Chapter 64: Fishing for a Rich Woman

Chapter 64: Fishing for a Rich Woman

Chapter 64: Fishing for a Rich Woman (The ambiguous plot in the previous chapter has been modified)

This post maintains the same standard as always by President Shizuko Kawaide.

The pinned part is the song "Short Song of Thundergod", followed by a long analysis and boasting with many words of praise.

Kitagawa Hide simply skipped the analysis of "Thorajit Tanka". To be honest, President Kawaide Shizuko is good in everything except her literary criticism ability, and the reviews she wrote have a bit of a "what a pity that literati are uneducated, and their "fuck" is widely accepted" flavor.

But her praise and admiration for Kitagawa Hide really came from the heart. The various words of praise that filled the screen made even Kitagawa Hide blush and feel ashamed.

And there is one great thing about President Shizuko Kawaide. She said that she admires writers with literary talent very much, so she wants to meet them, but she does not want to disturb their peaceful life with her actions.

She offered 100 million yen to find the haiku master who wrote "Thorashi Tanka", but resolutely refused as netizens did not want to seriously disturb the haiku master and the Haiku Research Group of the Faculty of Literature of the University of Tokyo!

"He's a good person," Kitagawa Hide sighed after reading the post. The comments from netizens in the post were also very positive, mostly saying things like "Don't disturb the personal practice of the Heisei haiku master" and "He must have his reasons for not wanting to reveal his identity."

The thousands of posts below are all discussing the exquisiteness and beauty of "Thoriumin Tanka". After all, when haiku is dead and there are basically no haiku poems worth reading, it is normal that such a poem popped up and shocked literature lovers.

In the early days of the Internet, due to the huge cost of Internet access, the quality of Internet users was indeed much higher than later.

"Hideki, is this a big problem for you?" Yumeko Agatsuma asked quietly beside him, "I don't know how to tell Captain Kobayashi."

"It's okay, it's just a small matter." Beichuan Xiu rubbed her little head, "Just tell Captain Xiaolin to ignore those people who come to the door, and hide this matter from everyone for the time being."

Kitagawa Hide never expected that this poem "Thoraga Tanka" would cause such a huge craze. From this perspective, it seems that haiku, which he previously thought was not profitable, might also be a field he can venture into.

However, he is not planning to open up this track for now. He will first solve the problem of Kodansha and then consider how to monetize through haiku!
Thinking about these things, Kitagawa Hide asked his wife Yumeko to take five magazines from the bookshelf, which were the core reading materials from the top five publishing houses.

Shinchosha's "Shincho".

"Gunzo" by Kodansha.

Shueisha's "All Stars".

"Literary World" of Bungeishunju.

"Literature" by Kawaide Shobo.

These five publishing houses are like the five great masters in Jin Yong's novels in the current Japanese literary world. For other publishing houses, they are like a dimensionality-reducing blow.

It is impossible for Kodansha to continue the cooperation. Given the personality of General Manager Noma Airi, she would not tolerate Kitagawa Hide's sudden change of track from so-called romance novels to a rogue novel like "No Longer Human".

Of the other four, the first to be excluded was Bungeishunju, a publishing house where right-wing elements gathered. As soon as it saw the popularity of Kitagawa Hide's "Hear the Wind Sing", it immediately found a bunch of writers to imitate it, and the extremely hypocritical editor-in-chief Ikejima Shinpei in the literary salon.

These points alone were enough for Kitagawa Hide to completely banish Bungeishunju to the sidelines.

Shinchosha has always been the leader among the five major publishing houses in terms of status and reputation, especially in the post-war Showa era, when it once had the aura of "who else but us" in the field of pure literature.

However, in recent years, as its editorial department has become increasingly conservative and overly focused on pure text skills, the gap between it and the other four has become smaller and smaller.

Moreover, the editorial department of Shinchosha was very confused about the criteria for judging the works to be published, and sometimes they always liked to serialize some empty and boring novels without any plot in the magazine.

The writing style that Kitagawa Hide is currently displaying can be said to be completely opposite to the style advocated by Shinchosha. If he had continued to produce books by the great writer Murakami after signing the contract in the past, his head would probably have been smashed by the editors of Shinchosha.

Shueisha is well-known for its wealth, which can be seen from their willingness to spend a lot of money to promote their comic works. Moreover, Shueisha's pure literature works are the closest to popular literature among the five major publishing houses, so Shueisha's writers are rarely favored by the Akutagawa Prize, but are frequent winners of the Naoki Prize.

Shueisha's award-winning novels and published works are also the best-selling ones in Japan among the five major publishing houses, except for those of Shinchosha.

but!

Kitagawa Hide, who traveled through time, knew better than anyone that Shueisha's editorial department was truly despicable.

They are totally uninterested in the subsequent training of writers or in winning various awards, and are only concerned with hype and making a quick buck.

So even though he makes the most money, he has the fewest contracted writers and the most award-winning writers to lose, and his reputation in the pure literature world is very bad.

The last one is Kawaide Shobo. This publishing house is the youngest of the five major ones. It was founded the latest, has the lowest industry reputation, produces the fewest famous writers, and its magazine sales are always at the bottom. From the Showa era to the Heisei era, it has always been a very stable last-place publisher, and it cannot be shaken!

And maybe it’s because Kawade Shobo has no connections in the literary world, but it and its writers are not well received by the mainstream literary world. Although the other four publishing houses continue to fight overtly and covertly, their attitude towards Kawade Shobo is consistent.

What the hell is this? Is it worthy of standing shoulder to shoulder with us?
Not to mention the mainstream awards, I heard that Kawaide Shobo has even made a public statement that if its writers win any mainstream literary award, the company will give them a bonus of 500 million yen.

This shows how little it is recognized by mainstream awards.

Kawaide Shobo also likes to create gimmicky news. For example, the winners of its own Newcomer Award in recent years are all under the age of 20, and the editorial department has invited a large group of mystery and romance writers to serialize novels, etc.

In short, some of the actions of this publishing house are very confusing, and are completely different from the styles of the other four.

But there are two good points about this publishing house.

First, although the family business is not large, the ability to publish books is extremely strong. As long as your serialized work is not rubbish and is cancelled during the serialization period, the editorial department will be willing to submit a plan and publish your book as a single volume, allowing the writer to earn more royalties.

First, they are very serious and responsible in the cultivation of contracted writers. It is said that many editors will even answer the author's phone calls late at night to provide point-to-point guidance and encouragement. Even if your book has no sales and has not improved at all, they will still be very patient with you.

In addition, Kawaide Shobo accepts the most direct submissions and self-publishing among the five.

It can be seen that Kawaide Shobo wants to cultivate and firmly grasp a group of good writers like a big family to ensure that they can sit back and relax for decades. After reading the literary reviews and various words and deeds of Kawaide Shobo's acting president Kawaide Shizuko, Kitagawa Hide can understand why Kawaide Shobo's current style is like this.

This acting president was completely different from the senior executives of publishing houses he had met.

Kitagawa Hide wrote and drew on the draft paper with a fountain pen, and finally came to the conclusion: Freelance Writers > Kawaide Shobo > Shinchosha > Shueisha > other small and medium-sized publishing houses.

To be honest, he has a very good impression of Kawaide Shobo now. The acting president Kawaide Shizuko has no idea that he is the haiku master. Judging from her words and actions, her thirst for talent and her love for pure literature are at least stronger than those old guys!
He did not completely block the possibility of small and medium-sized publishing houses. If the other party is willing to give him great creative freedom and a sky-high contract, it is not impossible to take a risk.

After having an idea in mind, Beichuan Xiu crumpled up the draft paper, took out another one, and started writing quickly.

The best case scenario is that after he secretly spreads some news, a publishing house they like comes to poach him.

If no one takes the initiative, Kitagawa Hide will have to consider bringing the ball to the door for negotiations himself.

There is only one word difference between active and passive, which makes a huge difference in the status and bargaining chips during negotiations.

Kitagawa Hide supported his chin with his hand, thinking about how to "cleverly" spread the news, when his eyes suddenly caught sight of the post by Kawaide Shizuko.

A short song like "Thor's Song" can cause such a big stir on the Internet.

It can be seen that the speed and breadth of network communication are already quite good.

He immediately posted some messages on various forums using his online name "I just want to make money".

The post titles are all full of gimmicks and deliberately attract people's attention, such as "Shocking rumor! Mr. Hide Kitagawa seems to be at odds with the top management of Kodansha!", "Mr. Hide Kitagawa's new work is suspected to have changed the track, and Kodansha is not optimistic about it!".

The content of the post doesn’t matter, just make it up.

Kitagawa Hide's main purpose is to use these gimmicky posts to draw the attention of a certain wealthy woman to this possibility, and to lure her, or some publishing houses, over to have a talk.

Of course, these tricks may have no effect.

Then he has to consider bringing the ball to the goal and make the new club willing to take over with his excellent works and results.

After thinking these things through, Kitagawa Hide turned off the website and the Internet, immediately called up the document, and typed in the beginning of "No Longer Human" which he had written today word by word.

Many things happened recently that upset him, but for some reason, when he started typing on the keyboard and devoted himself to the creation of the book, those things that annoyed him disappeared one by one.

He seemed to have instantly fallen into the life of an ordinary young man named Takuya Yanjing.

A study in a luxury house in Minato-ku, Tokyo.

"Boom boom boom——"

There was a knock on the door.

"Shizuko, I cooked some red bean soup. Drink some to replenish your blood." The old woman's voice came.

The woman, wearing only a thin silk pajamas and black round-frame glasses, was staring at the computer screen and typing on the keyboard, as if she was arguing with someone.

Hearing the sound outside, she quickly pressed the monitor switch and responded: "Okay, I'll be out right away, thank you grandma~"

Shizuko Kawaide stood up and quickly tidied her appearance in front of the mirror. After she felt that she had returned to her daytime appearance, she slowly walked to the door.

"Put it at the door after you finish drinking it. The servant will take it away tomorrow morning. Get more rest, Shizuko." Keiko Kimura reached out and rubbed the cheek of the tall woman in front of her with some heartache. Ever since her son-in-law fell ill, the responsibility of the publishing house fell on her, the 29-year-old granddaughter.

Internal and external troubles, and various chores, are not the pressures that someone of Shizuko Kawaide's age should have to bear.

"Okay grandma, I'll go to bed after I finish my work, and you should also go to bed early."

Shizuko Kawaide gently hugged Keiko Kimura and returned to the house with the red bean soup.

Turning the monitor back on, the forum of Qiwu.com appeared before my eyes.

She held the bowl in one hand and refreshed the mouse with the other.

The bowl that was about to reach his mouth suddenly stopped.

A post suddenly popped up in my eyes.

"Shocking rumor! It seems that Mr. Kitagawa Hide is at odds with the top management of Kodansha!"

"What about Mr. Hide Kitagawa?!" The somewhat sleepy Shizuko Kawaide suddenly became energetic!

She put down the bowl in her hand and immediately clicked on the post to check. Behind the dim light of the computer screen, the huge bookshelf was filled with row after row of hardcover copies of "Hear the Wind Sing".

The character card of Shizuko Kawaide has been reviewed, and the controversial content in the previous chapter has also been modified.

Except for Team Leader Kobayashi, no one knew that this assignment was from Yumeko, and Yumeko did not announce to the public that the work was hers.

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(End of this chapter)