Isn't this a coincidence?
Why……? Isn't this a coincidence?
If you feel sleepy, someone will give you a pillow.
I was preparing to be a copywriter when the boss of the bookshop over there came to my door.
In fact, Xu He had already prepared for the bookstore boss to come to his door.
In the bookstores of this era, high school students who passed the college examination, provincial examination, and general examination over the years would buy copies of Cheng Wenhui from their high school years and sell them to scholars for study.
But at the college examination level, not everyone’s articles can be selected.
Due to quality reasons, the bookstore will only purchase the first articles and good articles from the provincial examinations and general examinations over the years to be compiled into a volume.
But this time, Shopkeeper Ji from Guangling Bookstore came to visit in person. It was definitely not that simple.
If Xu He only needs one or two articles, then the bookstore can just find someone to come over.
Sure enough, Shopkeeper Ji said: "Xu Anshou is our first Xiao Sanyuan in Nanzhili. I read the article on the government examination, and every time I think of "Singing Nine Virtues and Nine Gongs, Yong Yong is like the harmonious song of a phoenix bird" , and the voice is superior. Dancing for nine Shao and cooperating with nine tunes, staggering like a hundred beasts dance, and the tolerance is superior.] I can't help but admire these two sentences!"
"So, the book shop wants to buy all the articles written by Xu Anshou for the county examination, government examination, and college examination, and then ask Xu Anshou to compile the 10 or 20 articles he wrote on daily basis into a booklet!"
"Don't worry, the price is based on the price of articles published by Nanzhili Chinese Jinshi in previous years. An article costs 2 taels of silver!"
Xu He nodded. He had heard Xie Liangcai tell him many times about the rules of the bookstore.
The price offered by shopkeeper Ji this time can be said to be very sincere.
Thinking of this, Xu He said: "This is a good thing. Shopkeeper Ji will wait a moment!"
After saying that, he turned around and entered the study, took out a stack of articles and handed them to Shopkeeper Ji.
The first few of these articles are exam preparation articles that I wrote down after taking the exam, and the others were articles written while discussing with Xie Liangcai.
Quality and everything else are still guaranteed.
Shopkeeper Ji suddenly took out a thick stack of manuscripts and quickly started flipping through them with great joy.
Needless to say, after reading the article that got three heads of cases, shopkeeper Ji repeatedly praised: "The title of Mr. Xu's head of cases is worthy of the name!"
After saying that, he started reading Xu He's other articles.
The title of the first article is "Knowing that benevolence and courage are the three great virtues in the world." This is a title on "The Doctrine of the Mean", which means that wisdom, benevolence, and bravery are the three great virtues in the world.
Let’s take a look at Xu He’s statement: “Virtue is practiced in the world, and in a nutshell, everyone can practice it!”
What does this sentence mean?
It is [Virtue] as a principle that has been acquired by the world in ancient and modern times. In short, it shows that everyone can practice the way of human relations.
Although Shopkeeper Ji is a businessman, booksellers in this era have no worse vision than ordinary scholars. When he saw this question, he was immediately shocked.
Xu He's solution to the problem can be described as rigorous.
It was immediately clear that his article was not about virtue or the world's great ways, but focused on the word "practice".
That is the word "da" in the title.
Wisdom, benevolence, and courage are common human natures and characters that are common in people. No matter noble or humble, wise or foolish, or saintly, they all have the seeds of wisdom, benevolence, and courage.
But [Da] is like a car, its existence, or mission, is what the car needs to carry.
So what is this thing?
It’s [Tao]!
It is said that stereotyped writing is the most serious problem.
Xu He said so many truths in just one sentence.
You don’t need to read this article, the content below is not bad at all.
This is what Li Zhijie calls "one word to establish the bones", an outline and a clear outline.
Shopkeeper Ji thought to himself that if there were articles of this caliber, then this collection of Cheng's essays would probably be a big seller.
After reading one article, he couldn't wait to read the next one.
Sure enough, Xu He's level can be said to be very stable, and his writing style has changed. Whether you like couplets or loose prose, you can learn something from these articles.
Shopkeeper Ji immediately made the decision: "Mr. Xu, our Guangling Bookstore wants these articles, and I'm offering two or two and a half dollars each! But I also have a condition. You can't sell these articles to anyone else except our bookstore!"
Xu He nodded, which was the proper meaning of the question.
Don’t think that there was no copyright protection in ancient times.
At least since the Song Dynasty, the copyright protection of authors and bookstores has been written into the law.
Among them, the most famous koan is that of Zhu Xi, the great sage of Neo-Confucianism.
The work of Zhu Xi, a great scholar of the Southern Song Dynasty, became very popular. He printed and sold his own book "On Mencius' Theory of Justice", but it was illegally pirated by Zhejiang booksellers.
Zhu was so angry that he hurriedly wrote to his friend Lu Zuqian for help, hoping that as a local official, he would help him to ban reprinting and selling, and he would not hesitate to file a lawsuit to defend his rights, so as to deter the arrogance of the villain.
Zhu Xi's high awareness of copyright is related to his maternal ancestor Zhu Que, a giant businessman in Huizhou.
The Zhu family was a famous calligrapher in the Song Dynasty and was extremely wealthy. His family property accounted for almost half of Shexian County, so it was called "Zhu Banzhou" at that time.
Zhu Xier, who lost his father in his early years and was raised by his widowed mother, was no stranger to the publishing industry.
According to later generations' statistics, Zhu Xi's publishing income in his lifetime was no less than more than two million taels, equivalent to seven to eight hundred thousand taels of silver, and he was richer than a prince.
Zhu Xi, the great scholar who wrote the most books in history, had his son and son-in-law in charge of the business, and his disciples and disciples helped.
Descendants published the "Collected Works of Zhu Xi" for 800 years and had an exclusive monopoly until the Qing Dynasty.
Other bookshops are only envious and would never dare to get involved in pirated printing.
The earliest known copyright protection document in China was issued by Zhu Xi's cousin Zhu Mu at the request of the government.
There are 71 volumes of Zhu Mu's self-written geography work "The New Edition of Four Liu Must Use Fangyu Shengkan". The cost of engraving and printing is astonishing. In order to prevent competitors from profiteering and piracy, he published it in the second year of Jiayi in the Southern Song Dynasty (1238 AD). Requesting the two Zhejiang Road Transportation Departments and the Fujian Road Transportation Department to issue a list of articles: "I am very poor, I take over and copy by myself, sleep and eat, beg for restraint, and avoid the danger of plagiarism."
Zhu Mu specially attached a text after the preface to warn pirates: Once discovered, they have the right to report, pursue people to destroy copies, and severely punish them.
With legal support, the sales of his works have naturally increased.
Fang Hui of the Yuan Dynasty recorded in "Huikui Lvsui": "People from Sichuan came to buy thousands of pieces at a time."
But if you want to protect your copyright, you actually have to go to the Yamen to report it.
Of course, it costs a lot to manage everything up and down.
This also reflects from the side that shopkeeper Ji is very optimistic about the sales of Xu Hecheng's collected works.
Indeed, at least before the provincial examination next year, articles like Xu He's are very popular.
What's more, Xu He also has the title of "Little Sanyuan". It is estimated that once the book is published, apart from other places, Luoyang paper will definitely be more expensive in Nanzhi.
This is really not bragging, why?
Because everyone wants to find out the taste of Yang Yinqiu, the great master, from Xu He's articles, so that they can copy the writing style in the coming year and adapt to his liking.
After talking about the business, Shopkeeper Ji quickly paid the money and invited the local chief to be the middleman. The two parties signed the contract and when it was handed over to the Yamen, the contract for selling the articles was officially established.
Shopkeeper Ji smiled and said: "Young master Xu is so talented that he will definitely be on the honorable list in the next year's provincial examination. Then he will have to come and harass you. In this case, I'll take my leave now!"
Xu He smiled and said: "Shopkeeper Ji, wait a moment, I have something else I want you to take a look at!"
