Editorial: Lanzhou Police Cross Provinces to Arrest a Group of Female College Students Writing Novels

Translated from 李宇琛:兰州警方跨省抓了一群写小说的女大学生 Translator’s note: China Digital Times (CDT; Chinese: 中国数字时代) is a California-based 501(c)(3) organization that runs a bilingual news website covering China. [404 Archive] Li Yuche...

June 1, 2025 · someone

Author's Narrative: Pseudonym 135

Orignal Chinese Version 2025-05-31 I am going to Lanzhou next week, feeling desperate. I finally gained a few readers who like me after starting writing. When I was happy to meet those loving readers and friends, what they tipped me became the ironclad evidence of my profiteering. I just passed the postgraduate entrance examination this year, found a temporary job, and made plans with friends to go out for a trip and wait for the start of school in September....

May 31, 2025 · someone

Author's Narrative: Pseudonym 132

Original Chinese Version 2025-05-30 I am the author of ….. There are many things I want to say, but I keep writing and deleting them over and over again…They gave me some warnings, I cannot say anything related. For the first time, I learned that even without drinking water, a person can cry so many tears. Almost every night, I suffer from insomnia.When I finally fell asleep, the nightmares woke me up and I was back to that day again....

May 30, 2025 · someone

Author's Narrative: Pseudonym 137

Orignal Chinese Version 2025-05-30 I’ve lived like an orphan for decades—gritting my teeth and getting through it all on my own, carrying a body full of pain and illness. But I’m still standing strong. Just a few days ago, I joked with my bestie: maybe I should start preparing clothes for all four seasons—because if I really do end up in prison, you’ll be the only one bringing me something to wear....

May 30, 2025 · someone

Author's Narrative: Pseudonym 133

Original Chinese Version Translator’s note: The police have issued summoning orders to writers living outside Lanzhou and they’re legally bound to travel there. No financial aid for traveling either if you cannot afford it you just become a criminal by not showing up. 2025-05-30 In the past twenty years of my life, I may have never thought that the first time I were to fly would be to get to the police station in Lanzhou....

May 30, 2025 · someone

Author's Narrative: Pseudonym 135

Orignal Chinese Version 2025-05-29 When [incomprehensible] I really felt how absurd this world is. Sometimes I even wonder if one of my readers might be from my university too. I was even taken away right on campus in front of my friends, who watched as the officers followed me up to the dorm and searched my stuff. Back then I felt like I had completely lost face. Luckily, those were some of the very few closet friends I had, and they already knew I wrote fiction online....

May 29, 2025 · someone

Author's Narrative: Pseudonym 131

Original Chinese Version Translator’s note: The police have issued summoning orders to writers living outside Lanzhou and they’re legally bound to travel there. No financial aid for traveling either if you cannot afford it you just become a criminal by not showing up. 2025-05-16 Yesterday, I finished my one-day trip to Lanzhou. I took a rest for the whole day. When asked what my biggest thought is, it will probably be that I left too hastily, Lanzhou was so cold, and I was still wearing a short-sleeved shirt from Chongqing....

May 16, 2025 · someone

Article | The Haitang Incident 2024 and the ugliness of danmei culture/industry

The Haitang Incident 2024 and the ugliness of danmei culture/industry Liang Ge Open access | Research article https://doi.org/10.1177/13675494251326775 First published online March 19, 2025 Abstract The Haitang Incident of 2024 exposed the precariousness of danmei (boys’ love) culture and its creators in China under the dual pressures of state surveillance and platform capitalism. I critically interrogate the Chinese danmei cultural ecology through ugliness – not as a state-imposed stigma but as a critical lens and a generative conceptual tool....

March 19, 2025 · someone

Mo Xiang Tong Xiu Reportedly Sentenced to Three Years — Is This the End of the Golden Era for Danmei Adaptations?

Translated from 墨香铜臭传获刑三年,耽改IP的好日子到头了吗 Translator’s note: The Paper (Chinese: 澎湃新闻; lit. ‘Surging News’) is a Chinese digital newspaper owned and run by the state-owned Shanghai United Media Group. Mo Xiang Tong Xiu Reportedly Sentenced to...

November 16, 2020 · someone

CNN: Chinese writer sentenced to 10 years in prison for homoerotic book

Original Post on CNN, 2018-11-19 Beijing(CNN) - A Chinese novelist has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for writing and distributing homoerotic novels, provoking widespread debate online over the severity of her sentence. The female writer, surnamed Liu, but more commonly known by her internet pseudonym Tianyi, was arrested in 2017 following the success of her novel “Occupy,” according to reports in Chinese state media. The book was described by police in East China’s Anhui Province as depicting “obscene sexual behavior between males” set to themes of “violence, abuse and humiliation....

November 19, 2018 · someone