Gao Xingjian was born on January 4, 1940 in Ganzhou (Jiangxi province) in eastern China. Today, Xingjian is a French citizen. He's a writer of prose, translator, dramatist, director, critic, and more...

As a playwright, he has introduced absurdist and "avant-garde "ideas to a Chinese audience. His first job was as a translator on the French-language edition of "Chinese Reconstructs" (he took a degree from the French Department of Foreign Languages in Beijing). He spent five years in a cadre school during the Cultural Revolution and later worked as a translator in the Chinese Writers Association.

He published his first novella in 1978. In 1981, he transferred to the People's Art Troupe as a writer, and has written numerous plays, of which the most famous and abstract is "Chezhan" ("The Bus-stop, "1983). Other works include: "A Pigeon Called Red Beak" (1985), "Collected Plays" (1985), "Wild Man" (1985), and "In Search of a Modern Form of Dramatic Representation" (1987). He now lives in France. Many of his works have been translated into English, Swedish and French.

If one of the criteria for a great writer includes that his books have been banned, Xingjian fits well in the ranks of the greats... "The Other Shore" was banned in 1986; and since then, none of his plays have been performed in China.

In the Press Release, the Swedish Academny states that Gao Xingjian's "great novel "Soul Mountain" is one of those singular literary creations that seem impossible to compare with anything but themselves."

Here's an excerpt from the first chapter of his book, "Soul Mountain":

The hunter is already myth. To talk about a mixture of history and legend is how folk stories are born. Reality exists only through experience, and it must be personal experience. However, once related, even personal experience becomes a narrative. Reality can’t be verified and doesn’t need to be, that can be left for the reality of life experts to debate. What is important is life. Reality is simply that I am sitting by the fire in this room which is black with grime and smoke and that I see the light of the fire dancing in his eyes. Reality is myself, reality is only the perception of this instant and it can’t be related to another person. All that needs to be said is that outside, a mist is enclosing the green-blue mountain in a haze and your heart is reverberating with the rushing water of a swift-flowing stream.

According to the Swedish Academy, "Soul Mountain" is a novel of a pilgrimage made by the protagonist to himself and a journey along the reflective surface that divides fiction from life, imagination from memory. The discussion of the problem of knowledge increasingly takes the form of a rehearsal of freedom from goals and meaning. Through its polyphony, its blend of genres and the scrutiny that the act of writing subjects itself to, the book recalls German Romanticism’s magnificent concept of a universal poetry."

Gao Xingjian is also known for his second novel, "One Man's Bible". Although the themes are in line with his previous book, apparently, this book is more accessible. Here he draws from his own experiences in China: "With ruthless candour the author accounts for his experiences as a political activist, victim and outside observer, one after the other" (Swedish Academy Press Release).

So, the work of Gao Xingjian will be remembered for all time, “for an œuvre of universal validity, bitter insights and linguistic ingenuity, which has opened new paths for the Chinese novel and drama.”

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