"Think like a king, work hard like a waiter" is someone else's advertising slogan, which Mr. Huang Jiwei gave as a "motto for book copywriters", inscribed at the end of his new book "Three Chapters of Copywriting".
"Three Chapters of Copywriting" is a beautiful little book, small open hardcover, three sides of the incision spray red, so that it holds in the hand like a delicate little red box, suitable for storing treasures. "The binding was carried out by Zhu Yingchun, a famous designer who has won the 'Most Beautiful Book in China' and 'The Most Beautiful Book in the World' awards and was permanently collected by the British Library." What book invites the blessing of such a master of rank, but the title is so weak and self-sustaining?
"The readership of this book is vertical." Well, that's roughly what it means to be "a specific target audience." "Others, of course, can also watch, but it is possible that he will feel - equivalent to you are a fitness maniac, I know a little bit, and then you try to tell me a variety of fitness strategies, you say too much I will think 'what does this mean?' It's that you love it so much, and I'm average, I think, 'What does this mean?' It's not interesting'. "Teacher Huang Jiwei is very afraid that I am causing trouble for myself, and I am looking for him to talk about such a professional book that is not easy for ordinary readers."
Our last interview was in 2002, he was a famous "yellow old evil" in the jianghu, every week thunder and lightning inventory of internet hot words and fresh words, known as the Internet age of Chinese observers, "collectors".
"For a year, most of my reading interest has focused on phrases that are far less appropriate to call 'aphorisms' than 'gossip'. They come from TV series, advertising themes, news headlines, celebrity gossip, movie talk, comic book narration, slip of the tongue, witty remarks, articles... Until I hit the out of the 'face' of the master's words to me to the head. Whether it is said to be a 'folk language' or a 'language paragraph', it is the most important 'mainstream' in the non-mainstream of modern life. I know that this very high gold rich mine is actually permeated in every inch of the air we live in. What I do now is to fold my hands and hold them up, carefully, even religiously. I'm going to let that gold-like folk water leak out as little as possible. The above is excerpted from the "afterword" of Huang Jiwei's "Please Read My Lips" (1999).
In real life, he is a senior publisher, publishing idle books such as the "Reading Notes" series and the "Words and Notes" series. Before finishing his work as a journalist, he edited "Interview with Lonely Island"; before finishing his publishing work, he wrote this "Three Chapters of Copywriting - Book Editing Business Manual".
On the afternoon of July 31, before a heavy rain, we met at a Hong Kong-style tea dinner in East Forty Bridge. The TV is fiercely TVB's period drama, the background sound is Chen Baiqiang whispering "What to Ask for in Life", and there are naturally many "past", "no" and "no more" in our discourse. 18 years have passed without knowing how, and I am still summarizing my life in the language he collected—such as "too ugly to wake up, too poor to sleep"—to summarize my life, teacher Huang, who is as kind as yesterday, still orders a lot of delicious food, and brings me a bouquet of yellow flowers as a gift, has been retired for three years.
Once I put myself
Tied to time
Beiqing Daily: From what year did your "Notes on Words" not come out? Your blog", "Lonely Islander", was gone by December 2018, when the "Language of the Week" column was gone.
Huang Jiwei: Tired, tired, this is one of the reasons. You want to do something for 20 years, and it's very hard for me. The main dilemma is that the way I record, this is the setting, binds itself to time.
As a simple example, you get to December 31 every year and the year is over, right? But after you've slept for 5 hours, the next year starts again. Time doesn't stop, let's assume that January 1 is Monday, and then I have to write on January 7th. Sometimes I feel that this matter is endless. For time is eternal and man is short-lived. A person's life is very short, so I feel very hard.
One of my hardest ones was in 2009, when I went to Frankfurt on a business trip. I don't want to bring a computer, I'm too tired, the laptop is too heavy. At that time, I used my first Apple phone, and I wrote "Language of the Week" on my phone. One of our fellow housemates said, "What are you doing with the black light blinding the fire?" If you look closely, you will find that there is a issue of "Language of the Week" in October that is particularly simple. Because you want that Apple 3 to be tiny.
Beiqing Daily: Writing is one thing, what about your collection?
Huang Jiwei: Feel free to do it. Now it is more convenient than before, the original had to tear it down, take a notebook to write it down, now all electronic version, convenient.
Beiqing Daily: Have you also cultivated some people who help you collect these things, and when you see something, you "quickly recommend it to Teacher Huang"?
Huang Jiwei: Yes, less. People do bigger things and don't do such small things.
When I started taking "word notes" 20 years ago, this angle and method were unfamiliar to everyone. But 20 years later, words like this and looking at social change from the perspective of words have become a very familiar way, and it is a way of rapid consumption. The value of my re-doing this work is not very great.
So while I was doing this, I wanted to do it in a different way, and I was tired. So I simply cut it off. In fact, I haven't broken it, I'm still doing it myself. I just changed my ways. I put the news down, I don't chase you anymore, I just rest on my book, and then I do the analysis. I take it in as a sample, and then I do it more valuable, or more meaningful than newsworthy.
It turned out that the news was very strong, one a year, very tired. Why didn't I come out later? Actually, I have it all. After I made the 7th book of word notes in 2009, I didn't do it later. Why not? No time to do it. If I want to make up last year's, do I write this year? Don't I still have to write? My "language of the week" actually didn't stop, I just switched to the electronic version. I don't think there's any need for readers to see you come up with another paper version.
I will have a new book this year or next year, which is a routine like "word notes", but it will be more interesting than "word notes". Because its journalistic nature will decrease, it will be more closely related to the phenomenon of language. It's about making yourself less rushed when you're doing this. You have to know that the quality and quality of this book is related to time, just like when we make a dish, you make a dish in 5 minutes and a dish in 5 hours, not a category, right? I think it's good for the elderly to have a slower pace.
Beiqing Daily: I want to see the words you collected now on your official name, "Encourage with boredom."
Huang Jiwei: Yes, I am actually still doing it on my public name, but it has become a message every day, a book, a word, today is a book, tomorrow is a word. I don't do interpretation, I just copy down what other people say. I don't explain because the explanation is...
Beiqing Daily: It's very difficult, if you don't get it right, people will think you are redundant.
Huang Jiwei: Right. People have said it's so pretty, you're here, what's the matter, right? For example, I just collected a sentence this morning, I don't know who it is, I am still very touched and a little sad after reading it. The greatest pleasure for me to do this is that you don't want to do it, and then you see this sentence and you are moved. At a certain point, you feel like he's saying something about you. So you have a battery and you can run.
You see she said, it must be a girl I think, she said: "In the off-season of love, I ordered a cup of rain and enjoyed unlimited refills". The picture also came, very complicated feelings.
Beiqing Daily: Where do you see all this?
Huang Jiwei: Sina Weibo. I thought it might have been a long time doing something, and I forgot to tell you a very pretentious statement: "It's not that I'm looking for good sentences, it's that they come to me." "Pretentious?
Beiqing Daily: No. But it is true that you have dabbled enough...
Huang Jiwei: Or maybe you've been paying attention long enough.
Those books were on the shelves
Once gave me comfort
Beiqing Daily: Your public name is "Language Express" one day, and "Old Yellow Flipping Book" one day. I sometimes see a particularly early book in "Old Yellow Books", such as Xi Murong. I wondered what the surrounding environment of Teacher Huang's life was like, and whether there were books full of all kinds of small strips.
Huang Jiwei: This column is also, I don't write a lot of comments, and it is very tiring to write reviews. I once wrote a small column on Sina Weibo called "Flash Reading", which evaluated a book in 140 words and wrote it for several years, starting in 2009. I forgot when I started not writing, too tired to say a good book in 140 words. And I think there's a problem, you love a book, right? But when you talk to someone else, they haven't read the book, so he can't get what you're talking about. Later, I felt that it would be better for me to copy a paragraph for you that I liked, and you liked to read it or not. This satisfied my liking for the book. This is one.
And one, there are too many books in the house, a lot of books I want to give away, and then before I leave I take a picture with it - that is, I follow this book, it came to our house, before I give it to others, I copy a paragraph, and then I can not say this to others. So some people will think that your "old yellow book" is weird, and many years ago you are still talking about the book. But it made sense to me personally, it had been in contact with me, it had interacted with me, like a good friend of mine, and we are gone now, and he is staying far away. Especially once I was at my mother's house and saw those books that I used to have, I felt that the book was really like a person, it was your good friend, and it brought you a kind of comfort at some point. In fact, you may not be able to read this book, but it is placed on the shelf to give you comfort.
Then our society is changing so fast, so fast that everything becomes so fleeting. When you look back, you will find that you are particularly impetuous, particularly noisy, or you feel very wronged, or you are very excited, you are very squealing, you just open the book, and your heart will be quiet. You'll find, hey, why didn't I read this book sooner?
I've also worked as a journalist, and people have given you a lot of books that I haven't read. I originally had a small principle that said, I will not open this book without reading the plastic seal, which means that you have not read it. Later I found out that it wasn't right either, because you didn't watch too much. So now give me the book I will dismantle, dismantle I will read, but I may not finish reading. I feel like a friend, if you don't talk to him about this day, maybe you won't have a chance to talk again, right? See a book as well.
Beiqing Daily: By the way, many people don't know much about your experience, so you just want to talk about it.
Huang Jiwei: Graduated from Beijing Normal University. Then as a teacher, in the hot spring two middle school, it is long gone, this school is gone. After six or seven years as a Chinese teacher, he came out to "Sanlian Life Weekly" and became a reporter as an editor, and then he didn't get it done and left again. I went to the "Book Dealer Daily" as a reporter, as an editor, then to the "Reading Library Network", and then to the Relay Publishing House. If it is a pretense, it is to have read, taught, written, and compiled. It has something to do with books anyway. I'm still very happy.
Because in our time, from no books to read to books to read, in fact, our initial love is perverted. Because you haven't read any books before, you don't have much culture. And then when you have books and you have choices, you especially want to possess those things.
But in fact, you don't have the ability to really read this book. You no longer have the ability and mental resources to construct your worldview. Reading this book is conditional. For example, when you read The Troubles of Young Werther, you don't have this book, you don't know you have it. By the time you get The Troubles of Young Werther, you're 30 years old, and you've missed the best age to read the book. So in essence our sad thing is that we're basically an enthusiastic, ignorant person.
But it's better than you have no feelings for the book at all. Words to comfort yourself.
I actually found out very late, and I couldn't read that kind of particularly grand book. Smaller ones are OK, and they are related to life and the daily life of human nature, and I may be better. That particularly large worldview, that kind of extraordinary imagination of the book, I have a hard time reading.
Beiqing Daily: For example?
Huang Jiwei: For example, a lot of science fiction books, too tired to read. Like Tolkien's book, The Lord of the Rings. People around me also advised me, "You can read this kind of book." He said, "Well, it doesn't matter if you can't read Tolkien, you watch his movies." Otherwise I'll buy you a ticket, there's no one in the cinema, five films in a row, 10 hours, just in Beijing. Yes. "But I refused. Many of my friends around me are particularly cultured.
Write a book by people with hearts
Read enlightening books
Huang Jiwei: Now that I read the books I have written before, I think there are many problems in many places. But my editors didn't tell me at the time, and they probably thought, just look at your good place, you must have something to offer, right? It is others who have a lot of tolerance for me. When I get older, I feel this feeling particularly obviously. When you were young, although on the surface you were a very humble person, you felt that you were quite good inside. When you are old, you don't think so, and when you are old, you feel that "Oops is like that.".
Later, I thought that it might be related to the good name of "Zosi" and "Youxiang" (Editor's Note: Teacher Huang's twin sons) - "Zo" is to get help from good people and assist; "You" is to get help from God. When I get older, I especially think that you may be a very interesting person, such as me. But you're really more interesting than you think, it's just that your friends see the good side of you and don't care so much about the side that is flawed in you.
Beiqing Daily: The books you have published, "Notes on Words" This is a category.
Huang Jiwei: There are also reading notes, and there are a lot of them, "The Back Garden on Paper", "Good Night, Paper Furniture", and "Your Mind Is Not As Good as My Mind".
I published a book in 1990 called Aesthetic Sociology, which was a pamphlet with 100,000 words, and now there is no more on the market. It is a pamphlet on aesthetic history, that is, aesthetic sociology, about how the concept of beauty came about with the evolution of human beings.
Beiqing Daily: So "Three Chapters of Copywriting" is a new type?
Huang Jiwei: Not really.
Beiqing Daily: Is writing such a book a gift for you to serve the publishing industry to the end of your career?
Huang Jiwei: Give yourself a gift. I first told the editor to write a book, and the name at that time was "How to Write Book Copywriting", just like "how to prevent Alzheimer's disease" is a meaning.
Beiqing Daily: So why do you think this question is so important that it is worth writing a book for it? I read this kind of text a lot every day, because my publisher friends recommended their books in my mailbox, and they all had a brief introduction to the book and a brief introduction to the author.
Huang Jiwei: You're right, so I won't show it to you. Because the general level of editing copywriting is not high, you can't rely on them, it is a very comprehensive ability. This book specifically mentions Lu Xun and Mao Dun, and many famous artists in modern literature have published it, and they have all written content summaries and author profiles. In the end, this book is about carving insects and tricks, which is not a big deal. But it is not easy to do this carving insect trick well. Yes, it's a less pompous thing. But you have to put 100 words, 200 words of copywriting, so that the reader immediately feels that this book may be I like, it is not easy to do. China produces hundreds of thousands of books every year, but none of them are on technology. I think I can share it with you.
The book also stayed in my computer's "Bad Drafts" folder for several years. At one point I didn't want to write much. Because I think what use is this book? People who can't write still can't write, and people who can write don't need to read your old man's book. Then I thought about it, psychological construction is like this, the secret of copywriting is whether you want to write well, you want to write well you can write well, you don't want to write well, you can't write well, you can't write well. This "thinking" is very complicated, understand? And of course, skills. You said let a primary school student write, he wanted to write well, but I am not on this topic for elementary school students, I said to an adult staff member, right?
In fact, the copywriting thing is really impossible to say. It's like you going to an interview, how did you learn it? Your character, your knowledge, your cultivation, and most importantly, if you practice, you will. If you had been taught to interview at school, you wouldn't have interviewed. So why did I later be calm, anyway, write it, write a person with a heart to see the enlightened, unintentional people to see the useless things.
Actually in this book
There's a lot of sadness
Huang Jiwei: In fact, I personally have a lot in this book, in fact, ordinary people can't see it, you may not be able to see it, this book is actually a bit sad.
The third chapter, "Experiences," is my comments on some specific copywriting. Initially there was only a "Single Case" section. I have delivered the manuscript, the editor told me, Teacher Huang has a matter, he said his intuition, the copy you commented on is what you like, after others get the book, "Hey, his personal interests", so can you write some books that everyone knows, such as "Siege", such as "Jane Eyre", such as "1984"?
I think this advice is very good. But by this time I had already written a lot of reviews, and I was bored to death. Take the copywriting written by others, you are here, what to say, the words are almost finished. Later, I had a sudden idea, I said otherwise, I found "1984" 6 copywriting together.
This section is the most colorful part of the book, and no one does it. I think his ideas inspired me because then I don't have to write a single book, get it? I don't want to look for "Siege", "Scream" or whatever, I put 5 "Screams" together and said, I was very proud at that time. It really stumped me when I really wrote it.
Beiqing Daily: Why? You're the best at reviews.
Huang Jiwei: It's not easy to write, but it's hard.
You think of "1984" 6 copywriting, fun is fun, you can see the changes of that era. In particular, "The Scream" really touched me. The earliest I chose was "Scream" in 1973, and the "Cultural Revolution" in 1973, and I couldn't write it. How do you think that editor wrote this copy? He actually wrote it awesome. I feel that "today is yesterday's non- and not", in this copy, it is called "today is not yesterday", and our young people today can't make this copywriting. He wrote entirely a history of the circulation of a version of The Scream. Great editor, no name left. If it weren't for this book, I wouldn't have looked at this place again, I'm sick, how do I look at a copywriter in 1973?
But then I thought, after this thing is done, I will leave a target or a road sign for the people behind me, anyway, he will know that there is a person who has done this in the future, and he will come from this method. In fact, why is it a little sad? I think it's a pity to publish this thing, they are all dancing in shackles. It was great that he was able to write that way at that time.
When I see the copywriting of "Fu Lei's Family Letter", I sometimes think of the contents of the book, which is really uncomfortable. This is not in the text, you can't see it. But you as the author, when you write this book, you will think of that book, or think of his story, which is inevitable. Then your heart will be particularly complicated, thinking that such a great life is long gone, his father is gone, his mother is gone, he himself is gone. In fact, I also knew Fu Min indirectly. I haven't seen it, I've called, and then I feel very sad. So this book is a small gift for me.
Writer/ Reporter Wu Fei