The contest created by the Writers' Union ignited the hearts of countless young people.
It was inevitable. Who wouldn't welcome a newly created ladder to success?
And this was no different even at the relatively conservative Sandhurst.
Especially here.
"Arghhh!! Come to me, come to meeeeee...!!"
A voice strained with pain, as if a woman were giving birth, echoed from the throats of both the cavalry and cadet—Churchill.
"Aarghhh!!"
Gulp, gulp.
He pulled out a hidden hip flask and tilted it back, and when that wasn't enough, he blew into the bottle's mouth, guzzling the whiskey.
But even that didn't settle him.
Something seemed to be blocking his thoughts, refusing to let them flow.
"How in the world does one write like Hanslow Jin?!"
Littering the ground around him were piles of the highest quality paper, far too good to be wasted like this.
On them were words written with lavish strokes, yet the writing remained incomplete, ultimately discarded by the frustrated author.
—A long time ago, the celestial and demonic clans descended upon Albion...
—I'm screwed. / I'll say it again. / I'm completely screwed...
—"An unfamiliar ceiling." / The boy stared blankly at the dazzling chandelier he had never seen before...
"Aaarghhh!!"
Winston Churchill screamed as he tore up the thirteenth draft he'd been working on.
This wasn't it.
This couldn't be called a manuscript worthy of the ad banner boasting "The Next Hanslow Jin."
Strangely enough, the more he worked on it, the more his sentences stiffened and froze.
If Hanslow Jin had been there, he would have surely said, "Wow, what kind of hybrid is this? Some sort of middle schooler's guide to literature?"
Churchill wanted to capture the feeling he thought was the coolest, but the more he wrote, the further it seemed to drift away from him.
'As Vincent said, perhaps admiration is the emotion furthest from understanding…'
It was a completely unrelated thought, yet now his mind was entirely consumed by the question: How could he write something as concise, yet packed with meaning, wit, and humor as Hanslow Jin?
'To write like that, I need to approach writing with an entirely different concept than I've known up until now.'
Even though his breath reeked of whiskey, his eyes remained sharp.
The literary talent that would one day earn him the Nobel Prize in Literature with his handwritten memoirs did not fall from the sky.
He had his own artistic sensibilities, and when it came to grammar and speech writing, he could confidently claim near mastery.
Hadn't he won multiple oratory competitions?
'Literature is the crystallization of natural growth.'
Like Seurat's pointillism, the trends in painting can sometimes seem to appear from nowhere, born purely from talent.
But literary trends don't work like that.
Poetry can sometimes produce a breakthrough. Even short story writers, though rarely, can do so.
But not with novels.
To fill hundreds of thousands of pages, millions of paragraphs, and billions of words, the writer must condense and compress the stories they want to tell, the stories they have experienced, and the lessons they have learned.
A writer is both a producer and consumer of culture, and whether they like it or not, they pour what they've seen, learned, and experienced into their literature.
Take H.G. Wells, who is quite popular these days.
Winston Churchill immediately recognized Wells as a passionate evolutionist and an Enlightenment thinker when he read his The Time Machine while skimming through Temple Bar.
That 'appeal' permeated his writing.
Of course, some might not notice it, but Churchill had the capability to discern it.
But even with all that ability.
He couldn't figure out Hanslow Jin.
'At first, I thought he was just a writer with an overwhelming imagination like William Blake.'
He had thought Hanslow was a genius at blending light adventure narratives like those of George MacDonald.
Vincent Villiers was also somewhat unconventional, but that's to be expected. After all, it was more realistic than imaginative.
But DawnBringer? And now Doctor Dickter's Bizarre Adventures?
Culture progresses gradually.
It follows formulas from past successes, ones that have already been proven to work.
But Hanslow Jin? He's... something else...
'There's no clear direction.'
Some parts seem gradual, yet others... feel hundreds of steps ahead, as if some avant-garde experiment is lurking within.
It's as if he digs into tastes the public—and Winston Churchill—never knew they had, suddenly pulling them out and saying, "Hey, you actually like this, don't you?"
Churchill realized this with certainty as he delved deeper into Jin's work.
This is undoubtedly strange. For someone like him, who had lived a life where everything was controlled from above, it should feel unfamiliar, if not outright repulsive.
And yet... it's too delicious to put down.
'How on earth is this even possible?'
He didn't know. He wanted to give up. To just quit and go back to being a simple consumer.
But at the same time...
He wanted to reach that peculiar avant-garde level as well.
He wanted to see the view that Hanslow Jin was seeing. That's what he was thinking.
Winston Churchill gritted his teeth out of habit.
His friends often teased him, saying his face looked like a bulldog when he did that, but he took pride in it.
Tenacity, like a bulldog biting down. That was his identity.
"Phew... fine, let's take a short break and start again."
Of course, even that tenacity required a brief pause to be effective again.
Churchill reached for the pile of magazines and newspapers.
It was a simple thought: just like eating something when you're hungry, when the words won't come, you need to read something to spark your thoughts.
But then...
"What, what is this?!"
A sentence in one of the newspapers caught his eye and shook his mind.
"H-Hanslow Jin... just who are you...?"
The person he so desperately wanted to understand slipped away once again, boasting an unfathomable depth.
***
Damn, I failed.
I let out a hollow laugh. I wanted to look away from the thing in front of me.
But I couldn't. This was my burden.
And in front of me were Mr. Bentley and Mr. George Newnes, wearing expressions much like mine.
"Just look at this!"
They were standing with their arms crossed, looking at the mountain of manuscripts that could fill an entire warehouse.
"I never dreamed there would be this many aspiring writers hoping to make their debut."
"Well, come to think of it, there have always been plenty of people who wanted to be writers but couldn't."
"Yes, seeing this... it makes me wonder if our publishing houses had been too narrow in the way we recruited authors."
And these were just the submissions sent to Bentley and Sons and George Newnes publishers.
If you added the other publishing houses that had partnered with the Writers' Union for this contest, the piles would be just as large, if not more.
"It's incredible. Sure, the population of Britain is large, but I can't imagine this many manuscripts being produced."
"Well, the thing is, Mr. Writer... some of these submissions are coming from America..."
"..."
Why?
I silently screamed inside, trying to calm my mind.
'Right, this is Britain...'
Unlike in Korea, the language community here is shared with America. That means there's no problem seeing the advertisements directly, and it's easy to submit entries.
It was an oversight I hadn't considered.
And it's not like the population is small. The British Empire as a whole is larger than the U.S., but if you only consider Great Britain and Ireland, America has already surpassed Britain long ago.
No wonder there were so many. I had noticed an unusual number of envelopes with customs stamps.
"But we can't just throw them away."
"Yes, we're considering using some of the college students you sent over last time as temporary workers to help with the initial screening."
"That's a bit... concerning."
I shook my head reluctantly. Sure, hiring temps would ease the workload to some extent.
But those college students are still beginners, and if they can spot good writing, they probably have enough talent to write themselves.
So, they might end up reviewing their own submissions.
"What about using housewives instead?"
"Housewives?"
"Yes."
I nodded calmly. Bentley and Newnes also nodded, as if they hadn't thought of that.
This was still a time before male-oriented and female-oriented literature had split. Housewives made up a significant portion of the readership for serialized novels.
It was a time when the children were at school, the husbands were at work, and the housework was done, leaving them with nothing to do at home. They consumed literature the way people today watch dramas.
What? A career? Dual-income households? Where would you find such a thing in the 19th century?
Machismo wasn't just confined to the southern states of America.
England was a bit better, but for women's suffrage and labor rights to be secured, we'd have to wait until after World War I.
This era didn't even know what the suffragette movement was.
The publishing industry, at least, is one of the few sectors with a relatively low entry barrier for women, thanks to the influence of female writers.
In fact, there's even an editor named Maria working at Bentley Publishing. Now that I think about it, I've known her for quite some time. What was her last name again? Mel? Mul? Something like that?
Anyway, the important point is that housewives can also be a valuable workforce.
"But, sir, don't some of those housewives also aspire to be writers?"
"I think they'd be much safer than college students," I said calmly.
It's not about one group being more reliable than the other, but rather about their respective situations.
Think about what it would mean for a college student to get this part-time job.
For them, it's just an option—a choice. If they get fired or something goes wrong, it's no big deal.
But housewives are different. There are very few industries they can work in, and publishing is one of those rare fields.
If they cause problems while working a part-time job in publishing, there's no going back. This industry is so small that it's almost entirely driven by personal connections, so it would be even worse for them.
"Hmm. I don't think it's such a bad idea! Housewives would also be cheaper than college students, wouldn't they? Heh heh heh."
George Newnes, the notorious aristocrat and magazine king of England, chuckled darkly as he puffed on a Cuban cigar.
Ugh. He's already wearing the trademark bowler hat of the upper class, so all that's missing is a cat for him to pet as he sits there...
Anyway, I'm just making a suggestion. It's up to them to decide.
Running the business isn't my job.
Still, if there's even 1% treasure hidden in that mountain of manuscripts...
I smacked my lips in anticipation.
Just thinking about the first editions of works by authors of this era, which I've stored in the private library I set up in the basement of Mr. Miller's townhouse, is enough to make my mouth water.
In a few decades, the value of that library will skyrocket.
Just imagining it puts me in a good mood.
As I was daydreaming about those potential profits, I heard a voice.
"Mr. Hanslow Jin."
"Oh, Maria."
I briefly turned my head at the youthful voice calling me in an American accent.
It was Maria, the editor at Bentley Publishing, who I had just been thinking about.
"There's something urgent you need to see."
"What is it?"
"Well... a scientific paper with your name on it was just published in Germany."
"... What?"
What on earth was she talking about?
As I stood there, dumbfounded, Maria handed me a newspaper. Just from the headline, I could guess what was happening.
"Does the 'Transparent Light' from the Popular Serialized Novel 'DawnBringer!' Actually Exist?"
"Dr. Roentgen's Paper Mentions Hanslow Jin! Is the Novelist a Co-Researcher?"