Writers who craft scenes of wonder

Anomad has found his settlement in the wide open and fertile plains of literature.

Sonam Tsering, a laureate of this year's Lu Xun Literature Prize, one of the country's most prestigious awards, shared his first encounter with literature in Beijing on Sunday.

The 37-year-old recalled his time herding hundreds of sheep on the pasture, reading and writing while surrounded by nature's majesty, before taking them back to the fold.

He was born to a nomadic Mongolian family in Haibei Tibetan autonomous prefecture, Northwest China's Qinghai province.

After dropping out of school at the age of 12, he used to doze to kill time as a shepherd until he found a kung fu novel — tattered and missing its front and back covers — at his uncle's home.

It changed his life. Years later, he brought the draft of his first novel to town on a motorcycle. Fearful of being mocked, he dropped the draft in a mailbox right across the copy desk of a local literary magazine as he was too shy to hand it over in person, and went back.

Impressed by the vividness of his work, Zhao Yuanwen, editor-in-chief of the magazine at the time, went to the pasture three times to find Sonam Tsering. All to no avail. It was as if the pasture was hiding the talented writer.

Half a month later, the duo finally got to meet and discuss the work. Zhao helped the young man polish his novel and taught him the basics of writing until it got dark.

The novel was published in April 2006. The young man was obviously thrilled that his writing would reach readers. This sense of excitement about writing remains evident today.

Sonam Tsering expressed his gratitude for Zhao, his literary mentor, during the award ceremony on Sunday. He won the prize for the novella On the Wasteland, a story of six herders going into the mountains to kill rats and protect the pasture. It highlights the influence that modern development has on nomads.

"The novella has always been a distinct and powerful section of the Chinese literary landscape, where a number of classic works, with a national consciousness and realistic spirit, have emerged.

"The harvest of novella works has the echoes of human destiny," Sonam Tsering says of works by modern writers like Lu Xun and Shen Congwen that have led him to embrace the image of the time and the subtleness of life.

Established in 1997, the Lu Xun Literature Prize is given every four years. In its eighth edition, altogether 35 authors were awarded for works in seven categories: reportage, literary theory and criticism, short story, essay, novella, poem and translation.

Although the list of winners was announced in August, it was the first time the China Writers Association, the organizer of the prize, held an awards gala that was broadcast on satellite television and livestreamed online to promote the winning works.

During the event, the lives of the laureates, their literary experiences and reflections on writing were recounted.

Jiang Wei, a winner for the reportage award, talked about his travels to rural regions around the country since 2019, learning about the poverty alleviation effort. He was 72 years old when he started his journey.

"Setting out is a writer's most beautiful posture," he says.

The winner of the literary theory and criticism award Zhang Li says a good critic has gentleness, emotion, individuality and his or her own journey of discovery, and is a bosom friend to literature, literary works and the writers.

However, a critic should also be frank when discussing the shortcomings of a work, and be dedicated to building empathy and a precious aesthetic trust together with writers, readers and our times, she adds.

Dong Xiaqingqing's works shed light on the life and thoughts of border soldiers at Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.

"Every stroke of a short story helps us see clearly the natural landscape, heroic people and the great times, and illuminates parts of the history and details of life that we've been longing to record," she says.

Dong joined the military at 18 and was transferred to Xinjiang at 22. She recalls how she went on patrol with border soldiers in a blizzard. It was around — 20 C. Heavy winds seemed to assault them, and they could barely open their eyes.

However, when they managed to find a sheltered place to eat, the squad leader prepared her a bowl of instant noodles, while the other soldiers stuck to cold and dry food and frequently shifted position to shield her from the wind.

That moment she made up her mind to write down their stories.

In a congratulatory video, her border soldier buddies say that many plots in her novels reflect what is happening around them.

"Only someone who has lived with us could write something like that," one of them says.

Also highlighted at the ceremony were a group of pupils from a rural elementary school in Huitong county, Hunan province, and their Chinese language teacher Li Bolin, who initiated a poetry course.

Under Li's guidance, these emerging writers have created more than 1,000 poems.

Liu Yingying wrote: "On hearing people praise it, the cotton grins, opens its mouth and spits out white, soft clouds."

In her poem Blague, Long Chunru wrote: "The mosquito says, I'm so popular that once I fly out of the house, everyone applauds me."

Tie Ning, chairwoman of the China Writers Association, said during a symposium attended by award-winning authors: "When writers join hands with the Party and the people for the bright future of our nation, they will naturally be moved by the hustle and bustle of life and the lovely and respectable people.

"Their words are infused with the juice of life and carry the weight of the era."

It was announced at the gala that an award ceremony like this will be held for the Mao Dun Literature Prize, a prestigious literary award for fulllength novels that's given every four years, in Tongxiang, East China's Zhejiang province, next year.