China’s Mo Yan, 57, received the 2012 Nobel Prize in Literature along with $1.2 million, making him the second Chinese writer to receive the award. To many, he is best known for his novel, Red Sorghum, from 1987. The prize committee cited Yan for his “hallucinatory realism [that] merges folk tales, history and the contemporary.”

Yan, a controversial and often banned writer, is praised for his representations of rural life and women in China. His other well-known books include Big Breasts & Wide Hips, Life & Death are Wearing Me Out, and The Garlic Ballads. This award is expected by many to be a big boost to China’s national mentality regarding its cultural and artistic accomplishments.

Yan told British literary magazine, Granta, that he uses magical realism in his work to subvert and avoid censorship, saying “a writer can inject their own imagination to isolate them from the real world or maybe they can exaggerate the situation—making sure it is bold, vivid and has the signature of our real world.” Mo Yan, a pen name, means “Don’t Speak.” The author’s real name is Guan Moye.

Last year’s winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature was Swedish poet Tomas Transtromer.

Sources: The New York Times, USA Today, Granta

Photo taken from The Nation.