The Republic of Wine

Professor Yuan Shuangyu of the Liquorland Brewer’s College, is the great-great-great-great-great grandson of Mr Nine Five Yuan, the creator of Great Clouds and Rain! As a professor at the Brewer’s college, he has been generous in demonstrating the amazing skills handed down by his ancestors. Under his leadership, and with the concern and guidance of the Municipal Party Committee and government, we here in Liquorland have ridden the mighty steeds of reform and liberalization. In a mere ten years, building upon the foundation we inherited, we have created at least a dozen new liquors that compare favorably with Great Clouds and Rain, some actually surpassing it in quality. Such brands as Overlapping Green Ants or Red-Maned Stallion or Love at First Sight or Fire Clouds or Ximen Qing or Lin Daiyu Buries Blossoms … but even more inspiring is the fact that my father-in-law, Professor Yuan, went up to White Ape Mountain alone, his hair matted, his face dirty, an old man with a ruddy complexion, making friends with the apes and learning from beasts in the wild, absorbing the apes’ wisdom, continuing his ancestor’s tradition, and drawing lessons from outsiders’ experience, making the past serve the present, foreign things serve China, and apes serve humans, until, at last, success was his and he could take his place as a world leader with his city-toppling ape wine.
    Ape wine will be solemnly introduced at the first annual Ape Liquor Festival!
    A thousand ounces of gold is easily obtained, a single drop of Ape Liquor cannot be begged!
    Friends! Don’t hesitate another second, come to Liquorland, and hurry!
    Do not pass up this opportunity!
    III
    Dear Elder Brother Yidou
    Your manuscript arrived safely.
    As luck would have it, a publishing friend of mine dropped by, and I showed him ‘Liquorville.’ When he finished, he pounded the table and shouted, This has real potential. He said that if you can expand the story to seventy or eighty thousand words and add some graphics and photographs, you can publish it as a book. His house will assign it a number and assume editorial responsibility. All your city has to do is come up with a subvention and guarantee the purchase of ten thousand copies. He said that since you’ll have to prepare promotional materials for attendees to the first annual Ape Liquor Festival, why not include copies of an illustrated book? It will provide everyone with an accessible, readable history of Liquorland that they can keep for a long time. I think it’s a terrific idea. Talk it over with your mayor. You’ll probably have to give the publisher about 50,000 yuan, a trifling amount for Liquorland, wouldn’t you say? Please let me know as soon as possible, whatever you decide. That friend of mine was so interested in the concept that I gave him your address before he left. He may contact you directly.
    As for naming your new brew and participating in the liquor-laws drafting group, since the potential benefits are apparent, I see no reason for false modesty. I accept your invitation. As soon as I put the finishing touches on my novel, I’ll leave for Liquorland. We can work out the details of all these matters then.
    Best wishes for success in your writing,
    Mo Yan
    IV
    … wah wah wah! When Ding Gou’er’s thoughts turned to Diamond Jin and all those baby boys who were eaten then excreted into toilets, feelings of personal responsibility and a sense of right and wrong, like the brilliant stars of the Big Dipper, lit up his consciousness, which had been flitting and fleeing in the darkness. At such times, he experienced sharp pains in the helixes of his ears and the tip of his nose, as if they had been pierced by poison darts. Instinctively he sat up - the sky spun, the earth tumbled, his head was as big as a willow basket - and forced his puffy eyelids open; four or five large gray shadows leaped away from his body and landed with dull, meaty thuds. At the same time he heard a high-pitched chirping. A strange bird? Some wild beast? The investigator imagined a grouse or a wild rabbit, even a flying dragon or a flying squirrel. A pair of flashing green eyes poked through the blurry background in front of him. He strained to roll his glassy, crusted eyes and moisten them with the secretions of his tear glands; the tears that glistened across his eyeballs carried the smell of cheap booze. After rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand, the scene grew clearer. The first thing he could