MO YAN

China

Biography

Mo Yan was born February 17, 1955 in Shandong province, China, is an author steming from a farmers family and known in the West for two of his novels which were the basis of the film Red Sorghum. He left school during the Cultural Revolution to work in a factory that produced oil. He joined the People's Liberation Army at age twenty, and began writing while he was still a soldier, in 1981. Three years later, he was given a teaching position at the Department of Literature in the Army's Cultural Academy. In 2006, he received the Fukuoka Asian Culture Prize XVII. His works include The Garlic Ballads, The Republic of Wine: A Novel, Red Sorghum, Shifu: You'll Do Anything for a Laugh, and Big Breasts & Wide Hips."Mo Yan", meaning "don't speak" in Chinese, is a pen name. His real name is Guan Moye.

Bibliography

• Red Sorghum, 1987
• The Republic of Wine: A Novel , 1992
• The Garlic Ballads, 1995
• Big Breasts & Wide Hips,1996
• Shifu: You'll Do Anything for a Laugh, a collection of short stories, 2002