Spanish sinologist Ana Padilla Fornieles explains why contemporary Chinese literature and ordinary lives resonate with readers around the world.
As more young writers enter overseas publishing markets, Chinese literature is offering international readers new ways to understand the country. For Spanish sinologist Ana Padilla Fornieles, who has lived in Beijing for more than a decade, this is a change she has both witnessed and taken part in.
In her view, the Chinese stories that resonate most with readers around the world often come from ordinary lives.
Ana still remembers her first days in Beijing.
“I always felt welcomed,” she recalled. Walking through the city, she noticed that strangers would look at her with curiosity because of her foreign appearance. Some would stop to talk with her, while others would simply smile and say, “Welcome, welcome.”
More than ten years later, the city has changed from a foreign place into somewhere she calls home. From learning Chinese to introducing Chinese literature to Spanish-speaking readers, Ana has continued to explore how Chinese stories can be understood by the world.
A Chinese Name, Two Identities
“Lin Shi’an” is a name Ana chose for herself. The surname “Lin” came from the Chinese writer Lin Huiyin, one of the first Chinese authors she read. The character “shi” reflects her love of literature, while “an” echoes her original name.
The name also reflects something about her relationship with Chinese literature: a search for balance between two languages and cultures.
“Honestly, people around me usually call me Ana in daily life,” she said. “I used to feel a little regretful about that. But now I feel that Lin Shi’an is more like another identity of mine, one that is closely connected with literature.”
Two names represent two sides of her life. One belongs to everyday life, while the other belongs to the literary world.
That second identity began with a decision she made at the age of 18.
“I was quite idealistic at that time,” Ana recalled.
When choosing her university major, she hoped to “see the world” in the future. She loved languages, had enjoyed reading since childhood, and had always been interested in Asian cultures. Eventually, she chose translation and interpreting.
At first, it was simply a choice of major. Later, it became a path that led her to China.
A New Generation of Chinese Literature
In Spain, the names of Chinese writers such as Mo Yan, Yu Hua and Su Tong are already familiar to many readers.
In recent years, works by younger Chinese writers, including Shuang Xuetao and Hu Anyan, have gradually reached Spanish-speaking audiences. Their writing has brought more diversity to the global understanding of Chinese literature.
Their themes, narrative styles and literary voices reflect a different generation.
“The major historical events experienced by these literary masters naturally shaped their generation,” Ana said.
However, younger writers are growing up in a different environment. With the development of the internet, they have been connected to global information flows from an early age. They have more opportunities to experience different cultures, literature and ideas through travel, study and communication.
“They inevitably face the whole world,” Ana said.
Meanwhile, this change can also be seen in their writing. In her view, if some earlier Chinese literature focused more on history, national identity and major social themes, many younger writers pay more attention to personal experiences today.
They write about a young person’s growth, loneliness in a city, and the choices ordinary people make when facing pressure in life.
Some people see this shift as a move away from grand narratives toward smaller stories.
Ana disagrees. “I strongly support this change,” she said. She is also interested in ordinary people’s lives. “The things we experience every day are not insignificant.”
For Ana, literature does not have to focus only on major historical events. A person’s confusion or an ordinary life experience can also carry universal meaning.
“Everyone faces similar questions — how to deal with uncertainty in life and how to find their own place.”
Finding Balance Between Two Languages
For Ana, translating literature is never just a process of changing words from one language to another. It is also about finding shared experiences between two cultures.
“A literary translator is, in a way, a ‘secondary writer’,” she explained. A translator needs to understand the original work and recreate it in another language, allowing readers to feel the spirit and characteristics of the original text.
She added that “preserving the value of the original work does not mean making no changes at all.”
When translating, Ana pays particular attention to one question: how to keep the uniqueness of Chinese culture while allowing overseas readers to understand it naturally.
She focuses on expressions that are deeply rooted in Chinese but can still be easily understood through images and context. For example, some idioms related to animals or farming scenes can cross cultural boundaries because readers can understand their meanings through the pictures they create.
By contrast, expressions based on historical references or those with a highly subtle and poetic style can be more challenging to translate.
Over the years, Ana has noticed that many translators used to rely on footnotes and explanations to present Chinese culture as something “exotic.”
However, she believes cultural exchange should not be built on creating distance.
“I believe readers are intelligent,” she said. “If readers can understand Western food traditions, there is no need to introduce Asian culture exotically.”
She gave jiaozi as an example. Western readers can understand words like “pizza” and “baguette,” so they can also understand “jiaozi” without extra explanations that make it seem like a mysterious foreign object.
For Ana, a good translation does not constantly remind readers that they are entering another culture. Instead, it allows them to naturally enter a different world through reading.
From Beijing Literature to Everyday Lives
After living in Beijing for more than ten years, Ana has developed a special connection with the city.
She believes the value of Beijing literature lies not only in describing the city itself, but also in helping overseas readers understand how a city is shaped by its history.
“Literature can enrich the experience of living in a foreign place,” she said.
For someone who has spent years in Beijing, works that describe changes in the city, relationships between people and everyday life have helped her better understand the place she passes through every day.
Besides Beijing literature, Ana has also become increasingly interested in Chinese works about ordinary people.
If she were to recommend one Chinese book to Spanish readers, she would choose Hu Anyan’s I Deliver Parcels in Beijing, which tells the story of an ordinary courier’s life.
“Many young people and ordinary workers in Spain today also face similar difficulties,” she said.
Life pressure, career choices, uncertainty about the future and the search for personal value are experiences that can cross cultural differences.
“A sense of vulnerability and uncertainty in human life can actually touch everyone.”
Literature Crosses the Distance Between People
Over the years, Ana has increasingly felt that ordinary people in Spain still have limited opportunities to understand China.
Media coverage often focuses on public issues such as politics and the economy. When people think about Chinese culture, they often first associate it with traditional symbols such as the Great Wall, kung fu and pandas.
Literature offers another way to see China.
It does not describe an abstract country. Instead, it tells stories about real people.
“I hope Western readers can understand today’s China through contemporary literature — a China with rich and authentic everyday lives,” she said.
What has impressed Ana most is not how different cultures can be, but how similar people often discover they are after reading. “Actually, we have more in common than differences.”
The anxiety of leaving home for the first time, uncertainty about the future, pressure at work, confusion during growth, and the value people place on family, love and friendship — these emotions do not disappear because of different languages or national borders.
This is why Ana has continued translating Chinese literature.
She hopes more Spanish readers can see a real, diverse and changing China through literature. She also hopes Chinese literature will continue reaching readers around the world — not because it is unfamiliar, but because it is genuine.
By Chenhui.
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