CDJMM – Volume 1 – Chapter 26 Writing in the Republic Era (25)

The Last Person Who Didn’t Take Drugs would be a short story, about fifty to sixty thousand words in total. Though short, Le Jing had to weigh every sentence carefully, which made it much harder to write than The Rise of a Dynasty.

After all, the direction he set for The Rise of a Dynasty was popular literature, aimed at the middle- and lower-class readers. To fit the knowledge level of such a wide audience, Le Jing didn’t need to be overly particular with his wording— the simpler and more elementary the style, the better. That way, the work could spread easily among the common folk. What’s more, the novel’s content followed a straightforward, blood-pumping, “爽文” (爽文: indulgent, wish-fulfilling stories) formula. In later generations, countless works would use this same formula. All Le Jing had to do was slip in some “private goods” of his own along the way.

He didn’t intend to use lofty literary techniques or ornate diction in The Last Person Who Didn’t Take Drugs either. This story had to be down-to-earth enough to circulate widely among the people, so they could truly and deeply realize the harms of opium.

But what made Le Jing feel that The Last Person Who Didn’t Take Drugs was difficult to write lay in its higher demand on writing skill. He had to think about how to make the satire both witty and easy to understand, while still provoking thought in readers. If in the end the story was only taken as a funny anecdote to laugh at, then it would be a failure.

Le Jing pondered for a long time, drafting several different outlines. He considered everything—except the poor condition of this body.

Currently, he had two serialized works running: one was the weekly, “Looking Down on Humans Through a Rat’s Eyes”, written under the pen name “The Watchman,” which required four to five thousand words a week (already reduced in length to make room for the other novel). The other was Lin Zhongqi’s daily serialization, The Rise of a Dynasty, which demanded at least three thousand words a day. Altogether, he was producing nearly thirty thousand words a week.

And on top of this heavy load, Le Jing, always restless and easily bored, had now started on a brand-new work, The Last Person Who Didn’t Take Drugs. Though only a short story, it couldn’t be finished without thirty to fifty thousand words. Even for a healthy person, such an intense writing schedule would be exhausting—let alone Le Jing, whose body had already been hollowed out by wine, women, and opium.

So, after pulling two consecutive all-nighters to rush drafts, it was no surprise that he fell ill.

In the sweltering days of midsummer, he lay on his bed wrapped in a quilt like a woman in confinement. His face burned bright red, and his whole body kept breaking out in cold sweat.

The doctor called in was the same old Chinese physician who had once remarked that Le Jing’s “excessive brilliance would harm his health.” After checking his pulse, the old man couldn’t help but sigh and bluntly scolded:

“I don’t know how someone so young can have so many worries. If you go on like this, I fear your lifespan will be shortened.”

He shook his head and went on:

“This time you’ve fallen ill because your energy is stuck in your heart, draining your essence and blood. That allowed the wind-evil to invade, giving you this heat-induced cold. The prescription I give you will only calm your heart and relieve your condition. It treats the illness but not the root. A doctor cannot heal the heart—that depends on you learning to let things go.”

Le Jing: …

Alright then, so now he really had become like Qingwen in Dream of the Red Chamber—“a heart higher than the heavens, yet a life as fragile as paper.”

Who would have thought, after transmigrating, he hadn’t gotten the script of a heaven-defying protagonist, but instead the script of Qingwen? Truly suffocating.

Despite his unwillingness, Le Jing had no choice but to pause all his ongoing serials and begin his recuperation. After all, as a certain great figure once said—the body is the capital of revolution. He still had many things he wanted to accomplish, and he definitely didn’t want to kick the bucket early.

Fortunately, he still had some manuscripts of Rise of the Dynasty in reserve to keep it going for a while, but as for Looking Down on Humans Through a Rat’s Eyes, he could only put it on hold.

So, when the editor of The Literary Gazette, Yang Jinglun, came as usual to collect the manuscript, he was shocked to see Mr. Li lying in bed under a quilt in the scorching midsummer heat, looking pale and sickly.

“Sir, you’re ill? Did you see a doctor? What did the doctor say?” he asked in alarm.

Le Jing coughed, trying to sit up, but Yang Jinglun quickly stopped him. “Sir, please stay lying down, don’t get up. Your health comes first right now.”

Thus, Le Jing stayed on the bed, rasping with a hoarse voice and giving a bitter smile as he replied: “The doctor said it’s heatstroke-induced flu. He told me to rest well. I’m really sorry for wasting your trip. Looking Down on Humans Through a Rat’s Eyes will probably have to be suspended for now.”

Yang Jinglun quickly reassured him: “Sir, what are you saying? Of course your health is far more important than an article. Please don’t worry about the novel—just focus on recovering.”

Back at the editorial office, Yang Jinglun went straight to the chief editor to report that “The Watchman” needed to suspend his serial due to illness. The chief editor wasn’t unreasonable. He immediately said: “Let Mr. Li take good care of himself. The serial can wait. Write a leave notice and put it in the next issue of the paper.”

Yang Jinglun nodded, but he couldn’t help recalling Mr. Li’s pale, sickly face, and sighed inwardly. So young, yet his health was already like this… could it be true that Heaven really is jealous of talent?

No, no, nonsense! He scolded himself immediately. A man as gifted as Mr. Li would surely live a long life!

So, the next day, many readers following Looking Down on Humans Through a Rat’s Eyes discovered a short leave notice in The Literary Gazette. It said that due to illness, Mr. Watchman’s serial would be temporarily suspended.

This notice, only a few dozen characters long, created an earthquake-level shock among readers. In no time, countless letters of concern flooded the editorial office.

“What illness does sir have? Is it serious?”

“I know a famous doctor, I can introduce him to sir!”

“Please give me sir’s address, I have a family secret remedy that will surely cure him!”

These were still considered reasonable—concerned about the author’s health. But Yang Jinglun also received some utterly absurd letters that left him speechless.

“The newspaper must have bullied our sir!”

“Shameless press! For money, you’ve forced sir to overwork himself writing—he fell ill because of you!”

“Where have you hidden Mr. Watchman? I warn you, illegally detaining an author is against the law! You must hand over his address—I need to personally confirm that he’s safe!”

Yang Jinglun nearly choked reading these. Did these readers forget how just days ago, Mr. Watchman was writing fiery essays scolding Nantang?

And as for claims that their paper had “enslaved” him into overworking… Yang Jinglun’s mouth twitched. He almost wanted to grab these readers by the collar and shake some sense into them.

Look carefully—your sir only updates once a week, and each time just four to five thousand words. If that’s considered “slaving away at the cost of his health,” then how should those hardworking authors who update daily feel?!

As for the accusation that they were “detaining” the author, Yang Jinglun strongly refused to shoulder that blame on behalf of The Literary Gazette! It was clearly because Mr. Li was modest by nature and disliked fame. Their newspaper had only followed his instructions. How did it turn into them scheming to imprison the author in the eyes of these readers? They felt more wronged than Dou E herself!

Yang Jinglun didn’t know that in later generations, there would be a special term for this kind of “blindness” from fans—it was called “fan filter.”

Under the “fan filter,” fans saw their idol as the last pure white lotus in the universe, unstained though it grew from the mud—fragile, innocent, and endlessly adorable. With their idol, they gained both armor and weakness. They could charge through thorns for them, or use dozens of alternate accounts to wage online wars. Compared to the frenzied fans of later generations, Republican-era readers sending a few threatening letters was really child’s play.

What the young and inexperienced Yang Jinglun also didn’t know was that many courtesans in the Eight Hutongs were mourning bitterly upon hearing that The Watchman had fallen ill, crying with their heads in their hands.

Though many men often said, “A whore has no affection, an actor has no loyalty,” had those men ever thought why prostitutes were “heartless” toward them? It was only because those men had been just as heartless to them. Courtesans like Sai Jinhua had been loyal, yet she ended her days destitute, dying in the Eight Hutongs. Little Fengxian had been loyal, but why did her life turn out so turbulent, tossed about by fate for half a lifetime?

Of course courtesans could have feelings—they simply offered them to the right people. And The Watchman was undoubtedly such a person.

As a man, he had never despised them as cheap or filthy. Instead, he had repeatedly written articles in the newspaper on their behalf, speaking for them.

Though many of them could not read, they had ears—and their hearts could read! They understood who truly cared for them, who truly spoke for them.

Every word in The Watchman’s articles was filled with concern and compassion. His writing carried emotions—so pure, so gentle, so beautiful—that these women, living in a cold hell, for the first time felt the warmth of being cherished.

The Watchman made them realize that not all men in the world were hypocritical, cold, and lustful; there were also good men like him—gentle, kind, and upright! How could they not worship him, not fall in love with him?

Now, upon hearing that the only good man in the world had fallen ill, countless courtesans wept into their handkerchiefs, cursing Heaven for its blindness. With so many healthy villains in the world, why must such a great gentleman as The Watchman fall sick?

And so, some courtesans wrote a letter to Madam Bai Shaoyao, a former courtesan who had bought back her freedom and was now a brothel keeper. Since she had once briefly corresponded with The Watchman, they begged her to send him a letter to ask about his health.

They didn’t even need to plead. Bai Shaoyao had already written to the editorial office. Because she had exchanged letters with Le Jing several times before, Editor Yang personally passed her letter on to him.

Le Jing, bedridden and listless, finally perked up when he received it—at last, he had something to occupy his mind.

He opened it. As before, the letter was ghostwritten for Bai Shaoyao.

Le Jing stared at the flamboyant cursive characters, and an incredible thought crept into his mind—could it be that this letter was written by Marshal Xue himself?

Perhaps it was the boredom of convalescence, but his imagination ran wild. If this really was the Marshal’s calligraphy, it would be worthy of being passed down as a family heirloom. He chuckled at himself afterward—what nonsense.

Leaving aside the fact that he was essentially a sexless, asexual man, with his frail, failing body, who knew if he would even live to see Li Shuran marry and have children? The thought of descendants was laughable.

He refocused and began reading Bai Shaoyao’s letter. She had written at length about his health, earnestly offering to find him famous doctors and rare medicines to cure his illness. And at the end, shyly, she asked whether she could adapt Memoirs of a Courtesan into a stage play, performed by herself and her sisters.

Le Jing blinked, then smiled. A stage play? He welcomed it wholeheartedly.

Many courtesans couldn’t read, which limited the spread of his works. But if adapted into a play, even the illiterate could grasp the story—for it was their very own lives.

Think of the courtesans after the founding of the new nation—why did those who resisted reform weep bitterly and resolve to change after watching Master Cao’s Sunrise? Why were Master Hong’s plays, like The Thousand-Year Ice River Thaws, sold out night after night? Was it not because these plays truthfully portrayed the courtesans’ sufferings?

So he immediately picked up his pen and wrote back to Bai Shaoyao, agreeing to her request. He only set two conditions:

1. The play must strictly follow the plot of his novel.
2. All actors must be courtesans.

An all-courtesan cast would, first, guarantee great attention to the play (whether praise or criticism—hadn’t later entertainment industries thrived on “the more they scold, the more popular”?). Second, it would set a positive example for the liberation of courtesans. And third, through this play, he hoped to show them that life was not confined to a single path.

Even if they were born into lowly circumstances, they could still stand under the dazzling spotlight, radiant and magnificent, winning the admiration of all.