Red Dust

by Ma Jian, Flora Drew, William Rycroft (Narrator)

In 1983, Ma Jian turned 30 and was overwhelmed by the desire to escape the confines of his life in Beijing. Deng Xiaoping was clamping down on 'Spiritual Pollution'; young people were rebelling.

With his long hair, jeans and artistic friends, Ma Jian was under surveillance. One day he bought a train ticket to the westernmost border of China and set off in search of himself.

Audible Audio

Published January 9, 2014

About the author

Ma Jian was born in Qingdao,China on the 18th of August 1953. In 1986, Ma moved to Hong Kong after a clampdown by the Chinese government in which most of his works were banned.

He moved again in 1997 to Germany, but only stayed for two years; moving to England in 1999 where he now lives with his partner and translator Flora Drew.

Ma came to the attention of the English-speaking world with his story collection Stick Out Your Tongue Stories, translated into English in 2006.

His Beijing Coma tells the story of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 from the point of view of the fictional Dai Wei, a participant in the events left in a coma by the violent end of the protests. His most recent novel China Dream will be published in the US in May 2019.