Chapter 826: Calligraphy, Spring in Qin Garden: Snow (3/3)
Translator: Legge Editor: Legge
At the venue of the calligraphy competition, the atmosphere was getting livelier and livelier.
“Director Xu, I should learn calligraphy from you if there’s a chance.”
“This ‘Spring in Qin Garden’ was really well written.”
“Old Xu, gift this calligraphy piece to me!”
“No, you can’t have it. I want it too!”
“I asked for it first! Haha, no one argue with me for it!”
A woman who was in charge of program team at Department 7, and seemingly on good terms with Xu Yipeng, went up to him and directly asked for his piece. Thereafter, she took the calligraphy scroll of “Spring in Qin Garden: Plum” for herself before the competition even ended. As the judges still had to select the top three contestants, she did not take it away, since the ink still had not dried yet either. However, that woman stood guard at the side of the calligraphy piece as though she were afraid someone would steal it from her.
Xu Yipeng felt very flattered.
And everyone was happy with this outcome.
“Has everyone already written their piece?”
“Who hasn’t written yet?”
“Are there still any contestants?”
“I think there are.”
The people looked around the event hall and ended up gazing at Zhang Ye who had been very quiet ever since he’d arrived. Of those who had joined the competition, it seemed like he was the only one left who had not written his piece yet.
Yan Tianfei laughed.”Teacher Little Zhang?”
Huang Dandan also anticipated it a lot.”Teacher Zhang, it’s your turn.”
“Are we the only ones left?” Ha Qiqi asked.
At once, everyone from Department 14 livened up and waited to see Zhang Ye strut his stuff. Central TV Department 1 and the program team of Rise to the Dance had stolen the show earlier when the station head bestowed his calligraphy piece upon them. This had made the Department 14 people jealous and they naturally wanted to make a stand for themselves.
Jiang Yuan looked at him.
Xu Yipeng gave him a glance.
But right at this moment, someone came running into the event hall from outside.
“Director Chen, the viewership ratings are out.” That person had run towards Department 11’s Director Chen Huo. Although he did not speak very loudly, the people around still heard what he said.
What?
It’s finally out!?
Everyone’s eyes lit up, as their attention totally moved away from the calligraphy competition!
Chen Huo asked,”How much?”
That person immediately answered,”Celebrity Kitchen had a viewership rating of 0.43%!”
Chen Huo nodded in satisfaction.”It’s a new record?”
“Yes, it’s higher than the previous week by a full 0.1%!” that person replied excitedly.
Chen Huo declared,”Very good!”
Following that, another person came to the hall as well. He found Central TV Department 1’s Deputy Director Jiang Yuan.”Director Jiang, yesterday’s Your Face Looks Familiar had a viewership rating of 0.51%!”
Jiang Yuan acknowledged,”That’s quite alright.”
As it was, Central TV Department 1 could not possibly only have one variety show in its lineup. Besides Rise to the Dance, one of the others was Your Face Looks Familiar, which was a long running variety show and had been broadcasting for the past one and a half years now. Its viewership ratings had not been too high or low, but for it to have reached 0.5% this time, it made Jiang Yuan very satisfied with its performance. Of course, the reason for this was because several big name celebrities were invited to Your Face Looks Familiar for this particular episode.
After last week’s heaven-defying viewership rating of A Bite of China, many of the variety shows were stunned and felt a sense of panic. All of them were vying now against a documentary as though they were all on steroids. It was even more apparent for those entertainment shows scheduled on Friday, as they all gave everything they had. This was also the reason behind the increase in this week’s viewership ratings across the board.
Everyone was talking about this now.
“Congratulations, Director Chen.”
“Director Jiang, Your Face Looks Familiar has already broadcasted for a year and a half, but it can still manage such a viewership rating. This isn’t common at all in the industry, and I guess the only one who can compete with it is probably Beijing Television’s Do You Remember? In my opinion, Your Face Looks Familiar should still be able to go on for at least another year without any problems!”
“What about Rise to the Dance?”
“How much did Rise to the Dance get?”
“Who knows? Has it been released already?”
Suddenly, Xu Yipeng received a call. Everyone saw his expression turn from anxiety to shock, then from shock to surprise!
Chen Ye hurriedly went over to him.”Director Xu?”
Jiang Yuan was also very anxious to find out.”How is it?”
Even the station head and two other station leaders looked over to them.
Xu Yipeng swallowed hard and said very excited,”The viewership rating for Rise to the Dance last night was—1.52%!”
Chen Ye was immediately astonished by that!
Their program team staff also started cheering. Their past week of efforts had not been in vain. They were finally seeing the results of it!
Everyone was clamoring!
1.52%?
The second episode was 1.52%?
Rise to the Dance had only managed 1.27% last week in its premiere broadcast! But the second episode managed to gain an increase of 0.25% in the viewership ratings? What did difference of 0.25% mean? In the current advancement of the Internet and the low audience base for traditional television broadcasts due to the adoption of online broadcasts, this downturn in the market had left some variety shows not even achieving 0.25% in the viewership ratings, yet Rise to the Dance could increase by 0.25%? This was already very heaven defying!
Jiang Yuan guffawed.”Old Xu, Little Chen, well done!”
A lot of people did not expect that Rise to the Dance would be able to increase their viewership ratings so quickly. With a jump, they had already moved onto a different level of popularity! At this rate, it was taking another step closer to being proclaimed as a successful variety show!
Ha Qiqi looked glum.
Yan Tianfei frowned deeply.
The people of Department 14 had an uneasy feeling as their confidence took a hit!
1.52%?
How could they possibly scale this giant of a mountain?
…
The viewership ratings ranking for Friday had not been released yet, but the individual viewership rating for each show was already announced.
In the program team office of Sing.
The staff were all feeling a sense of pride.
“Our viewership rating for this episode was 0.78%!”
“It still feels unrealistic to me!”
“Yeah, like this is all just a dream!”
“We actually broke 0.7%!”
“It’s a first in the history of our show! Let’s celebrate!”
“What about those two shows?” the supervisor asked.
Everyone knew which two shows the supervisor was referring to.
Someone answered,”I don’t know about A Bite of China as the viewership rating has not been announced yet. But for Rise to the Dance, they had a viewership rating of 1.52%. Needless to say, they will surely get number 1 in the nationwide rankings! The Voice ended long ago. In the market environment now, with that viewership rating, there should be nothing that can threaten it anymore, not even A Bite of China, right?”
“What a pity that our viewership rating is so inferior when compared to Rise to the Dance.”
“It’s fine. We’ve already done quite well.”
“Yes, let’s not compare ourselves to Rise to the Dance. That is an entertainment show that has over 100 million RMB invested into it!”
…
At Beijing Television.
In the program team office of Do You Remember.
Xiao Lu rushed in to bring the good news.”I’ve just received news that our viewership rating for Friday was 1.01%. After the content revision, this is the first time that we’ve broken 1%! Before this, our viewership ratings had dropped to 0.6-0.7%!”
Dafei said happily,”It’s all thanks to Teacher Zhang’s suggestions for the content revision! Otherwise, if our viewership ratings continued to slide, it might’ve even dropped below 0.4%. Then our show might really have to stop broadcasting!”
Dong Shanshan asked,”How did A Bite of China do?”
Xiao Lu replied,”I don’t know. It’s not out yet.”
Hou Ge was stunned.”Why isn’t it out yet? Don’t they announce it all at once?”
“I’ve asked and even checked with some people whom I’m acquainted with,” Xiao Lu said exasperated.”I don’t know what’s going on either, but I think they said that there was some miscalculation for the viewership rating of A Bite of China, so they’re reverifying it at their end. I suppose there was some system malfunction or something, but it should be announced very soon. I’ve also asked about Rise to the Dance’s viewership rating.” Here, Xiao Lu’s expression changed for the worse as she said,”They managed to get 1.52%, a new high for them! And it’s not even higher by just a bit!”
Hou Di was speechless.
When Hu Fei heard that, he could only sigh.
1.52%?
This increase was really too great!
If a variety show did not underestimate their opponents and performed to their potential, then this would be the outcome. No matter what, a niche documentary program would never be able to catch up to it, so how could A Bite of China still tie them for the number 1 spot again this time? Even with Zhang Ye helming the documentary, this was not a viewership rating that he could surpass, right?
…
Online.
The netizens were also in an uproar!
“Ah, it’s out!”
“Do You Remember is awesome! They’ve exceeded 1% in the viewership ratings again!”
“Sing is quite good too. This week’s variety shows are all too heaven defying, especially those Friday entertainment shows. Other than 2 shows that suffered a drop in viewership ratings, all the other shows experienced an increase!”
“Awesome!”
“This is not a phenomenon that we will easily be able to see again in the future!”
“The most noteworthy is Rise to the Dance. This time, they’re definitely going to be the number 1 in the nationwide rankings!”
“Don’t forget about A Bite of China. Why are there still no updates about it? Where is A Bite of China’s viewership rating?”
“Someone has already gotten 1.52%. Why would you still care about the viewership rating for A Bite of China!?”
“1.52%—this is an absolute crushing for sure! It doesn’t matter whose viewership ratings get announced next!”
“Central TV Department 1 has already stamped their authority on the viewership ratings!”
“Damn! All I want to know is how A Bite of China has done! Even if it loses, we have to know the reason why. They can’t just not announce the viewership ratings, right? What’s the meaning of that?”
“Yeah, even if it can’t match up to Rise to the Dance, at least let us know how it did!”
Victory had already been decided.
In fact, there was no suspense at all.
A lot of the media outlets had already starting drafting their reports. On Rise to the Dance’s unavoidable win this time, none of the reporters felt surprised by it. To them, this was actually how it should have been all along. This showed that they were in fact still living in a normal world!
…
At Central TV.
In the event hall where the calligraphy competition was being held.
There were congratulations and celebrations.
“Central TV Department 1 has gotten number 1 in the viewership ratings again!”
“Director Jiang, Director Xu, Teacher Chen, congratulations!”
“Haha, when are you going to treat us?”
“This viewership rating is really way too high!”
“Is the next episode’s viewership rating headed for 1.7%?”
There were also some people who expressed their regrets and said,”A Bite of China has already done very well, but it’s just too bad that it’s a documentary. The audience base is too niche and it cannot sustain enough interest.”
The Rise to the Dance program team was already celebrating their victory in advance.
There were some staff members who had been stifling their emotions for a week now and could finally take a breather. Their victory stage had been set, and they were unable to hold back from making sarcastic remarks anymore.”I said that history wouldn’t be changed so easily. A documentary is still just a documentary. So many predecessors have tried and were unable to rewrite history and end this downturn of the documentary industry, so how could it be so easily rewritten? The experience from history and the market trends has to be respected no matter what!”
A lot of people in the program team also thought this way.
A Bite of China’s viewership rating for last week could not be considered as getting number 1 since it was a tie, so it wasn’t exactly rewriting history in that sense and they still lacked that final step if they wanted to do it!
Heh!
If so many people could not change history, what makes you think that you can? On what basis did you think you can do it? Was Zhang Ye twice as capable as other people? Was Zhang Ye so good that he could be talked about in the same way as the collective efforts and wisdom of the industry veterans? You want to use a documentary to dominate the television viewership ratings?
That was just you daydreaming that it could be done!
This was basically something that went against all sense and logic!
Yan Tianfei and the others from Department 14 could indistinctly hear those people’s discussions and their expressions were getting worse and worse. Those people chattering on about this matter were talking in low whispers and away from them, but with the venue so large, it obviously could be heard by anyone there!
The people of Central TV Department 1 were enjoying their victory,
The people of Department 14 no longer were in the mood.
Ha Qiqi said,”Let’s go.”
“Come on, let’s go back.” Zhang Zuo also did not want to stand around here any longer and get pointed at.
If they lost, so be it. What was wrong with that? As a documentary, they’d done amazingly well. At least for the premiere broadcast, they had managed to tie for number 1 with the industry’s highest viewership rated variety show! Not being able to compete with a variety show was no shame in itself, so why was everyone gloating at them now?
Department 14’s people were turning to leave.
Xu Yipeng and Chen Ye noticed this from the corners of their eyes and smiled even more.
“Eh?”
“Teacher Zhang?”
“Uh, you…?”
But who could have expected that at this juncture, Zhang Ye actually pulled up his sleeves and strode over slowly toward the desks and lightly picked up the calligraphy brush.
Everyone was stunned.
Yan Tianfei stopped dead in his tracks!
The station head, Jiang Yuan, and everyone else also looked at him!
Zhang Ye dipped the brush in the inkstone as his gaze fell to the outside of the windows on that vast snow covered ground and the heavy snowfall. With a deep breath, Zhang Ye’s stance changed, as though he had become a different person. A fearsome gaze emitted from the look in his eyes as he held the brush in his hand. With a smile, he put the brush down heavily onto the paper!
The first four words written were “Spring in Qin Garden”!
Everyone was stunned!
You’re going to write a piece based on Spring in Qin Garden as well?
Are you doing this on purpose to go against Xu Yipeng?
But this ci of Spring in Qin Garden was not famous at all. There was only “Spring in Qin Garden: Plum” that had some recognition, but that has already been written by Xu Yipeng, so what are you going to come up with?
Then, everyone was shocked to discover that Zhang Ye wrote the word “Snow” behind the four words of Spring in Qin Garden!
Just from a few words, he had already shown whose calligraphy was better. Compared to the station head and Xu Yipeng, it was basically on a different level. How laughable it was that some people thought that Xu Yipeng’s writing could actually compare to a professional calligrapher’s writing. It was only when Zhang Ye had started writing this piece that those people realized that they had been too gullible in their thinking! There was no need to compare, and no way to compare either. Even if it were someone who did not know much about calligraphy, they would be able to see the domineering aura of Zhang Ye’s writing. It was at a level none of the contestants could reach even if they combined their calligraphy experience together!
Except that this poem…
Spring in Qin Garden? Snow?
What was this?
Someone searched on the Internet but did not manage to find any trace of this poem.
Damn! Could it be that you composed this poem? Composed it right here at the venue??
Everyone’s astonished or curious gaze fell onto the brush tip that Zhang Ye was holding. Yan Tianfei, Ha Qiqi, Jiang Yuan, and many others also went up and gathered around him.
They saw Zhang Ye writing speedily!
Every word felt like it was written in a very carefree manner, yet seemed to exude a sense of magnificence!
“Spring in Qin Garden: Snow”
The northern sight:
The land iced with white,
Blizzards in flight.
From the Great Wall, both in and out,
Remains a vast white route;
The Yellow River throughout,
No longer spouts.
Mountains of silver snakes dancing,
Hills of pale elephants advancing
Against the Skies, vying for a chancing.
Reading up to here, some people were already rocked by the images described on the tip of Zhang Ye’s brush. They gasped in shock at how such a tune that was never historically well-known could be used to write such a great poem!
Mountains of silver snakes dancing?
Blizzards in flight?
Against the Skies, vying for a chancing?
What kind of audacity was this? What pompous talk was this!
He wants to outdo the Heavens???
Everyone looked at each other. While reeling in shock from Zhang Ye’s talent, they also couldn’t wait to read on, as they saw the Xuan paper being filled up with even more of Zhang Ye’s semi-cursive script!
Wait for a clear day;
The snow bright under sunny display
Enchanting all the way.
So fine and charming a land:
Serving it ’til death, the hero bands.
Sadly Qin Shi Huang and Wu of Han,
Of poetic grace they were wanting.
Taizong of Tang and Taizu of Song
Were short on literary excellence.
That proud son of Heaven,
Genghis Khan,
Knew only how to shoot eagles down with his bow.
But gone they all are.
For truly great men,
Look around!
He put down the brush.
The station head was shocked!
Yan Tianfei gasped at this!
Ha Qiqi was stunned!
This literary talent had left everyone in the venue at a loss for words!
A staff member of the Rise to the Dance program team, who was not convinced, muttered,”‘But gone they all are?/ Look around?’ You’re basically not giving any respect to the predecessors? Aren’t those words too arrogant?! The boundaries and limits of a documentary are there for all to see! This truth has never been changed no matter how hard the predecessors have tried!”
Someone else added,”You’re even ‘against the Skies, vying for a chancing? Before talking about the Heavens, why don’t you try to outdo Rise to the Dance in the viewersh—”
“The viewership rating for A Bite of China is out!” interrupted a staff member running in from outside.
With this shout, everyone jumped in shock!
What are you shouting for?
Do you have to be so loud?
Yan Tianfei immediately asked,”How much?”
The staff member answered while catching his breath,”They thought that there was some miscalculation earlier, so they went through it again. However, they discovered that the figures were actually correct. The viewership rating for the third episode of A Bite of China that was broadcast last night was—2.36%!”
Yan Tianfei was stunned!
Jiang Yuan froze!
Xu Yipeng was dumbfounded!
Chen Ye’s pupils dilated!
At this moment, no one said anything!
At this moment, it was as though time had stopped!
