Back in 1974 He Chengwei could regularly be seen carrying a large, old-fashioned recording machine across various parts of China. Little did he know at the time, but he was one of the last people recording a way of life that was soon to disappear forever. 

He collected stories from ordinary people, and retold them in a magazine called Gushi Hui.

Most Chinese people in their 20s and 30s have heard of Gushi Hui, and many have grown up reading it on a regular basis. To date, this biweekly periodical has seen an incredible 1.40 billion copies in print since 1974, featuring more than 30,000 original stories. The publication still sells 4 million copies a year.

Everyday life

A report in the Chinese newspaper Legal Evening News recently said that former basketball star Yao Ming is a big fan of the magazine. Whenever he is in Beijing, Yao requests the owner of a local newsstand (near the athletics department of the General Administration of Sport of China) to keep every issue of Gushi Hui for him to read when he is staying there.

"Gushi Hui is by, and for, the people; it is a part of our everyday life," He Chengwei said. As the senior chief editor, the 62-yearold is now responsible for the running of the magazine. Sitting in his office in an old, Western style building on Shanghai Shaoxing Road, He related the story of how the magazine came about.

Gushi Hui emerged in 1963 and has been published in 24 intermittent volumes since then. It was closed between 1966 and 1974 because of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). He took charge in 1974, and admits that he was reluctant to take the job in the first place.

"This was still during the Cultural Revolution and people weren't in any mood for anything to do with culture," said He. "I didn't really believe that 'folk' literature had enough value or enduring popularity to succeed in the way that novels and poems do. I also didn't think that publishing was a promising industry at that time. However, the stories people told me changed my mind, and I really felt that the humor and wisdom of ordinary people was something precious."

He told the Global Times that, during the Cultural Revolution period and because of a lack of stories, he led a group of editors at Gushi Hui to visit different areas of China to find out what was happening at the local level.

"We mainly went to factories and farms to ask people to tell us stories they knew or had heard of. Some stories are true encounters that we chanced upon, while others are legendary and allegorical but are strongly rooted in local culture," said He. "The people we met told these stories in a very interesting way, full of rhythmical sensation and always accompanied by their vibrant body language. And we recorded all of these stories."

And today many of the writers of the magazine are non-professionals who contribute ordinary stories about everyday life.

"Most of our stories are related to the lives of ordinary people, to our 'grass-roots' culture, if you like. The stories may vary in content and context but they all convey universal values such as how to live as a good person," said He.

Absorbing tales

He told the Global Times that the most important quality in a writer for the magazine is the ability to tell a good story.

"I always believe that a story is not just written, it is spoken. Therefore, the first qualification for a contribution to Gushi Hui is that it has a spoken quality and the sentences should be simple and short, as if you are telling a story as you are watching it unfold. And the introduction is obviously the key to an absorbing story." He believes that a good story should have a simple beginning that is not necessarily descriptive.

"If you say how blue the sky is, how deep the sea is at the very beginning, I don't think anyone will carry on reading, or remember anything about your story. The secret to creating a good story is like making a good movie; you have to engage your reader from the very first moment," He said.

Cui Zhi, the deputy director of the Folk Literature and Art Society of Beijing has written stories for Gushi Hui since the 1990s. He told the Global Times that the editing course undertaken by Gushi Hui is especially demanding. And he has jokingly commented that he has suffered "harassment" from the editor. "They take the utmost responsibility for the work they do," he said.

Xia Yimin, a senior editor who joined Gushi Hui in 1991 said that every contribution to Gushi Hui is edited three times by different editors. Then there is a final editorial discussion to decide whether to use it or not.

Today, the headquarters of Gushi Hui on Shaoxing Road has become a shrine for bookworms. And every summer, a story creation training course is held there, led by senior writers and editors from Gushi Hui.