth Tight".
Zhou Rongchi. Recently, the winners of the 5th Mao Dun Newcomer Award were announced, and Yangzhou young writer Zhou Rongchi was on the list. The biennial Mao Dun Newcomer Award of the Chinese Literature Association is a literary award approved by the Party Group of the China Writers Association and led by the Chinese Literature Association. The award is aimed at awarding young writers, critics and screenwriters who have achieved high achievements, aiming to encourage the younger generation to carry forward the excellent culture of the Chinese nation and bravely climb the peak of literature, so as to promote the prosperity and development of Chinese literature.
As a grassroots writer rooted in the grassroots, Zhou Rongchi has taken his village "Nanjiaodun" as the origin in recent years, taken the "Lixiahe Plain" as the scene, and extended the dual linear space of geography and history of the "Grand Canal", and has created and published 14 essays and works, and won 8 important domestic professional literary awards. Zhou Rongchi's creation with the background of the countryside directly hits the current situation of urban and rural development, while pursuing literature and ideology, in the dual expression of prose and **, it reflects the persistent pursuit of a grassroots writer committed to new local writing.
After winning the award, the reporter interviewed Zhou Rongchi online for the first time and listened to him talk about his efforts and gains in literary creation.
Writing about the difficult things of the countryside is valuable.
Zhou Rongchi's prose creation has always been based on the "Lixiahe Plain" as the scene, forming a literary landmark with "Nanjiaodun" as the origin, realizing his own unique exploration and pursuit. From the simple and original "The Hometown of Plants and Trees", to "The Truth of the Village", which reflects unique thinking, to "One Man's Plain", which reflects the fate of individuals and the times, to "The Village Keeps My Mouth Shut About Me", which reflects on the relationship between urban and rural areas, and then to the long prose column "The Corner of the Earth" in "Hunan Literature", the original intention of his creation adheres to the profound thinking of the changes in his life circumstances and the entanglement of the changes of the times.
His "The Ancient Garden of Grass and Trees" won the 4th Wang Zengqi Literature Award, "One Man's Plain" won the Prose Award of the Purple Mountain Literature Award of Jiangsu Province, "The Moment" won the Sanmao Prose Award, "Ten Chapters of the Mother" won the Feng Zikai Prose Award, and "On the Riverside" won the 20th Hundred Flowers Literature Award Prose Award. His essays have also been published in Xinhua Digest, Prose Overseas Edition, Selected Essays, Annual Anthology of Chinese Prose and other anthologies.
Zhou Rongchi pays attention to the combing of local cultural and literary resources in his prose creation, and his series of essays "The Rural World Written by Wang Zengqi" in the magazine "Meiwen" has attracted wide attention in the industry. At the seminar, the panelists believed that this series of essays explored a new path of hometown writing, rediscovered the Chinese prose tradition, and realized a new attempt to look at the countryside from a different perspective. Whether a writer who has lived in a familiar local space for a long time can break through the limitations of space and truly write about the universal spirit and soul is the current problem and test faced by "hometown" writing, and Zhou Rongchi has made an effective attempt to get out of "nostalgic writing" in the new series of essays, so that the text has a "sense of foreign land", and his creative ideas and explorations are worthy of recognition.
When it comes to prose creation, Zhou Rongchi said with feeling: "In the literary world, writing 'vernacular prose' faces a double dilemma. First of all, prose is a genre that has been neglected in terms of artistic level, and it is not as valued and studied as **, and the writers themselves are also negligent in self-discipline and vigilance. At the same time, as a major part of literary subjects, the literary attitudes, emotions and methods of the countryside have not been fundamentally changed and improved, so writing a single 'vernacular prose' may be 'retrograde on a broad road' - of course, I think that difficult things are valuable, and the process of chasing is poetic in itself. ”
Standing on the plain, the future is more dependent on the scene and the past.
In Zhou Rongchi's literary creation, he uses prose writing to express the "history of the soul" with one hand, and embodies the "era" with the other hand. He is not only obsessed with prose writing, but also has his own pursuit in writing, and strives to use two forms to excavate and express the countryside. "* and prose are more like the mutual correspondence and observation of 'virtual and real', ** can reach more parts of reality that cannot be seen, while prose may have more simple and strong emotions. When it comes to prose writing, I'm more concerned with the expression of personal experience, and its strength lies in the authenticity;And in **, I can use symbolic and euphemistic methods to express the unspeakable affection of the past and the present, and I am more concerned about expressing some expectations in these **, because the future may be more dependent on the scene and the past. ”
Zhou Rongchi's long-form "Li Guangrong as a Village Official" and "Li Guangrong Goes to the Countryside" created with the background of "Lixiahe Plain" show the magnificent process and real picture of the construction of the new countryside with its documentary style and aesthetic expression. "Li Guangrong as a Village Official" won the Yangzhou "Five Ones" Project Award as a key support project of Yangzhou Literary and Art Guidance Fund, and "Li Guangrong Goes to the Countryside" won the "Five Ones" Project Award Book Award of Jiangsu Province as a key support project of Jiangsu Writers Association. Zhou Rongchi's short story collection "Da Nao New Things" shows the new style of the times with the theme of good people and fashion in the form of new stories, and also contains the poetry and customs of Da Nao River. As a key support project of the China Writers Association, he created the long "Shan Wei" (formerly known as "Where the Gongs and Drums" came from) as a key support project of the China Writers Association, and was published in a long-form special issue of the "** Monthly", and won the "Five Ones" Project Award Book Award in Jiangsu Province after publication.
While paying attention to the theme of realism, Zhou Rongchi also paid attention to excavating traditional cultural resources, to find the facts and blood and tears shed in the "past" on the "land", and successively created and published three full-length documentary literary works, "Night Stalker - The Biography of Mao Fuxuan", "New Life - The Biography of Cheng Yibin" and "Finding the Way - The Biography of Ma Chang". For these documentary works that are close to the facts, Zhou Rongchi has his own thoughts: "I know that although the writing of ** must be 'three feet above the ground', our feet must step on the earth, so that the land on the plain has always become our scene." What I am talking about is not only the land under my feet, but also the need to make my writing always have a 'sense of the scene', a kind of 'realism' full of affection and power, and a kind of literary power to find the future in the past and the present. ”
Pay attention to the reflection Every flower blooms thanks to the land.
Zhou Rongchi focuses on his own corner in his literary creation, and constructs a literary landmark with "Nanjiaodun" as the origin at the geographical and literary levels. "South Corner Pier" is a writing object full of affection and deep meaning, and to a certain extent, it is also a kind of "deliberate" landmark construction and literary construction. "I finally had the opportunity to write about the countryside because I left the country. Zhou Rongchi said, "I want to pay tribute not only to the countryside, but also to books and literature." Without lyrical and rational literary writing, I might not be able to state all this today, so I pay more and more attention to my own reflection and reflection in writing, only in this way can the flowers of the countryside bloom more brilliantly. ”
In order to improve his theoretical literacy in creation, Zhou Rongchi participated in the 43rd advanced research class of Beijing Lu Xun Academy of Literature in 2023 for three months. During this period, he completed his new long essay "The Corner of the Earth", which is also a new exploration and harvest in the field of literature on the issue of urban-rural relations. Zhou Rongchi's attention to theory in his writing is conscious, sober and vigilant, which also makes him constantly self-plan and guide his own writing, and these reflections have formed a series of special interviews and reports such as "Finding the Value and Meaning of Writing in the Countryside", "I Want to Write the Glory of the Land of Lixiahe", and "What Future Will Local Literature Face". Zhou Rongchi also paid attention to the dynamics of the industry, published a theoretical monograph "One Man's Criticism", and published hundreds of thousands of words of commentary and research articles in newspapers and periodicals such as "Literature and Art Newspaper", "Literature Newspaper", "China Reading Newspaper", "Guangxi Literature", etc., and set up a literary and artistic column in newspapers and periodicals "Cooking in Spare Books".
Since 2022, he has served as the chairman of the Yangzhou Writers Association, during which he promoted Gaoyou to become the hometown of Chinese literature, and the first Chinese Writers Association in Jiangsu Province settled in Yangzhou in the new era of civilization practice, attracting a group of literary masters to write the plain, the canal and the ancient city of Yangzhou, so that literature is like the water of the canal affectionately irrigating and nourishing the land of Jiangbei. In the natural village "South Corner Pier", which is almost once every three or two days. "Constantly returning to the land of one's hometown is not an empty ritual or formality, but a constant gratitude and reflection. Zhou Rongchi told reporters, "We know very well in our hearts that every flower blooms thanks to the land, and every stroke of our writing is actually the lyricism of the earth itself, as witnesses and observers of the scene, we are at most a pious and affectionate recorder." ”
Correspondent: Kong Lingling, Reporter: Wang Xin.