Writing the village as universe

Wei Sixiao, 38, speaks after winning first prize in the Blancpain-Imaginist Literary Prize. [Photo provided to China Daily] Wei Sixiao has won the 2024 Blancpain-Imaginist Literary Prize for his novel Tu Guang Cun Mu (Vast land, Small Tree), beating other four shortlisted writers. Cofounded in 2018 by Swiss luxury watch brand Blancpain and Chinese publisher Imaginist, the annual prize was established to shed light on Chinese writers under 45. The winner receives a cash prize of 300,000 yuan ($42,022), and a Blancpain watch. Leung Man-tao (left), chief consultant of Imaginist, interacts with the five finalists of the 2024 Blancpain-Imaginist Literary Prize. [Photo provided to China Daily] The theme of this year’s award was “Where is the originality in literature?” According to Leung Man-tao, chief consultant of Imaginist, with the theme, the award chose to inspire people to explore the experiences and creativity that define us as individuals, especially in the context of being surrounded by the cocoon of information, big data, and artificial intelligence. The evaluation committee, which is composed each year of different writers, literary critics, and a celebrity reader from another field, consisted of poet and literary critic Zhang Dinghao, actor-director Joan Chen, writer Shuang Xuetao, who won the award in 2020, Xu Zidong, former director of Department of Chinese at Lingnan University, and writer Luo Yijun. Representing the jury, Xu delivered the award speech for the 38-year-old’s winning entry. “Focusing on a village, rather than a single character or event, the book makes use of meticulous realism to carry on the tradition of Sheng Si Chang ( The Field of Life and Death , by Xiao Hong). “It deepens and develops the mainstream of Chinese rural literature in terms of space. In terms of time, it not only narrates the lives of farmers over the past few decades, as seen in Huo Zhe (To Live, by Yu Hua) and Pingfan De Shijie (Ordinary World, by Lu Yao), but also keeps pace with the times by depicting new rural scenes: tractors harvesting corn, farmers using social media, township elections and nursing homes. “Amid the changes to the […]

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