Yao Xueyin's letter to ***: In addition to writing "Li Zicheng", he also wrote about the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.
Lao Qin wrote a story about Li Jianhou the year before last, he regarded himself as a descendant of Li Zicheng, and could not bear to bury Li Zicheng's deeds, so he resigned and went home, engaged in agricultural production and creation at the same time.
It took him four years to complete the first draft of "The Romance of Yongchang", but because he had no funds to pay for it, it was only circulated among the countryside. By chance, ** read this book and praised it a lot.
He asked Li Jianhou to be invited to Yan'an and appointed him as a senator of the border district. Li Jianhou received the best guidance, rejoiced, and promised. However, in 1947, Li Jianhou was once held hostage by Hu Zongnan, and the revision of the manuscript was interrupted.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, ** was still concerned about Li Jianhou and his "Romance of Yongchang", and proposed that he be appointed as a researcher of the Shaanxi Provincial Museum of Culture and History to continue to revise the "Romance of Yongchang".
However, Li Jianhou fell ill in 1950 and died soon after, unable to complete the revisions. It is regrettable that after the death of Li Jianhou, his work "Romance of Yongchang" could not be revised.
Yao Xueyin's son Yao Haitian revealed that as early as the mid-to-late 40s of the last century, Yao Xueyin had already begun to study the history of the Ming Dynasty. He collected a large number of historical materials on the peasant uprising at the end of the Ming Dynasty, thoroughly studied all kinds of official history, wild history, local chronicles and anthologies of the Ming and Qing dynasties, and copied out more than 20,000 data cards, which were distributed and preserved in different categories, and had successfully launched academic treatises such as "Jinyiwei in the early Ming Dynasty" and "The Biography of Emperor Chongzhen".
In 1957, Yao Xueyin was looking at melons and herding cattle at Dongxihu Farm in Wuhan, and began to write the first volume of "Li Zicheng". In 1961, the first draft of 300,000 words came out.
In 1962, Yao Xueyin made three major revisions to the book, and at the end of that year, he went to Beijing with the manuscript to visit Mao Dun and Wu Han. Mao Dun is a literary master, and Wu Han is an authority on Ming history, both of whom are full of praise for the first volume of "Li Zicheng".
Yao Haitian said that Wu Han even said to his father with admiration: "You are not as good as me in studying the history of the early Ming Dynasty, and I am not as good as you in studying the history of the late Ming Dynasty." Wu Han's words are not modest, but the truth.
Because, Lao Qin has read "The Biography of Zhu Yuanzhang" written by Wu Han, and there are many mistakes. The reason for this is that Wu Han extremely trusts some absurd wild history legends. Having said that, in 1963, the first volume of "Li Zicheng" was published by the China Youth Publishing House, which was an instant hit and caused a great impact in society.
After being translated into Japanese, he received the Cultural Award from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, and Foreign Affairs. Yao Xueyin, who was dominated by joy, sent a sample book from Wuhan to *** through the post office.
Jiang Hong, a professor at Jianghan University in Wuhan, is a friend of Yao Xueyin's and reminded him: "The chairman is so busy, will he have time to read your book?" ”
Yao Xueyin's self-confidence is based on his trust in the chairman. His"Ambition"While continuing to complete "Li Zicheng", it is also necessary to complete "Tianjing Tragedy" with the theme of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and "Day and Night of the Great River" with the theme of the Xinhai Revolution.
However, difficulties were encountered in the writing process, and the first draft, which was revised in 1972, was not published. So, at Jiang Xiaotian's suggestion, he asked Chairman *** for help and reported his writing plan and concerns in detail.
**The chairman read Yao Xueyin's long letter with a near-blind condition and immediately gave instructions to support him in completing the work. This trust and support enabled Yao Xueyin to continue his creation, and finally completed the creation of "Li Zicheng".
The first two volumes of Yao Xueyin's magnum opus Li Zicheng were successfully published in 1976 and 1981 respectively, and he was fortunate to win the first Mao Dun Literature Award. The third volume was also published.
However, the first. Volumes 4 and 5 have never been completed in the process of creation and revision. Yao Xueyin passed away in April 1999, when the manuscripts of these two volumes had not yet been revised.
After the collation of his family, the two volumes of the work were finally released to a wide audience in August of the same year. It is a pity that the "Tianjing Tragedy" and "The Great River Flowing Days and Nights" conceived by Yao Xueyin were not released.
But as early as 1961, when the first draft of the first volume of "Li Zicheng" was basically completed, Yao Xueyin completed the 57,000-word summary of the first volume of "The Tragedy of Tianjing".
Jiang Xiaotian, the editor in charge of the first volume of Li Zicheng, was deeply shocked after reading it, and he said with deep regret: "Mr. Yao Xueyin took away his long-brewing "Tianjing Tragedy", which is a great loss to the literary world. ”