Bringing Chinese literature to global stage highlighted

With a rich history spanning more than 5,000 years, China holds a treasure trove of literary classics, while their value has yet to be fully recognized on a global scale.

So how can Chinese literature go global is the pressing question.

This very query was posed to Liu Zhenyun, one of the country's most celebrated literary figures, at an event on Wednesday at the annual London Book Fair.

Hailed by The New York Times as "China's Franz Kafka", Liu has had his works translated into more than 30 languages, including English, French and German. He is so well-known that every corner of the event room was packed. Wherever he went at the fair, fans — many of whom were quite young — could be seen lining up for selfies, or requesting autographs.

The literary icon offered a simple and straightforward answer to the abovementioned question: "To have a global presence, you have to go out first."

He added: "I get a lot of nourishment from my interactions with readers. Sometimes, a casual line from a reader can have a profound impact on me because each country has very different perspectives of the world, and very different methodologies for analyzing events, even when encountering the same plots, characters or details.

"This difference in views is what we seek to learn from one another's civilization. But if you have never traveled, how can you find out, and learn from the strengths of others? It is only through knowing others that we can truly know ourselves."

Liu recalled an episode in the Netherlands where he met a woman, who had only known about China through the Western media, and once believed that Chinese people had blank faces and were empty-headed.

However, her stereotype was shattered after reading Liu's I Did Not Kill My Husband — a novel about a rural woman struggling for more than 20 years to shed her notorious reputation as a villainess — and the Dutch reader said she was struck by the character's audacity and resilience.

The hilarious tone of Liu's book also left this particular reader in stitches.

"Mr Liu, you must be the most humorous person in China," Liu's new Dutch fan conjectured.

Liu replied with his signature wit, "You're wrong because you've never visited my hometown in Henan province. I am the least humorous one in the village where I grew up."

The woman then replied, "Then I must go to China!"

To which the author replied: "There are really many foreigners visiting my hometown nowadays."

To explore opportunities for the wider global dissemination of Chinese literature, simply going out is not enough, Liu said.

"You must also bring in works from world-class writers, scholars and publishers, as exchanges are mutual."

Hurdles can still be foreseen ahead for Chinese literature striving for greater global exposure. Translators and Liu's fans echoed that language barriers can diminish Liu's pure, unadorned yet hilarious character portrayals, not to mention that his concentration on down-to-earth, local realities of China may present cultural differences for some readers.

"It's just like my foreign friends may never truly get to know my personality traits when I speak Mandarin," said Bai Yufan, a Chinese student studying at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

But efforts to engage are never a case of banging one's head against the wall.

"I am completely new to Liu's works, but it is just wonderful to have him here. It's good to watch his mannerisms, his tone, his way of speaking, and it's a learning experience for me," said Therese Wassily Saba, a freelance copy editor.