Cross-country race

Author: Ai Wei
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2001-10-01
Features: This is a novel filled with childlike imagination and abandon. The story takes place in a real village, which corresponds to an imaginary world—Tian Zhu, a white horse left behind by the army. Tian Zhu represents the landscape deep within our hearts, the source of all miracles, and the free sanctuary for the soul. The real village depicts the changes in our lives since 1965. The white horse connects the real world and the imaginary world. The novel spans thirty years, telling the story of people's survival in the political and economic eras. The author endows life with surreal fantasy, deformation, and exaggeration, giving the novel world a mythical aura. As people "run" along their journey, human wisdom, foolishness, desires, passions, and creativity are presented in astonishing ways, just like "a cross-country race without a direction."