Ouyang Yu

7.43 p.m.

 
 
Went to give a talk at the school where Man Chen is teaching. Had a haircut after dinner. Otherwise, daily details are not worth recording. One lives from day to day. One writes. But how much of his writing lasts? Very little. If it does, he won’t know. One just fills in, hoping to win. Why win? Doesn’t one win from day to day if he doesn’t die, doesn’t fall ill? He already wins. Why win more than mere living? Mere living from day to day? What is the obsession? Why the obsession? Youth is a forest of mistakes. Old age is a forest of corrections. Two forests, standing side by side. Looking across a barren field of lived landscape. A to-live landscape. Love is nothing but a sob. An orgasmic sob. Absorb? Abhor? Abhsorb? Love is nothing but an abhsorb.
 
 
 
 

Ouyang Yu has published 105 books in both English and Chinese in the field of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, literary translation, and criticism. His second book of English poetry, Songs of the  Last Chinese Poet, was shortlisted for the 1999 NSW Premier’s Literary Award. His third novel, The English Class, won the 2011 NSW Premier’s Award, and his translation in Chinese of The Fatal Shore by Robert Hughes won the Translation Award from the Australia-China Council in 2014. He is now professor of English at the Shanghai University of International Business and Economics in China.