The twilight is getting thicker, and the lights are on.

The night of the Mid-Autumn Festival came as scheduled, and just today, Yanjin City, which had been rainy for many days, ushered in a sunny day. Although it was not yet completely dark, near the Normal University on the outskirts of Yanjin City, you could already see sparse stars and a bright moon like a disk. Yanjin Normal University is located in the suburbs, and does not have the bustling scenery of the city; Although the terrain is a bit remote, the environment is very good. The moon wheel hangs high in the sky, the insects and birds chirp downstairs, and some people may complain about the poor environment and scarce entertainment venues nearby, but in this kind of festival, you can enjoy the Mid-Autumn Festival moon that is different from the city.

However, the so-called good flowers and full moon are often different from person to person. In this beautiful festival of family reunion, there was an old man sitting alone on the balcony of the faculty and staff family building, not admiring the moon, but looking at the manuscripts on the table in front of him.

The old man's name is Gu Yunsong, and he is a professor at Yanjin Normal University, where he teaches biological sciences. But what he was doing had nothing to do with biological science - what he was doing was a beautifully packaged French novel, and what he had to do was translate it into Chinese.

The reason for his translation of these novels began more than ten years ago. In his early years as a student in France, he was exposed to some very good French novels; Some of them are world classics and are known all over the world; Although some of them are well received, they are not popular in China because of their language. Soon after returning home, he began translating French novels, which quickly turned from a hobby to a habit, no matter how busy or tired he was, to find a little time every day to do some translations.

To date, he has translated more than a dozen novels, large and small. These range from autobiographical novels from the last century to science fiction novels that have only recently emerged. In his early years, he had to do some part-time jobs because of financial poverty, but now, he has become a prominent figure in the national academic community, and his children have their own careers, so the motivation for him to continue to do it is naturally no longer to make money - it is just a habit.

However, as he grew older and his energy declined, although he was gradually idle, he gradually lost his strength. When he was young, he was enthusiastic and energetic, and he could translate late at night in front of the desk after a busy day; Now that I'm older, if I look a little more, it will become difficult to concentrate; Coupled with the gradual deterioration of his health after old age, doctors have begun to persuade him to give up this job. And this manuscript is the last novel he translated.

"I'm back!"

With the sound of the door opening in the living room, the voice of his niece Gu Xiao interrupted Gu Yunsong's thoughts. Realizing that he was a little distracted, Gu Yunsong couldn't help but sigh and closed the notebook in his hand.

Today is the Mid-Autumn Festival, and for Gu Lao, he is naturally more willing to accompany his family. However, the eldest son went to Seattle in the United States for a meeting, and it is said that the meeting will end tomorrow; The second daughter and his wife went to Hong Kong to discuss business, but because their plans changed, they could not come back. Even the eldest daughter-in-law was busy with business, so she came over for a meal at noon, and after answering the phone, she hurried back to continue her work.

In this regard, Gu Lao was naturally a little unhappy, looking at the bright moon outside the window, he couldn't help but sigh again. That's what parents are like - they expect their children to succeed in their careers, and they want them to stay with them for a long time; Especially at a time like the Mid-Autumn Festival, the empty home is inevitably a little lonely.

"Happy Mid-Autumn Festival, Auntie~"

"Happy Mid-Autumn Festival~"

As soon as he entered the door, Gu Xiao's voice came from the living room. Mrs. Li Qingyuan, who was cooking in the kitchen, responded, "Xiao Qi is back, are you hungry?" The meal is not ready yet, wait a minute! ”

"Hmmm! Auntie, wait a minute, I'll come to help you right away......"

"This kid ......"

After only saying two words, Gu Xiao's voice came from Chaotai's side. "Uncle Uncle, Editor-in-Chief Wu asked me to ask you ...... by the way"

Saying this, Gu Xiao walked in with two documents. Seeing Gu Yunsong and the books in front of him, he stuck out his tongue, "Uncle, are you busy......?"

"It's okay, let's sit down."

Gu Yunsong pointed to another rattan chair opposite the square table, and only after Gu Xiao sat down did he ask, "What's the matter?" ”

"Today, another person applied for a translator, and Editor-in-Chief Wu asked me to show you something on the way."

As he spoke, Gu Xiao spread out the text and handed it to Gu Yunsong. Gu Yunsong took the text and browsed it casually.

This is a resume written in French, except for some simple personal information, it is a self-description and self-introduction. The reason why I showed him this resume is naturally not because the people in the publishing house do not know French; And the reason why the recruitment of the publishing house has to be seen by him is that the matter has to start with Gu Lao's retirement.

Gu Xiao works at Yanjin New Frontier Publishing House, a state-owned publishing institution with a long history. Because the new editor-in-chief in recent years is a student of Gu Yunsong, the novels translated by Gu Lao have been published in this publishing house. Gu Lao didn't care much about the income and price, and the people from the publishing house also helped Gu Lao deal with the copyright issue in a big way, who knew that Gu Lao suddenly didn't want to do it in the past two years, and the problem appeared.

The student who became the editor-in-chief had previously helped Gu Lao buy the translation rights for a French novel, and another half-translated science fiction novel also had an entry in the licensing contract that had to be translated in its entirety. If Gu Lao doesn't do it, then who should he let turn it over?

If the owner of the translation rights is the publisher, there is no problem; Pull a few French lovers or newcomers from the market to you, and you can do it in a few days; After all, these books are not popular, they are often more political achievements than sales, and the quality and level are actually not important. However, the problem also came - the translation contract for these books was bought in the name of Gu Lao and the publishing house at the same time.

The matter of buying the translation rights was originally a matter of the editor-in-chief's student's own opinion; A translator of Gu Lao's status and level charges a lower translation fee than that of fresh graduates, even if it is a big face for him, it is reasonable to help Gu Lao deal with copyright matters. However, just after Gu Lao announced that he was going to retire, the publishing house found a few translators as successors for Gu Lao to look at, but Gu Lao rarely did not agree - the level of these translations was too poor in his opinion.

The reason why Gu Lao worked for the publishing house for a few years was not to cooperate with the publishing house to make money. He wants to translate these French novels, and the reason is that he loves them; However, other translations are different. This kind of novel is not well-known, the pay is low, and the translation is difficult, and most people are not willing to take it at all.

Gu Yunsong, a translator with too low a level, couldn't look down on it, and the translation publishing house with too high a price was unwilling to invite it, so the matter was put on hold. And Gu Xiao's work unit is this publishing house, and recently he will occasionally be asked by the editor-in-chief to send a few resumes to Gu Lao to see. However, so far, none of Gu Lao agreed or not to say anything, and the old translator who had been in the industry for five or six years that the publishing house had worked hard to find was also rejected by Gu Lao after the interview.

And today's one is also an amateur translator recruited by the editor-in-chief from the Internet. Because the whole article is in French, it looks amazing, so I sent it with the mentality of giving it a try. However, Gu Lao looked at it casually, but frowned.

The owner of this resume is an amateur French enthusiast with only a high school education, no translation experience and no previous works; The reason why he tried to apply for the job was because he liked this science fiction novel that had not yet been translated very much, and he wanted to contribute to the translation work. As a resume, the applicant's conditions are obviously a little cold, but Gu Lao doesn't care much about these - otherwise he would have chosen a random French student who graduated from a prestigious university to agree. Judging from the French text on the resume, this person's French level is okay, but Gu Lao is a little dissatisfied with this person's wording habits.

Resumes and texts written in French are full of flashy and fancy sentences. Although it is not easy to write these complex sentences without a single linguistic problem, the translator is clearly unaware of the specific origin of these sentence patterns, nor does he know much about their special meanings in different contexts. Some of these seemingly cumbersome grammar and sentence patterns are local slang in the south of France, and some are special sentence patterns that were only used in the script genre of the last century. After putting it together, although it looked powerful, it was actually a bit nondescript - so before he finished reading it, Gu Lao shook his head.

"Would you like to meet him?" Niece Gu Xiao asked.

Gu Lao frowned and threw his resume back on the table. He has translated French novels for decades, and is naturally sensitive to language. Judging by the flirtatious resume, the candidate did not live up to the level he wanted. However, before he could say no, the voice of his wife Li Qingyuan came from his side.

"The Mid-Autumn Festival, the child brought it to you from so far away, so you can go and see it."

With such a strange sigh, Li Qingyuan put the fruit plate in his hand on the table in front of Gu Lao like a demonstration. "Xiao Qi, come and eat apples."

Gu Xiao is the youngest child of the Gu family's peers, because of his lively and likable personality, he has been loved by his elders and older siblings since he was a child; For Gu Yunsong and his wife, it is naturally the same. In addition, today is the Mid-Autumn Festival, and none of his children have come back, seeing that the old man is still embarrassed, Li Qingyuan is naturally unhappy - at least she doesn't understand what there is to worry about a few French books that have nothing to do with her. Since my niece has made a special trip, let's go and see it.

With such a sentence, the atmosphere immediately became delicate. Gu Yunsong naturally didn't deliberately want to embarrass his little niece, for him, he mainly didn't look down on this bombastic applicant; As for Gu Xiao, she also didn't expect things to turn out like this - in fact, she just helped her colleague hand over the text. She is the editor of the morning newspaper department, and it has nothing to do with her that Gu Lao can't find a translator.

However, it was such a misunderstanding that made Gu Lao change his original decision.

"Okay, okay, I'll reply later, and I'll see him at noon tomorrow - by the way, call the last two too."

In the end, it was the Mid-Autumn Festival, Gu Yunsong didn't say much, and directly agreed to the meeting. This recruit's level is still somewhat, although this kind of pompous and flaunting style Gu Lao doesn't like it, but he doesn't mind meeting this person - he claims to be a lover who can learn this kind of Cheng dù without systematic education at all, Gu Lao is quite curious; Anyway, I have nothing to do lately, so let's go and see it directly.

Seeing his niece who was still a little hesitant, Gu Lao smiled and said, "Anyway, it's time to find someone to take over, if you keep dragging it, it's not easy for Xiao Li to do it." Let's go, let's help your aunt cook. ”

With that, the conversation ended. The three of them left the balcony with a smile, and their figures disappeared in the lights of thousands of homes during the Mid-Autumn Festival. For them, the freshly born qiē was just a little episode before the meal, and the people who were really worried about the conversation here were in a dilapidated rental building on the other side of Yanjin City.

"Brother, aren't you happy today? Why not eat meat? ”

Sister Zhou Lu put down the bowl and asked her brother who was picking up rice with his head stuffy.

"Is there any news from the company - about the car accident in the morning?" Seeing that Zhou Heng didn't answer, Zhou Lu looked at the laptop placed at the dining table and continued to ask, "What are you doing with the computer on?" ”

In Zhou Lu's view, today's Zhou Heng is obviously a bit abnormal. Although his brother was deducted from his salary, he still bought a lot of meat and vegetables to improve his food - Zhou Lu thought he was in a good mood before, but when he came back after painting, he looked frowning again. Even the computer, which I don't use much on weekdays, is always sitting next to it, opening the email page, and I don't know what I'm waiting for.

Zhou Heng swallowed the contents of his mouth and was about to answer, when suddenly the computer 'dingdong' sounded, which was the email reminder set by Zhou Heng.

"There it is!"

Zhou Heng was overjoyed, pushed the bowl, and pulled the computer in front of him. When I opened the newly received email, I saw a reply signed 'Nova Press', which said that he had been waiting for a long-awaited interview notice -- "Regarding Mr.'s application for translation, please go to 1O3 of the Nova Press office building for an interview at about 1:3o noon tomorrow." ”

Zhou Lu's little head leaned over, "What-"

"To put it simply, your brother is changing jobs."

"Huh, translation? Brother, are you going to change careers to become a translator? Zhou Lu wondered, "But this is just an interview notice, right?" ”

However, Zhou Heng only blinked mysteriously, "Don't worry, as long as you can go to the interview, there will be no problems." ”

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