{"id":131944,"date":"2018-12-13T13:00:34","date_gmt":"2018-12-13T18:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=131944"},"modified":"2018-12-13T13:28:33","modified_gmt":"2018-12-13T18:28:33","slug":"yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/","title":{"rendered":"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Yan Lianke. Photo courtesy of Grove Atlantic.<\/p><\/div>\n

History, Stephen said, is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.<\/em> \u2014James Joyce, Ulysses<\/em><\/p>\n

Near the beginning of James Joyce\u2019s 1922 novel Ulysses<\/em>, Stephen Dedalus famously compares history to a nightmare. It was also in 1922 that Lu Xun penned the preface to his first short-story collection, Call to Arms<\/em> (published in 1923), in which he asks whether he should try to use his writing to wake up his fellow countrymen still trapped in the proverbial \u201ciron house\u201d of Chinese feudal values. In these almost simultaneous texts, two of the twentieth century\u2019s leading modernist authors both equated history with sleep and dreams. Whereas Joyce\u2019s Dedalus wants to awaken from the nightmare that is history, Lu Xun worries that his works might in fact succeed in rousing his blissfully oblivious readers, causing them to awaken to a state of historical awareness for which they would then have no easy remedy.<\/p>\n

Nearly a century later, Yan Lianke appeals to a similar set of oneiric metaphors in his novel The Day the Sun Died<\/em>. Centered on a fourteen-year-old boy named Li Niannian, whose parents run a shop that sells items for funeral rituals and whose uncle runs a crematorium, the story describes a night during which most of the residents of the boy\u2019s village suddenly start sleepwalking\u2014or, to translate the Chinese term for somnambulism more literally, \u201cdreamwalking.\u201d The community degenerates into chaos, as many villagers act out the urges that they had kept suppressed during their normal waking state.<\/p>\n

Like Ulysses<\/em>, which famously unfolds over the course of a single day (June 16, 1904), the main narrative of The Day the Sun Died<\/em> takes place over the course of a single night, beginning at five P.M.<\/small> on the evening of the sixth day of the sixth lunar month, and concluding early the following morning. The novel is divided into a series of \u201cbooks,\u201d each of which opens with a header that notes a temporal interval using the traditional Chinese geng-dian<\/em> system, and each book is then divided into sections that similarly open with a header that notes the corresponding temporal interval using the Western twenty-four-hour system.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Day the Sun Died<\/em> also features a character named Yan Lianke, who is a well-known author of books whose titles are permutations of novels by the real Yan Lianke. For instance, Dream of Ding Village<\/em> becomes Ding of Dream Village<\/em>, The Sunlit Years<\/em> becomes The Years of Sun<\/em>, Lenin\u2019s Kisses<\/em> becomes Kissing Lenin<\/em>, and The Four Books<\/em> becomes The Dead Books<\/em> (in Chinese, the characters for four<\/em> and death<\/em> are homonyms). The novel also includes quotes from several of these fictitious texts, all of which are variations of passages from the real Yan Lianke\u2019s corresponding works. Although knowledge of Yan Lianke\u2019s earlier works is not required to appreciate The Day the Sun Died<\/em>, it may be noted that many of these works similarly focus on the dark side of modern China\u2019s rapid development. For instance, Dream of Ding Village<\/em> is named after a fictional AIDS<\/small> village in Yan Lianke\u2019s home province of Henan, The Sunlit Years<\/em> features a \u201ccancer village\u201d in which all of the residents die of throat tumors before they turn forty, and Lenin\u2019s Kisses<\/em> is set in a remote village of disabled residents, who are exploited by a local official for financial gain. Through these fictitious communities of marginalized figures, Yan Lianke hopes to draw attention to actual communities and social phenomena that remain hidden in the shadows of contemporary China\u2019s rapid growth.<\/p>\n

Even as Yan Lianke\u2019s dark vision has brought him considerable international recognition, it has also increasingly embroiled him with China\u2019s censorship regime. In 2016 the Chinese edition of The Day the Sun Died<\/em> won Hong Kong\u2019s prestigious Dream of the Red Chamber Award, despite the fact that the novel was never published in Mainland China. Similarly, in 2014, when Yan Lianke was awarded the Franz Kafka Prize, it was in recognition of his entire oeuvre but specific recognition was given to two books translated into Czech\u2014his novella Serve the People!<\/em> and his novel The Four Books<\/em>, both banned in Mainland China. Like many of Yan Lianke\u2019s works, all three of these books were published in Taiwan by Rye Field Publishing Company, which is increasingly serving as the primary Chinese-language outlet for his works.<\/p>\n

Coincidentally, Yan Lianke was awarded the Kafka Prize the same month he began writing The Day the Sun Died<\/em>. In his acceptance speech for the prize, he tacitly anticipates some of the central motifs of that novel. He opens his speech by recalling his experience growing up during the period of China\u2019s Great Famine of the early sixties, which led him to develop \u201ca very keen appreciation of darkness.\u201d He explains that even though today\u2019s China \u201chas solved the basic problem of providing 1.3 billion people with food, clothing, and spending money, [and] therefore resembles a bright ray of light illuminating the global East,\u201d nevertheless \u201cbeneath this ray of light there lies a dark shadow. It is as if the brighter the light, the darker the shadow becomes; and the darker the shadow becomes, the thicker the corresponding sheet of darkness.\u201d He adds that he feels he is \u201cone of those people who are fated to experience darkness,\u201d and views his recent literary work as an attempt to represent and explore this darkness.<\/p>\n

Although in this speech Yan Lianke was ostensibly referring to the works he had published up to that point, his remarks about light and darkness anticipate this new novel, The Day the Sun Died<\/em>, which he had only just begun to compose. As with his metaphorical description of contemporary China as a world shrouded in darkness, in the novel he describes a community from which the sun\u2014and all hint of light\u2014has disappeared altogether.<\/p>\n

Yan Lianke caps his speech with an account of a blind man from his home village who, every morning when the sun came up, would say to himself, \u201cit turns out that sunlight is actually black\u2014but that is good!\u201d Yan Lianke adds:<\/p>\n

Even more remarkably, ever since he was young this blind man always had several flashlights, and whenever he went out at night he would always take one with him. The darker it got, the longer and brighter the beam from his flashlight would become. As a result, as he was walking through the village streets in the middle of the night, people would be able to see him coming and wouldn\u2019t run into him. Furthermore, when people encountered him, he would use his flashlight to illuminate the road in front of them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yan Lianke offers this blind man as a model for his own literary projects, suggesting that he views his literature as a figurative flashlight to help others see a light that he himself is unable to perceive:<\/p>\n

From this blind man, I came up with a new form of writing that is premised on a conviction that the darker it is, the brighter it becomes; and the colder it is, the warmer it becomes. The entire significance of this writing lies in permitting people to avoid its existence. My writing, in other words, is like the blind man with the flashlight who shines his light into the darkness to help others glimpse their goal and destination.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yan Lianke not only hopes that his literature will offer readers a metaphorical \u201clight\u201d but further hopes that this light will help readers \u201cperceive the existence of darkness<\/em>,\u201d thereby allowing them to \u201cmore effectively ward off that same darkness and suffering.\u201d<\/p>\n

In this parable of the blind man and the lamp, Yan Lianke borrows, and partially inverts, Lu Xun\u2019s famous metaphor of the iron house. Just as Yan Lianke compares his writing to a blind man with a lamp who helps guide others with a light that he himself is unable to see, Lu Xun describes how he ultimately resolved to compose stories that conclude with an optimistic twist, conveying to his readers a hope that he did not share. In this way, it may be said that Yan Lianke hopes to illuminate the darkness that underpins contemporary China, and in the process help readers wake up from what Yan, like Joyce before him, suggests is the nightmare of history.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Carlos Rojas is the translator of several books by Yan Lianke, including <\/em>The Day the Sun Died;\u00a0<\/em>The Years, Months, Days;\u00a0<\/em>The Explosion Chronicles;\u00a0<\/em>The Four Books, short-listed for the 2016 Man Booker International Prize; and <\/em>Lenin\u2019s Kisses. His other translations include Yu Hua\u2019s <\/em>Brothers, which he cotranslated with Eileen Cheng-yin Chow and which was short-listed for the 2008 Man Asian Literary Prize. He is the author of <\/em>Homesickness: Culture, Contagion, and National Reform in Modern China;<\/em>\u00a0<\/em>The Great Wall: A Cultural History;<\/em>\u00a0and <\/em>The Naked Gaze: Reflections on Chinese Modernity, as well as many articles. He is a professor in the department of Asian and Middle Eastern studies at Duke University.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cTranslator\u2019s Note\u201d copyright \u00a9 2018 by Carlos Rojas. Excerpted from <\/em>The Day the Sun Died<\/a>, by Yan Lianke, copyright \u00a9 2015 by Yan Lianke. Reprinted with the permission of the publisher, Grove Press, an imprint of Grove Atlantic, Inc. All rights reserved.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Like many of his works, Yan Lianke\u2019s \u2018The Day the Sun Died\u2019 focuses on the dark side of modern China\u2019s rapid development.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1661,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[419],"tags":[1815,947,44244,530,44243],"class_list":["post-131944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts-culture","tag-china","tag-james-joyce","tag-lu-xun","tag-translation","tag-yan-lianke"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nYan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China by Carlos Rojas<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Like many of his works, Yan Lianke\u2019s \u2018The Day the Sun Died\u2019 focuses on the dark side of modern China\u2019s rapid development.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China by Carlos Rojas\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"December 13, 2018 \u2013 Like many of his works, Yan Lianke\u2019s \u2018The Day the Sun Died\u2019 focuses on the dark side of modern China\u2019s rapid development.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-12-13T18:00:34+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2018-12-13T18:28:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"836\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"557\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Carlos Rojas\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Carlos Rojas\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"8 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Carlos Rojas\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/41867861f18252c8d01c37c3abbb6ac5\"},\"headline\":\"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-12-13T18:00:34+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-12-13T18:28:33+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/\"},\"wordCount\":1559,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"China\",\"James Joyce\",\"Lu Xun\",\"translation\",\"Yan Lianke\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Arts & Culture\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/\",\"name\":\"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China by Carlos Rojas\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-12-13T18:00:34+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-12-13T18:28:33+00:00\",\"description\":\"Like many of his works, Yan Lianke\u2019s \u2018The Day the Sun Died\u2019 focuses on the dark side of modern China\u2019s rapid development.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"description\":\"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. Since 1953.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png\",\"width\":696,\"height\":696,\"caption\":\"The Paris Review\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/parisreview\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/parisreview\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/41867861f18252c8d01c37c3abbb6ac5\",\"name\":\"Carlos Rojas\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1577ae1d6d5d22afde83887b44e6b649c4908486f87691a06c4ed8ce59e90116?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1577ae1d6d5d22afde83887b44e6b649c4908486f87691a06c4ed8ce59e90116?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Carlos Rojas\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/author\/crojas\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China by Carlos Rojas","description":"Like many of his works, Yan Lianke\u2019s \u2018The Day the Sun Died\u2019 focuses on the dark side of modern China\u2019s rapid development.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China by Carlos Rojas","og_description":"December 13, 2018 \u2013 Like many of his works, Yan Lianke\u2019s \u2018The Day the Sun Died\u2019 focuses on the dark side of modern China\u2019s rapid development.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/","og_site_name":"The Paris Review","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/","article_published_time":"2018-12-13T18:00:34+00:00","article_modified_time":"2018-12-13T18:28:33+00:00","og_image":[{"width":836,"height":557,"url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Carlos Rojas","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@parisreview","twitter_site":"@parisreview","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Carlos Rojas","Est. reading time":"8 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/"},"author":{"name":"Carlos Rojas","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/41867861f18252c8d01c37c3abbb6ac5"},"headline":"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China","datePublished":"2018-12-13T18:00:34+00:00","dateModified":"2018-12-13T18:28:33+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/"},"wordCount":1559,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg","keywords":["China","James Joyce","Lu Xun","translation","Yan Lianke"],"articleSection":["Arts & Culture"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/","name":"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China by Carlos Rojas","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg","datePublished":"2018-12-13T18:00:34+00:00","dateModified":"2018-12-13T18:28:33+00:00","description":"Like many of his works, Yan Lianke\u2019s \u2018The Day the Sun Died\u2019 focuses on the dark side of modern China\u2019s rapid development.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/yanlianke_newauthorphoto.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/13\/yan-lianke-illuminates-contemporary-china\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Yan Lianke Illuminates Contemporary China"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/","name":"The Paris Review","description":"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. Since 1953.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization","name":"The Paris Review","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png","width":696,"height":696,"caption":"The Paris Review"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/","https:\/\/x.com\/parisreview","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/parisreview"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/41867861f18252c8d01c37c3abbb6ac5","name":"Carlos Rojas","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1577ae1d6d5d22afde83887b44e6b649c4908486f87691a06c4ed8ce59e90116?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1577ae1d6d5d22afde83887b44e6b649c4908486f87691a06c4ed8ce59e90116?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Carlos Rojas"},"url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/author\/crojas\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1661"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131944"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131944\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":131955,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131944\/revisions\/131955"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}