Chapter 126: The Japanese Break Through the Defense
Lies was put on the shelves of Guizi Bookstore, and was placed in the most conspicuous place. There was also a promotional poster next to it, with a portrait of Ito Hirobumi and a sentence: The predecessors' superb wisdom and strategy, a model of cultural war.
When people enter the bookstore and see the poster and the portrait of Ito Hirobumi, they immediately walk forward with great respect. They pick up a book of lies, open the introduction, and see that it says "This book tells about Ito Hirobumi's superb political vision and superb war strategy", and they are immediately full of chicken blood. They just close the sample, pick up a new book and go to pay.
They don't have time to read the contents carefully because they have to work non-stop. The rapid economic development of the Japanese is inseparable from the efficient operation of the entire society. Everyone is working non-stop and working overtime very late at night. It may take them several months or even years to finish reading this 50-word novel.
In order to confuse the Japanese, the despicable Americans not only changed Liu Hongmin's pen name, but also changed the title of the book.
《Ito Hirobumi》!!!
Just for the name, the Japanese are willing to pay for it. The Japanese are sentimental, and when this sentiment is only 1000 yen, which is only equivalent to their lunch, they are willing to buy it.
When office workers bring books to the company, their colleagues will immediately ask about it when they see it.
Book buyer: "It's a new book. I haven't read it yet. But since it's about the great Ito Hirobumi, it can't be too bad."
When my colleagues heard this, they all said it made sense. So, during lunch or dinner, they would stop by the bookstore and buy a copy. It didn't matter whether they read it or not, because everyone bought it, and if you didn't, you would seem to have no taste.
This phenomenon is common in major cities. Some people go too late and don’t even get to buy the book. Then they will sigh: “It seems that this book is really well written! Otherwise, it wouldn’t be so popular.”
They asked the bookstore staff to keep a copy for them when the book arrived tomorrow. Some people were so anxious that they even gave them 1000 yen.
The staff member didn't expect that the book would be so popular. He quietly put the money away and went to the store manager to ask him to buy more tomorrow. In this way, he wouldn't have to secretly reserve some for the people who stuffed the money.
In this way, almost all of the 300,000 copies printed in the early stage were sold out, which immediately pushed "Hirofumi Ito" to the top of the bestseller list.
Random House saw this and immediately started printing overnight. They printed the books in multiple locations in the Japanese territory and then shipped them to major cities nearby.
On the second day, because the printing factory needed to proofread the manuscript, only less than 100,000 copies were sold. On the third day, printing factories in many places began to ship the books, which caused sales to soar again, reaching 500,000 copies. On the fourth day, sales reached 1 million copies.
For a time, buying "Ito Hirobumi" became a fashion in the Japanese society.
For this reason, Random House even launched a hardcover commemorative edition of "Ito Hirobumi", priced at 12000 yen. As a result, the demand still exceeded supply, and copies of the novel were soon sold out.
Those who bought these hardcover collector's editions were either people of high social status or people who dealt with them. Some bought them to decorate their study rooms, while others bought them as gifts.
When "Hirobumi Ito" represents style, countless people will flock to it.
In just half a month, "Ito Hirobumi" sold tens of millions of copies. The hardcover commemorative edition also sold nearly one million copies.
Just when the Japanese were enjoying the craze over "Hirofumi Ito", someone finally noticed something was wrong.
Congressman Aso admired Ito Hirobumi very much. He bought a copy of "Ito Hirobumi" shortly after it was published. Every day after returning home, he would read it for an hour or two, hoping to learn Ito Hirobumi's political skills through this book.
He was born into a political family and was born with a strong political vision. He became a member of the House of Representatives with the help of his family. Although he was an overseas student, he did not have much education and lacked political means. He regarded "Ito Hirobumi" as a political secret book, just like the Qing Dynasty ministers regarded "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" as a military strategy.
It was because of this that he gradually discovered the problems in the book.
This book does write a lot about Ito Hirobumi, but it focuses on describing the disaster caused by Ito Hirobumi's cultural invasion, which is obviously not a position to praise Ito Hirobumi. In order to verify his own ideas, he read this book in addition to work. The more he read, the more critical of Ito Hirobumi. At the end, after Ito Hirobumi was assassinated, the book actually wrote "Under the 'cooperation' of Ahn Jung-geun and the Japanese military, this invader passed away."
"Asshole! This is not a book praising great men at all!"
Aso angrily threw the book to the ground and stomped on it a few times. The servants came over quickly, gathered up the broken pages and threw them into the trash can.
After calming down a little, Aso immediately started writing his speech. He could not let this book that slandered the "great man" continue to deceive the public. He had to take the book off the shelves!
The next morning, Aso went to the House of Representatives with red eyes and submitted an application to ban "Hirobunami Ito".
After seeing the application, the House of Representatives was puzzled. But when they checked the end of Aso's application, they realized the seriousness of the problem. The House of Representatives immediately held a meeting and Aso was allowed to speak.
He took the speech he had written all night and spoke eloquently at the meeting in a very inspiring manner.
The House of Representatives immediately voted to ban "Ito Hirobumi".
But before the document was issued, the American ambassador came to our door.
"This book is published by Random House in our country. All procedures are sound. You cannot ban it."
The president of the House of Representatives quickly explained: "Mr. Ambassador, this book slanders the great man of our country."
The ambassador asked, "How is it slandered?"
"He said Ito Hirobumi was an invader..."
The ambassador asked in return: "During Ito Hirobumi's reign, he was already preparing for war with China. If he is not an invader, then what is he?"
The speaker of the House of Representatives was suddenly stuck and didn't know what to say. If it was a Chinese, he would definitely have a hundred excuses. But the person on the other side was an American, so he didn't dare to say a word.
The ambassador said seriously: "If you want to ban this book, you must get the consent of Random House. Otherwise, as the American ambassador, I will never allow any behavior that harms our country's interests to happen."
The Speaker of the House of Representatives was confused. Random House agreed? Random House was still hoping to make money from the book, so how could it agree?
Finally, Aso proposed a solution.
"We can spread this matter. As long as Chinese people stop buying this book, Random House will probably agree to ban it."
So, the next day, the media reported the incident.
Suddenly, the entire Japanese society was in shock. The book they regarded as a golden rule was actually a criticism of Ito Hirobumi.
(End of this chapter)
