20 Facts About Qiu Xiaolong

Qiu Xiaolong is a Chinese American crime novelist, poet, translator, critic, and academic.

Qiu Xiaolong's father taught himself how to make perfume and started a small perfume factory in Shanghai.

The Red Guard searched their home for two days, taking away anything regarded as decadent ; Qiu Xiaolong's mother had a nervous breakdown, from which she never really recovered.

Qiu Xiaolong's father came home at times with bruises from being attacked at work.

Ironically, Qiu Xiaolong says, "The Red Guard's approval of my father's confession gave me some confidence in my writing".

The brother is still hospitalized, and Qiu Xiaolong makes regular trips to Shanghai to visit him.

At age 16, Qiu Xiaolong would have been sent to the countryside to be "re-educated", but was allowed to stay in Shanghai because he suffered from bronchitis.

Qiu Xiaolong began writing poems in Chinese in 1978, studying under the poet Bian Zhilin.

Qiu Xiaolong was impressed by the astounding social changes in the country, with newly minted capitalists becoming darlings and old socialist norms fading.

Up to 2019, Qiu Xiaolong has written eleven Inspector Chen novels.

Qiu Xiaolong goes back regularly to visit, watches Chinese TV via satellite, and reads Chinese newspapers over the internet.

In many of the Inspector Chen novels, Qiu Xiaolong portrays traditional Shanghai life amidst the old alleyways and how it is rapidly disappearing with modernization.

Qiu Xiaolong writes about Chinese cuisine in his novels, which gives Western readers a glimpse into Chinese food culture, and the Chinese people, as the Chinese people in Qiu Xiaolong's novels are not portrayed as the stereotypical characters who are ignorant and foolish, living an exotic lifestyle.

Furthermore, following Bian's footstep, Qiu Xiaolong started to write novels in English as Bian was writing English novels instead of Chinese novels.

Qiu Xiaolong believes it is an advantage rather than a disadvantage to write from a distance, which reflects the fact that he is writing about China from a distance.

Qiu Xiaolong's work has been criticized by Chinese critics and readers who claim that his depiction of China is not real as his target audience is primarily Western readers.

Some Chinese critics have complained that Qiu Xiaolong's content plays to orientalism that appeals to Western perceptions of China, utilizing cultural elements like folklore, ancient poetry, and cuisine.

Qiu Xiaolong has claimed that since the Communist party has taken over control of the media, the internet has become an important and effective way for people to speak out for justice in spite of constant censorship.

Qiu Xiaolong has argued that political reform in China would be impossible despite dramatic economic changes.

Qiu Xiaolong has commented that his love of incorporating authentic regional Chinese food into his fiction is related to feelings of nostalgia, such as Marcel Proust famously does in Remembrance of Things Past; and that traditional food in present China still exists because of the food-safety scandals.