Recently, a seminar on Zhang Wenhao's novel "White Rice and Red Persimmons", sponsored by the Luoyang Writers Association and the Luoyang Critics Association, and hosted by the Luoyang Long Fiction Society, was held in Luoyang.
Zhao Kehong, member of the Plenary Committee of the China Writers Association and vice chairman of the Henan Writers Association, Zhang Wenxin, chairman of the Luoyang Municipal Original Texts Association, Li Shaoyong, chairman of the Luoyang Municipal Appraisal Association, Yang Xiaohong, vice chairman of the Luoyang Municipal Appraisal Association, and more than 20 critics, scholars, professors and writers conducted in-depth discussions and comments on the ideological connotation, language art, character shaping, structural design, narrative methods, scene descriptions, emotional rendering, and detail grasp of the novel "White Rice and Red Persimmons".
The novel "White Rice and Red Persimmons" is divided into 52 chapters and more than 330,000 words. The novel takes the rural life from the 1980s to the arrival of the new century as the main background, and describes the tragic and joyful love story and the inspirational struggle chapter of youth that took place in the saltwater village of the western mountains of Yuxi with full of emotions, showing the ever-changing course of the times and the rural picture of unique and vicissitudes. This novel, with the theme of inheriting and promoting The Culture of Heluo and showing the cultural characteristics and life scenes of the Yellow River Basin as the core, was published by Writers Publishing House in January 2022 and sold on well-known websites such as Tmall, JD.com, and Dangdang, which attracted widespread attention from many media and gave positive reports and promotion.
During the discussion, everyone believed that the story occurrence and development in the novel "White Rice and Red Persimmons" mainly had three plot structure lines, according to the causal relationship between events, carrying on the upper and lower levels, interlocking, and closely related. The three plot threads and the narrative of nearly a hundred characters are intertwined, advancing in parallel, forming a network structure, and the small story in the big story skillfully and skillfully twists and reverses the storyline, giving people a sense of strangeness and surprise; but the novel is still built on a fairly complete story structure, so that the social life reflected in the novel is broad and rich. Being able to create this work with the structure of multiple plot threads that are not easy to grasp shows that the author has unique ingenuity and a deep mastery of the story structure.
Show the changes of yuxi mountain villages and carry forward the theme of Heluo culture. When exchanging reading feelings, everyone said that reading the long novel "White Rice and Red Persimmons" is like enjoying a slowly unfolding rural picture, which makes people pleasing to the eye and can't let go; as if listening to a long song, stirring the heart, reveling in it; and as if in the vivid storyline of the book, it is still difficult to calm down the mood for a long time, and the imagination is endless, and the thoughts are endless...
Everyone spoke enthusiastically and gave many affirmations to the works. Praised the novel "White Rice And Persimmons" for its delicate and three-dimensional description, the storyline is unique and wonderful, the details are vivid and touching; the overall structure is intricate and orderly, the fate of the characters is set up and downs; it covers a long time span, the human geography knowledge is profound and broad; the bearing is thick, close to the reality of regional life, and the precipitation is thick and nostalgic. It is a refreshing, refreshing and impressive reading; it closes the distance between the writer and the reader, and is an excellent work depicting the realistic theme of contemporary peasant life and the history of rural change.
It is understood that Zhang Wenhao grew up in the countryside, joined the army for eight years, and later transferred to the city to work and live. "White Rice and Red Persimmons" is the first novel he plans to create in the "Trilogy of Workers, Farmers and Soldiers" with the theme of rural areas, agriculture and peasants, and the second novel reflecting military life with the themes of the army, military camps and soldiers, "The Regiment headquarters compound" (tentative name) is being created.
Text/Guangzhou Daily, New Flower City Reporter: Wu Bo
Photo/ Guangzhou Daily, Xinhuacheng reporter: Wu Bo
Video/Guangzhou Daily Xinhuacheng Reporter: Wu Bo
Correspondent: Shang Xiaoyi
Guangzhou Daily New Flower City Editor: Liu Liqin