By Ersatz Culture: Red Star News — which is a division of Chengdu Business Daily, or perhaps the parent Chengdu Media Group organization — today (Tuesday, August 12 there) published an article about an event in Glasgow to promote the Tianwen program/award, previously covered in several items on File 770 since the Chengdu Worldcon.

Although the article is somewhat misleading about where the event took place, the text of a WeChat message forwarded to me the previous day indicates it took place on Monday morning at the Radisson Red hotel near to the SEC venue, but outside the actual convention area. I believe this is the same location where Dave McCarty had a notable encounter with a hat-wearing lady. Given that Dave has been seen in photos in the company of some of the people mentioned in this piece, and was front and centre at the original Tianwen launch at the Chengdu Worldcon, that may not be a complete coincidence.

Here are some extracts (via Google Translate, with some clean-up editing) from the article.  I’ve also included a couple of photos from an earlier Red Star News article from the 10th, which is more about the Glasgow Worldcon in general than Tianwen.

As one of the highlights of this year’s Worldcon, the first “Tianwen” Chinese Science Fiction Literature Competition Overseas Promotion Conference was held in Glasgow on the 12th. “Tianwen” is like a bright new star, not only illuminating the journey of Chinese science fiction literature to the world, but also attracting the enthusiastic attention of science fiction fans around the world.

This science fiction literary competition originates from Chengdu and is open to the world. It has nine permanent award categories with a total prize fund of over one million yuan [approximately $140k USD]…

Back in October 2023, the 81st Worldcon was successfully concluded at the Chengdu Science Fiction Museum. The afterglow of this science fiction feast is still there, and the “gravitational wave” effect is forming. The emergence of the “Tianwen” Chinese Science Fiction Literature Competition is one of the “results”…

Renowned science fiction writer [and 2024 Hugo finalist] Han Song once said in an interview with Red Star News that the special significance of the first “Tianwen” Chinese Science Fiction Literature Competition is that it is an award jointly initiated by the Chengdu Municipal Government and the China Writers Association.

On August 9, the “Tianwen Delegation” from Chengdu arrived in Glasgow. The 82nd World Science Fiction Convention had just opened…

At the promotion meeting of the “Tianwen” Chinese Science Fiction Literature Competition on August 12th… Wang Yating [aka Tina Wang/Wong], a nominee for this year’s Hugo Award and the host of the science fiction video program “Hugo X Interview” [aka Discover X], shared her imagination of science fiction literature while reviewing the course and achievements of Chinese science fiction in the past decade with Chinese science fiction writers such as He Xi, Qi Yue [‘July’], and Gu Shi; former editor-in-chief of “Science Fiction World” Tan Kai; Eight Light Minutes Culture CEO Yang Feng, and other industry insiders…

The “Tianwen” Chinese Science Fiction Literature Competition has nine permanent award categories with a total prize fund of over one million yuan.  There are 6 literary categories:

• • Best science fiction novel,
  • Best science fiction novella,
  • Best science fiction short story, 
  • Best science fiction film and television script
  • Best science fiction game script
  • Best science fiction comic work

and 3 institutional and individual categories:

• • Best science fiction literature institution
  • Best new science fiction writer
  • Best youth science fiction writer

[Note that on one of the pop up banners, the middle triad are instead described as “Industry awards”.  Note also that the banners display the logo of the Chengdu Science Fiction Society (CSFC), the body that was responsible for organizing the Chengdu Worldcon.]

…author Qi Yue [‘July’] said that “Tianwen” is a brand new voice for the science fiction community and a welcome thing for science fiction writers. In addition, film and television practitioners can also pay attention to works they are interested in through this award, “finding a clear thread for marketization and commercialization, so that this circle can form a positive cycle.”

For Chinese and foreign science fiction fans, the “Tianwen” Science Fiction Literature Competition is more like a bridge, allowing creators and fans from different countries and regions to share their works, views and creativity. Yang Feng, founder of Chengdu company Eight Light Minutes and editor-in-chief of the Chinese version of “Galaxy Edge”, believes that the overseas expansion of the “Tianwen” competition will help build a network of global science fiction communities. “Through online and offline exchange activities, it will promote international cooperation in SF creation and industry, enhance the international influence of Chinese SF and contribute important forces to the prosperity and development of global SF culture” [she said].

Neil Clarke, editor-in-chief of Clarkesworld, believes that promoting excellent science fiction works around the world is very valuable… [He said] “Science fiction always brings surprises to people. I saw the beginning of these surprises from “Tianwen”. I believe that more surprises will be discovered through “Tianwen” in the future.”

Carolina Gómez Lagerlöf, chair of the European Science Fiction Association, hopes that more works from non-English speaking countries will become known to more people through Tianwen in the future…  Representatives of the 2025 Seattle Worldcon said that Tianwen is a supplement to world SF literature [and she said that] “Through Tianwen, people in the worldwide community around the world can broaden their horizons and learn more about excellent non-English language SF works.”

It is worth mentioning that “Tianwen” will also be present at the Seattle Worldcon next year… At this 2024 Worldcon, the “Tianwen Delegation” also held a party, inviting writers, publishing organizations and senior SF fans to share the fun. The Chinese science fiction exhibits and the diverse “theme booths” became highlights of the event.

The “Tianwen Delegation” party mentioned in the final paragraph above appears to be the same thing as the “Chengdu Thank You Party”, seen on the banner behind Carolina Gómez Lagerlöf, and also promoted by Dave McCarty from his Facebook account.  I can’t say I was checking that closely, but I don’t recall seeing any photos from that party whilst I was trawling Weibo and Xiaohongshu for posts of interest.  I wonder if anyone reading this attended that party, or perhaps only a select elite were considered senior enough to hobnob with Dave and co?

For anyone wondering where the money for all of this is coming from, an earlier Red Star News article – which was briefly mentioned in a late July Scroll – stated that:

This dream-filled goal is inseparable from the joint efforts of various science fiction-related industries. Mu Tao, Chairman of Chengdu Media Group [the parent of Chengdu Business Daily] and Vice Chairman of the Competition Organizing Committee, signed relevant cooperation agreements on the “Tianwen” Science Fiction Literature Competition with Air China, Sichuan Energy Investment AsiaInfo, and Three-Body Universe at the press conference.

And as a reminder, that article also noted that the committee for the Tianwen award would include “relevant members of the World Science Fiction Association Mark Protection Committee”.  At present it seems that we can only speculate on the identity of these MPC members (or possibly just member singular).

Note: for an alternative perspective on this news, SF Lightyear put out a Chinese-language Weibo post just as I was starting this write-up earlier today.