Chapter 20: Figure skating… What is it?

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What was life like during the 1920s?

The country was suffering, the people were in misery, everyone was bullied by foreigners, and countless people searched for a way to rise out of the muck.

Among the various ways, some people believed that they should completely abandon Chinese tradition in favour of Western methods to salvage the current situation.

This led to many people today admiring Western learning and their authors, thinking that their writing was more refined, their stories more fascinating, and the ideas contained within more advanced.

Chyushka’s Divine Detective Ilya was beloved by many readers in China. It wasn’t because of the rich, three-dimensional personalities or the alternatingly funny and thrilling plots — there were many such skilled authors, after all.

No, the reason why this book became popular from Russia to Europe, then from Europe to China, was due to the ideas it conveyed.

Zhang Sushang had been born in a prosperous China. Although he had been abandoned in a public toilet just a few days after his birth, it wasn’t long before he was taken home by his adoptive fathers. He was well fed and well clothed since he was a child and both his parents were good people with upright morals who valued diligence and open-mindedness, which made him grow up to be a typical law-abiding boy of the 21st century.

As he read Divine Detective Ilya, Yun Yan thought that Chyushka was a very interesting person — he never seemed to think that women were inferior to anyone else. In the English version that he translated, there was a line: you and I are both human beings, we merely walk different paths.

Chyushka sympathised with this era’s suffering lower class, yet also proposed that suffering was not a justification for committing crimes. He occasionally played some tricks, such as using two cross-dressing men to scare the readers, and then throwing out a couple of progressive ideas while they were laughing and scolding.

This was an author who refused to walk the beaten path but was worthy of respect. Domestic readers all respected Mr. Chyushka and thought that he was indeed worthy of being a writer of the new Russia. Through his writings, they could observe his advanced ideas.

Moreover, the plot itself was quite attractive. Many people picked it up to relieve boredom only to gain a lot, so it could be said to be both entertaining and educational.

Yun Yan believed that it would never be a loss for anyone to read Divine Detective Ilya, and it would even be a pity not to read it, especially for the female students in China who were sent to the new-style schools by their parents, a large portion of whom only did so to increase their daughters’ ‘worth’.

If they wanted these children to realise that they weren’t inferior to anyone, they needed guidance from teachers. Was there any way to guide people better than reading?

Yun Yan was a scholar who loved reading. He believed from the bottom of his heart that reading was the greatest miracle of mankind, so he wanted to let his students, his friends, his relatives, and his countrymen see this masterpiece. This was why he translated Divine Detective Ilya in just half a month and used his connections to send a letter to Chyushka who was far away in St. Petersburg.

As a result, Chyushka replied, and he used neat handwriting to explicitly state that he was a Chinese person.

Let alone the others in the office, Yun Yan himself suspected that he sent his letter to the wrong place where someone with ill intentions impersonated Mr. Chyushka.

Another teacher in the office, Liu Ming, murmured, “H-How is this possible? Mr. Chyushka writes in Russian and his English translations are also selling very well in Europe, how can he be our, our…”

At this point, everyone was filled with disbelief — part surprise, part fear. If it were true, it would be a great joy that a Chinese author could be highly praised abroad, of course they should be proud! But if it were false, wouldn’t their happiness be wasted?!

But he even clearly wrote what school he attended, which class he was in, where he lived, and how to communicate with him, which all showed that he wasn’t afraid of being investigated.

And in order to prove his identity, Zhang Sushang also included the next update of Divine Detective Ilya which would soon be published in the St. Petersburg Morning Post.

Since he was showing it to his people, he gave the Chinese version.

After Yun Yan finished reading Zhang Sushang’s reply, he picked up the manuscript and took a deep breath. “The fourth case of Divine Detective Ilya introduces a thief called Crocodile. This person’s origins are unknown, and neither do the police know his age, gender, or appearance. They only know that he is good at disguising himself, has many identities, and likes to steal rare antiques.”

Zhang Sushang’s fourth case began with a museum director asking the cowardly Detective Ilya to help track down their missing artifacts. In the course of his task, Ilya met many new characters.

For example, Katarina, a single mother who worked at the museum and attended night school during evenings in hopes of being admitted to Kiev State University,¹Currently, the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv and her daughter Sasha.

Another example was an expert in antique appraisal.

Compared with the previous cases, this arc was less thrilling and became more light-hearted, but the content in each battle of wits was richer.

As the novel’s background was slowly revealed, readers discovered that there were two main forces. One was the righteous side composed of lawyers, policemen, and forensic pathologists to which Daria belonged, while the other was composed of Crocodile and his subordinates who stole and smuggled cultural artifacts by various means, very difficult to deal with.

Ilya was the guy unlucky enough to get involved. He did actually find the lost artifact — mostly by accident — and from then on became a thorn in the eyes of the Alligators.

After the case ended, Ilya received his reward and went to a cafe with his partner, where he swore to Vasily, “We’ll never care about these people again.”

Yet at this time, a beautiful woman came up to them and requested to share their table. When they finished their coffees, Ilya and Vasily both fainted.

As for what happened next, Zhang Sushang hadn’t written it yet, so Yun Yan couldn’t read it.

Therefore when Yun Yan finished reading it aloud and everyone’s expressions changed from doubt to eagerness, they asked, “And then?”

“No ‘and then’.”

“Ah?”

“That’s all Zhang-xiansheng sent.”

By the way, Zhang Sushang had praised Yun Yan’s translation in his letter, but in Yun Yan’s opinion, Zhang Sushang’s writing wasn’t bad either. Although he used vernacular a bit too much, it could still be described as concise and refined, and most importantly, it was humorous. The protagonists had fun and made jokes from time to time. It didn’t have Yun Yan’s elegant style, but it gave people a feeling of ‘this is what Chyushka is like’.

“As expected, a translation can never surpass the original. This isn’t the fault of the translator, but because the true writing style can never be imitated. We still have to ask Zhang-xiansheng to do it himself if we want to publish a Chinese Divine Detective Ilya,” he sighed.

Everyone had read both Yun Yan’s and Zhang Sushang’s versions. Although they all had different ideas in their minds, they had to agree that he was right.

After listening to the fourth case sent by Zhang Sushang, they all concluded that what he said was true. After all, only Chyushka himself could write such a wonderful story with Chyushka’s style.

“I never thought that our country would have a writer who can be praised by Europeans!” Liu Ming said, delighted.

Another teacher sighed and stamped his feet. “It’s just a pity that he’s writing about foreign countries. Our great country also has many things worth writing about, it would be great if Zhang-xiansheng could write stories for Chinese people someday.”

For the sake of further verification, they waited another few days until the newspapers in the concession published the newest instalment of Divine Detective Ilya. Everyone couldn’t wait to buy it and take a look, and sure enough, the story was the same as what Zhang Sushang had sent except for being in a different language.

Upon reading it, they had a conclusion in their hearts and soon, the news that Chyushka was Chinese spread from their group.

One mustn’t underestimate teachers. In this day and age, anyone who could read and write had already escaped from the lower castes of society — which of them didn’t have a few powerful classmates, friends, relatives, or elders?

When most people first heard of it, their first reaction was to think that it was a prank, but the person who said it swore that it was true.

“Chyushka really is one of us! I’m not lying!”

So the next day, the news that ‘Foreign Best-Selling Author Chyuskha is a Young Man from Our Country’ made the front page headlines.

Yun Yan immediately wrote another letter, hoping that Zhang Sushang could also send the Chinese versions of the first three cases. However, he had to wait more than a month for a reply, and the first sentence he saw was that the author was too busy to do it.

【Dear Yun-xiong, Sushang is touched by your kindness, but I am too busy to translate. To be honest, I learned figure skating after coming to Russia to keep fit, and I’m now quite good at it. I also met Misha, the silver medalist in figure skating at the previous Olympic Games, and we are currently training together. Misha was injured during jump practice the day before last, so I need to help him with rehabilitation and take him through this year’s competitions…】

The meaning could be summarised as: Yun-xiansheng’s version is good, just use yours, I need to take the injured Misha to compete and have no time to translate.

Yun Yan stared in amazement at the huge amount of information contained within the letter. “Figure skating… what is it?”

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Translator:
This novel will be dropped after the next update (chapter 21). My next project is 19 chapters of A World Dominated by Female Zergs by 狐生九影.

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  Currently, the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv