“THE great novel of our times has yet to be written,” writer Mo Yan says at the awards ceremony of the Eighth Mao Dun Literature Prize, held Monday at the National Center for the Performing Arts in Beijing. “It is out there, beckoning us, but the path to it remains unclear,” he adds.

Mo, together with Zhang Wei, Liu Xinglong, Bi Feiyu and Liu Zhenyun, won this year’s Mao Dun Literature Prize, the country’s most prestigious literary prize for novels, awarded every four years. For the first time, since the establishment of the prize in 1982, each winner was given 500,000 yuan (US$78,200).

The five award-winning novels all deal with different themes.

“You Are on the Highland” by Zhang recounts the vicissitudes experienced by four generations of the same family over 100 years of the nation’s political and social transformation.

“Sky Walker” by Liu Xinglong narrates the struggles and hopes of “citizen-managed” teachers — teachers in rural schools who are not subsidized by the government and have to survive on what the village heads give them — in a mountain village.

“Frog” by Mo examines the country’s family-planning policy through the life of a rural gynecologist, who is based on his own aunt.

“Massage” by Bi centers on the lives of a group of blind masseurs.

“A Sentence Is Worth Thousands” by Liu Zhenyun explores the theme of loneliness in a society without religion, where man is in constant search of someone to talk to.

The five novels sold out both in bookstores and online bookshops, soon after the results were announced Aug. 20. Publishers of the five novels have confirmed that tens of thousands of copies have been printed to meet demand.

According to Zhao Ping, director of Contemporary Literature Editing Room, People’s Literature Publishing House, Liu’s “Sky Walker” and Bi’s “Massage” were bestsellers even before the awards were announced. She says 50,000 additional copies printed for each sold out within a month of the announcement. Total sales for each book are put at more than 100,000.

Over the three decades since the prize was introduced, 38 novels have won the honor. Statistics from People’s Literature Publishing House, which has published 17 of the 38 winners, shows that total sales volume of the 17 titles has exceeded 6.5 million.

Among them, the top three are “White Deer Plain” by Chen Zhongshi with 1.35 million copies sold, “Red Poppies” by A Lai with 0.96 million copies sold, and “Hibiscus Town” by Gu Hua with 0.86 million copies sold.

(SD-Agencies)