Xie Xiangnan

Xie Xiangnan
謝湘南
Born1974 (age 51–52)
Leiyang Village, Hunan, China
OccupationPoet

Xie Xiangnan (謝湘南) is a Chinese poet and member of the Post 70s Generation of Chinese avant-garde artists.[1][2] He is often associated with the migrant-worker or battler poetry movement (dagong shige / 打工诗歌 in Mandarin)[3], a working-class literary movement originating in post-socialist industrial China.[1][4][5][6] Xie is the author of five poetry collections, including The History of Allergy[7] and Poetic Life in Shenzhen.[6] English translations of Xie's poetry may be found in the collection Iron Moon: An Anthology of Chinese Worker Poetry, edited by Qin Xiaoyu and translated by Eleanor Goodman.[4]

Life

Born in 1974 in rural Hunan, in the early 1990s Xie moved first to Zhejiang and then Shenzhen in search of work.[2][8] He worked for much of his twenties in different manual labour jobs, including on the assembly lines at a toy factory and an electronics factory, at a paper mill and as a construction worker, moving between jobs in Shenzhen and nearer to his hometown.[8][9]

Xie wrote poetry throughout this period, winning a 1995 poetry competition in Shaanxi, and after submitting work to the National Poetry Journal was invited to participate in the Youth Poetry Conference in 1997.[2] In 2003, he got a job as a reporter and editor for the Southern Metropolis Daily,[6][8] and has since drawn his primary income from writing work.[2]

He lives and works in Shenzhen,[6] and in 2021 was elected president of the Luhou District Writer's Association.[10] In January 2025, he was awarded the 9th Lishan Poetry Prize.[11][12]

Poetry

Xie's poetry is known for its witty and ironic style,[9][1] drawing on imagery of machinery, bodies and industrial environments.[13][14]

Much of his early writing testifies to the gruelling and precarious nature of rural-urban migration in China, contrasting the utopian imagery of national dreams with explotative working conditions[15][16]. He also makes use of the terse, technical language of factory reports to document the often dangerous conditions that he and fellow workers are exposed to, as in the poem "Work Accident Joint Investigative Report", which describes a young female worker losing her fingers to a faulty machine.[17][8]

Xie's later writing makes more abstract use of language,[9] and draws influence from the urban environment of Shenzhen. His 2018 collection Poetic Life in Shenzhen elaborates on his complex relationship to the city, describing himself as a "poet nurtured by the environment of Shenzhen", in spite of his traumatic early years there.[6] He has objected to the categorisation of his poetry as 'migrant worker' poetry, preferring to be referred to simply as a poet.[1]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d van Crevel, Maghiel (12 December 2017). "Walk on the Wild Side: Snapshots of the Chinese Poetry Scene". MCLC Resource Center. Retrieved 13 December 2025.
  2. ^ a b c d van Crevel, Maghiel (1 January 2017). "The Cultural Translation of Battlers Poetry (Dagong shige)". Journal of Modern Literature in Chinese 現代中文文學學報. 14 (2). ISSN 1026-5120. Retrieved 13 December 2025.
  3. ^ History, Working Class (12 September 2024). "WCL 7-9: Chinese migrant worker poetry". Working Class History. Retrieved 14 December 2025.
  4. ^ a b Iron Moon: An Anthology of Chinese Worker Poetry. Buffalo New York: White Pine Press. 2016. ISBN 9781945680038.
  5. ^ van Crevel, Maghiel (October 2021). "No One in Control? China's Battler Poetry". Comparative Critical Studies. 18 (2–3): 165–185. doi:10.3366/ccs.2021.0401. hdl:1887/3270703.
  6. ^ a b c d e "SZ In The Eyes of a Migrant-Worker Poet". www.eyeshenzhen.com.
  7. ^ Xiangnan, Xie (2012). The History of Allergy. 阳光出版社 (Sunshine Publishing House). p. 209. ISBN 9787552500783.
  8. ^ a b c d "Remembering the Anonymous". Asian American Writers' Workshop. 6 December 2018.
  9. ^ a b c Iovene, Paola; Picerni, Federico (24 February 2022). "Chinese Workers' Literature in the 20th and 21st Centuries". Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature. doi:10.1093/acrefore/9780190201098.013.1260.
  10. ^ Wei, Peina (2021-05-25). "Poet Xie Xiangnan Elected as President of Luohu District Writers Association". www.toutiao.com. Shenzhen Business Daily. Retrieved 13 December 2025.
  11. ^ Zhen, Cao. "A unique poetry meeting held at Xiangmi Park". www.eyeshenzhen.com. Retrieved 13 December 2025.
  12. ^ "学会资讯 | 第九届栗山诗会暨中国诗歌田野调查香蜜公园·香蜜湖写作计划举办".
  13. ^ "Bodies on the Line". The Poetry Foundation.
  14. ^ Sorace, Christian (11 May 2020). "Poetry after the Future". Made in China Journal.
  15. ^ Lawrence, Lee (13 May 2022). "'The Subplot' Review: Creativity and Censorship in China". The Wall Street Journal.
  16. ^ Walsh, Megan (June 2017). "China's Migrant Worker Poetry". Asia-Pacific Journal. 15 (17). doi:10.1017/S1557466017037718.
  17. ^ Albu, Raluca (June 2018). ""Iron Moon: An Anthology of Chinese Worker Poetry (Why This Book Should Win)"". Rochester University.
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