世界日報
- Books Sold on Commission by This Paper's Publishing Section
- World Daily Supplement Bound Volume
- Public Notice from the First Stage and the Deji Trading Company
This page of Beijing's World Daily (Shijie Ribao) for October 1, 1926, as read here, is commercial rather than political. The paper's own Publishing Section announced that it sold valuable Chinese books and magazines on commission and began a digest of titles recently entrusted to it. A second advertisement promoted a monthly bound volume of the World Daily Supplement, stressing fine printing and binding, about 120 pages per volume, and a clear difference from crude bundles of old newspapers. A short notice from the First Stage theatre and the Deji Trading Company said film screenings there were suspended and their contract cancelled because new films had not reached Beijing.
This reading covers three items: two advertisements for the paper's publishing business and one theatre notice. The medicine advertisements on the right are heavily blacked out, and the small print giving book prices, authors' names and text running across columns cannot be read reliably. Marked gaps [?] were left unfilled. The book list following the Publishing Section's introduction is not transcribed, and the titles, prices and publishers it gave cannot be read reliably. The bound-volume advertisement is not legible after the page count, so its price and the months on offer are not included. The historical context does not cover film distribution in Beijing or the First Stage theatre, because no verified source on those subjects was obtained.
Translation
Books Sold on Commission by This Paper's Publishing Section
[?] This paper's Publishing Section sells on commission valuable books and magazines of every kind from within China. The titles entrusted to this paper for sale over recent days are excerpted and listed below [?]. [?]
World Daily Supplement Bound Volume
[?] The bound volume gathers a month's contents into a single book. Its printing and binding are both extremely fine, entirely different from the ordinary kind made by binding up old newspapers, which are crude in form. Each volume runs to about 120 pages [?]
Public Notice from the First Stage and the Deji Trading Company
[?] Notice: The Deji Trading Company had been screening films at the First Stage. Because new films have been unable to reach the capital, screenings are temporarily suspended and the original contract is cancelled. We hereby make this announcement. Jointly issued by the First Stage and the Deji Trading Company.
Context
How a Beijing daily not yet two years old came to run its own publishing section
The World Daily was only a little over a year and a half old when this issue appeared, but it belonged to a fast-growing stable of papers. Cheng Shewo had left the Yishi Bao in 1924 and founded the World Evening News with 200 silver dollars he had saved over the years, then used that paper as working capital to expand step by step. The World Daily followed on February 10, 1925, as a four-page broadsheet that grew to eight pages within two months, and by October 1925 its picture page had been spun off as a separate pictorial, making Cheng the first Chinese newspaperman to run three papers on his own. The advertisement for the Publishing Section, which sold books and magazines on commission, fits this pattern of using the paper's name, readership and distribution to open further lines of business. The advertisement is itself the record of this book-agency side of the business.
What the World Daily Supplement offered readers worth binding
The bound volume carried the name "World Daily Supplement" (Shijie Ribao Fukan). According to a history of Cheng's papers, this supplement was added after the daily expanded its pages. It was edited by Liu Bannong, who invited many well-known academics and writers to contribute. Its pieces included Lu Xun's essays "Mashang Riji" (Hurried Diary) and its sequel, as well as fiction and classical verse by other writers. Another supplement, Mingzhu, serialized Zhang Henshui's novel Jinfen Shijia in 2,196 instalments over seven years. Given contributions like these, the advertisement's appeal makes sense: it offered readers a keepsake book of a month's supplement pages with good printing, binding and about 120 pages per volume, rather than a crude bundle of old newspapers.
The danger Beijing newspapers faced in the months before this issue
The ordinary commercial notices on this page appeared less than two months after the most dangerous episode in the paper's early history. In 1926, when Zhang Xueliang, Zhang Zongchang and other Fengtian and Shandong militarists occupied Beijing, they moved to intimidate critical papers. They shot Shao Piaoping, head of the Jing Bao, on April 26 on charges of colluding with "Red Russia". On the night of August 6 they arrested Lin Baishui, head of the Shehui Ribao, and executed him that same night. The following night, military police took Cheng Shewo away just after he had finished checking the proofs of the daily. He was freed on the fourth day after the former premier Sun Baoqi personally intervened with Zhang Zongchang. Afterwards Cheng kept a low profile and left for the south in August 1927. The book-agency and bound-volume advertisements show the World Daily continuing its commercial business during this period of political pressure.
Original
本報出版股代售書目
[?] 本報出版股。 代售國內各種有價值之圖書雜誌。 茲將連日委託本報代售之書目。 摘要錄左 [?]。 [?]
世界日報副刊合訂本
[?] 合訂本乃彙集一月所載， 裝為一册， 印刷裝潢， 均極精美， 與尋常以舊報裝訂， 形式粗劣者， 完全不同， 每册約一百二十頁 [?]
第一舞台德記商行公啟
[?] 啓者德記商行原在第一舞台開演電影茲因新奇片未能到京暫行停演將原合同撤銷特此聲明第一舞台德記商行仝啓