"Since January 9 this year, I have been in the Xixi studio for almost a year." On December 26, cartoonist Cai Zhizhong came to Shanghai, with a white shirt, khaki pants, and the iconic top hat, as usual. His 2.33 million followers, a personal Microblogtel, previewed the event, a signing party for the "Illustrated Chinese Classics" series, published by Princeton University Press. This was preceded by the selection of lucky audiences for the animated film "Wu Sheng Guan Gong" on January 8, which was forwarded as the general director.
For nearly a year, Cai Zhizhong's itinerary was almost blank, except for the revelation on November 17 that he had been ordained at the Shaolin Temple in Songshan. Two days later, he responded from his studio in Xixi, Hangzhou, that monasticism does not necessarily mean being born, and that there is no change in life. As for this form, it is because "after death in the future, I will be buried in the Shaolin Temple, and I cannot go to the monastery until that day."
The 72-year-old Cai Zhizhong is a strange person, 4 and a half years old knows that he wants to take a paintbrush for a living, 9 years old to establish a career in comics, 15 years old out of the first comic book collection.
Facing readers in Shanghai, he started from the beginning of his life, "I grew up eating American rice noodles, watching colorful cartoons such as Popeye and Mickey Mouse, but the influence of my family let me know that I have Chinese culture in my blood. ”
"To be a monk is to leave home", in this sense, Cai Zhizhong has been away from home for a long time. "There is a habit in our family that there is no question at home, and what to eat does not have to be asked: Can I eat it? Just eat it. At the age of 15, the publisher invited me to Taipei after receiving the submission. I told my mom to take the first bus the next day. Mom said, then you talk to Dad. After dinner, I found my dad, 'Dad, tomorrow I'm going to Taipei to draw cartoons.' ''Have you found a career?' I replied, 'Found it.' He didn't say much more. The next morning, sitting in the last carriage of the train, watching my hometown get smaller and smaller in view, I cried out in my heart, 'Never come back.' ’”
"When I arrived in Taipei, although I lived in a small place, my monthly salary was 3 times that of my father. The publisher was at the intersection, waking up in the morning to hear the sound of trucks starting, replacing the barking of dogs and chickens and ducks in their hometown. Cai Zhizhong said, "I know that life is completely different from now on, and at the same time, I have realized a truth, a person must do his best and favorite things to the extreme." ”
At the age of 29, Cai Zhizhong set up his own cartoon animation company, and the filming of "Colorful Cartoon Old Master" broke the highest box office record in Taiwan. "At the age of 36, I opened an animation company for 7 years, made a lot of money in an industry where no one made money, and won the Golden Horse Award. My company employees are paid 5 times the salary of the industry. I had 2.2 million yuan in my account and bought 3 of the most expensive houses, one of which was just across from Taipei 101. That year, I felt that I had had enough money in my life. ”
In 1984, at the age of 36, Cai Zhizhong went to Japan and spent four months learning Japanese. "The idea of becoming the greatest and greatest cartoonist seems to be working. But I quickly figured it out that if I couldn't be the best cartoonist, I would draw a comic that all publishers would grab. "What genre can you draw that will sensationalize the Japanese manga industry?" He thought of spreading traditional Chinese culture through comics, "starting with the strongest storytelling 'Zhuangzi'." ”
In his autobiography "Genius and The Great Master", Cai Zhizhong said that since 1998, he has spent 10 years and 40 days in retreat to study physics. Those 10 years were the happiest days of his life, followed by the four years when he was alone in Tokyo to draw the Zhuzi Hundred Manga Series.
In 1987, at the age of 39, Cai Zhizhong published the first book in the series of comics Zhuzi Baijia, "Zhuangzi Said: The Sound of Nature", which ranked first in the best-seller list for ten consecutive months, and the second, third and fourth places in the list were also his same series of works "Lao Tzu Says: The Whispers of the Wise", "Confucius Said: The Ding-Dong of the Benevolent", and "Liezi Said: The Philosophy of Walking Against the Wind". In the early 1990s, after the series of comic works was introduced to the mainland, it was also very popular. Princeton University Press's "Illustrated Chinese Classics" series is the latest English edition of the comic book Zhuzi Baijia series, and after the four kinds of "Sun Tzu's Art of War", "Analects", "Zhuangzi" and "Tao Te Ching", It will be published next year. "Princeton is all the work of university students, and I am the only Chinese author they have signed." Speaking of this, Cai Zhizhong is not without pride.
"I don't like to travel, the only time I've ever traveled in my life was when someone entertained me to Bali. My favorite thing is to shut up in the house and learn from the wise men of ancient and modern China and abroad. In Shanghai, Cai Zhizhong made three suggestions to readers, "To study on your own early, find your own answers to your own questions; be good at sorting out your own materials; and there is another place where I am particularly strong, I rarely get sick and never get angry." ”
How to achieve "not to get angry"? Cai Zhizhong's answer is two words - "no self".
Column Editor-in-Chief: Shi Chenlu Text Editor: Shi Chenlu
Source: Author: Shi Chenlu