Chinese sci-fi author explores galaxies beyond printed words

Liu Cixin, an author who shot to prominence after publication of The Three Body Problem.[Photo/IC]

The 2015 Hugo Award-winner, who lives in Yangquan, North China's Shanxi province, says he is looking to build a franchise of his works. A film adapted from the first book of the 53-year old's Three Body trilogy will likely be released in 2017. The interview has been translated from Chinese

What do you feel about the relatively new model of adapting books into films, TV or web series and video games in China?

In recent years there have been rapid developments in China's film and TV industries, especially the film business. A number of box-office successes and popular TV series have been adapted from literary works, mainly novels, which has made the copyright business lucrative.

But while that may be good news for both films and literature, there are factors that could lead to an overheating of the market.

Is it inspired by Hollywood?

Hollywood has had a big affect on the Chinese box office, which no doubt has inspired local entertainment. But China's film and TV industries at present aren't following the Hollywood model of making big-budget science-fiction films, for example.

Is your Three Body trilogy being adapted?

Parts of the Three Body trilogy are being adapted into films, TV shows, stage plays and games. A stage play based on the first part (The Three Body Problem) was successfully shown in the cities of Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou (in June). A film based on the first book is in post-production now. It is expected to be released by the middle of 2017.

Have you thought of turning your novels into video games or web series?

I certainly hope that my works can be made into games and network shows. In addition to the trilogy, I'm looking for collaboration on my other works.

Is sci-fi a popular genre in Chinese web entertainment today?

Science fiction has penetrated aspects of online entertainment but it is still a parallel genre much like the novels, so the online audience is comparatively smaller.

How are established authors responding to the trend of companies hiring people to write scripts online?

It is a big trend in film and TV - raising the incomes of writers and making their works known. But such creations are different from writing in the traditional sense, because when you work for a company, you also need to work with a team and not just as an individual writer.

Online writers are producing good writing but often the works aren't noticed by readers or even people from the industry because there are too many such novels. There should be some mechanism to select the better works from the pool by, let's say, the establishment of online literature awards.

With more tech companies getting into web-based entertainment, are cinema and TV likely to suffer a decline in the future?

When TV appeared on the scene, many thought it would be the end of films but that didn't happen. The development of online entertainment will definitely affect films and TV but they have their own advantages, and they can use the web to improve and promote the two industries. The three art forms will coexist in the long term.