First Chinese author to win Nobel traces literary beginning to years spent as cowherd
Mo Yan, who on Thursday won China's first Nobel Prize in Literature, says his literary instincts were spurred by loneliness, when he was forced out of the school by his cruel father and made to graze cattle. ‘A lonely boy stayed with the cow the whole day’ was how Mo, 57, summed up his initiation into literature while the talking to the state-run CCTV here before the Prize was announced.
‘All I could see is the blue sky, white clouds grass and locusts and other small animals and a cow. I was really lonely. Some times I repeated a song with different notes. Some times I talked to cow and talked to myself,’ he said struggling for words to describe the painful childhood years.
Most of Mo Yan's works are set in his own hometown, Gaomi County, in East China's Shandong Province. Before the age of 20, he never ventured beyond the boundaries of his own county. Strangely Mo Yan, which literally means ‘Don't Speak’ did not want to talk about the Nobel Prize fearing criticism.
‘I don't want to talk about the Nobel Prize, because every word about the prize will be criticised. Many people criticise that Chinese writers have anxiety about the Nobel Prize, and I have received more criticisms like this than others,’ he was quoted in the media as saying in the run up to the announcement about the Nobel Prize. Though famous, he has his critics in China who criticised him for not showing solidarity to those repressed by the dictatorial government.
Fellow Chinese writer Ma Jian has deplored the lack of solidarity and commitment of Mo Yan for other Chinese writers and intellectuals who were punished or detained for taking a critical view of the state of affairs in Communist China.
KNOW MO
‘All I could see is the blue sky, white clouds grass and locusts and other small animals and a cow. I was really lonely. Some times I repeated a song with different notes. Some times I talked to cow and talked to myself,’ he said struggling for words to describe the painful childhood years.
Most of Mo Yan's works are set in his own hometown, Gaomi County, in East China's Shandong Province. Before the age of 20, he never ventured beyond the boundaries of his own county. Strangely Mo Yan, which literally means ‘Don't Speak’ did not want to talk about the Nobel Prize fearing criticism.
‘I don't want to talk about the Nobel Prize, because every word about the prize will be criticised. Many people criticise that Chinese writers have anxiety about the Nobel Prize, and I have received more criticisms like this than others,’ he was quoted in the media as saying in the run up to the announcement about the Nobel Prize. Though famous, he has his critics in China who criticised him for not showing solidarity to those repressed by the dictatorial government.
Fellow Chinese writer Ma Jian has deplored the lack of solidarity and commitment of Mo Yan for other Chinese writers and intellectuals who were punished or detained for taking a critical view of the state of affairs in Communist China.
KNOW MO
- Most of Mo Yan’s works are set in his own hometown, Gaomi County, in East China’s Shandong Province
- Though famous, he has his critics in China who criticised him for not showing solidarity to those repressed by the dictatorial government
- Mo Yan, which literally means ‘Don’t Speak’ did not want to talk about the Nobel Prize fearing criticism