2021 was an unforgettable year. This year, the Liberation Weekend conversation/interview edition interviewed a total of fifty-one people, and we selected four of them for a follow-up interview. Their review and prospect may not only be personal feelings, but will become the memories of the times and the expectations of the collective.
This year, I live in the "Age of Awakening." It was a surprise to me that a TV series title that had been conceived by The Brainlight many years ago had become the number one online term in 2021.
For the past year, I have been touched by the feelings expressed by domestic and foreign audiences through various channels every day. During the premiere of "The Age of Awakening", I saw young people constantly issuing calls for "urging change", and saw countless shocking and tear-jerking bullet screens on Youku, iQiyi, Station B and other platforms; on the day of the Qingming Festival, the tombs of Chen Yannian, Chen Qiaonian, Zhao Shiyan and other martyrs in Shanghai Longhua Martyrs Cemetery were piled with flowers and oaths; a Yanqiao Road in Hefei was repeatedly sent to the Internet hot search, and Chen Yannian and Chen Qiaonian became models for contemporary youth to discuss, study and worship. All this made me deeply feel the "power of awakening".
Some people ask, is there a sequel to The Age of Awakening? The youth replied, "Our happy life today is the sequel." "Contemporary youth have sublimated the theme of "The Age of Awakening" in their own language. A TV series communicates the ideas of the post-90s and post-00s of 100 years ago and today's post-90s and post-00s, and the great spirit of party building has been recognized and inherited by contemporary youth, which is really the biggest surprise!
In addition to the TV series "The Age of Awakening", the recent long historical novel "The Age of Awakening" has finally met with readers. The nearly 700,000-word novel, originally scheduled to be published in mid-October this year, was reprinted in larger volumes by Liberation Daily and China Writers. The Propaganda Department of the Anhui Provincial CPC Committee, in line with the attitude of striving for excellence and in accordance with the opinions of the relevant leaders, asked Mr. Yan Jingming, vice chairman of the China Writers Association, to re-examine the manuscript before printing it, and put forward many important suggestions for revision. According to these opinions, I and the editors of the Anhui People's Publishing House carried out another unified reform for nearly two months.
I would especially like to thank the red metropolis of Shanghai for its love for The Age of Awakening. Over the past year, media such as Jiefang Daily, Wen Wei Po, Xinmin Evening News, and Oriental Satellite TV have publicized and reported on the "Age of Awakening" with extraordinary enthusiasm. I have also had the privilege of having in-depth exchanges with teachers and students from Fudan University and Tongji University, as well as friends in the party history, journalism, film and television circles in Shanghai, and have further realized the responsibility and value of party history researchers and film and television screenwriters.
I am willing to continue to use the pen to write about historical figures, whether they are big people or small people, so that they can come alive, enter the hearts of contemporary people, and let the heroes of history become friends of contemporary youth.
"Communicating the Thoughts of Generations of Chinese Youth: An Interview with Long Pingping, Author of the Long Historical Novel "The Age of Awakening""
Xia Bin wrote
Published on October 8, 2021