Xu Jilin on Chinese Young People and Grand Narratives

New on the site this time: an interview Xu Jilin on Chinese young people, titled “Those Born in the 1990s and 2000s No Longer Believe in Great Narratives.” The pretext for the interview is the recent publication of Xu’s new book on generations in modern Chinese intellectual history, but Xu talks less about the book and more about China’s contemporary social and intellectual scene, which he views as quite bleak. Appropriately, I guess, the interview was taken down by censors shortly after it was posted.

On a personal note, over the past few months I largely stopped translating so that I could finish up my book manuscript based on Reading the China Dream, and I submitted the manuscript in July. Publishing can be a risky business, so I’ll say no more about the details of publication at this juncture. Returning to Reading the China Dream after finishing up my manuscript, I admit to a certain project fatigue. Like the marathoner who takes the winter off only to find that their muscles resist the road when spring rolls around, I feel a near physical resistance when my fingers approach the keyboard.

I have not stopped translating entirely. I am working with Xiang Biao and his team to translate the follow-up to Self as Method, a volume called Hello Stranger which should come out in translation some time in 2026 (and which echoes some of Xu Jilin’s concerns about China’s young people). I am hopeful that this will lead me to more diaspora literature.
So Reading the China Dream will soldier on, if at a more sedate pace.

​At the same time, I am looking for a retirement home for the site. As things stand, were I to perish tomorrow, the site would disappear as soon as no one paid the bills my platform sends every few months. I don’t think it’s just my ego talking when I say that site has done some good in the world and should continue to be available in something like its present form (in other words, 10 volumes of printed translation gathering dust on some library shelf would not be very useful). I am in discussion with a number of institutions but am open to suggestions from readers as to where to park the site.