For a Song and a Hundred Songs
A Poet's Journey Through a Chinese Prison
Book • 2011
This memoir chronicles Liao Yiwu's four-year imprisonment from 1990 to 1994 for writing and distributing a poem that condemned the Chinese government's crackdown on the Tiananmen Square protests.
The book provides a personal and poetic account of life in a Chinese prison, highlighting the cruelty, compassion, and complexities of human behavior under totalitarian rule.
It includes detailed descriptions of prison life, the author's learning to play the Xiao (a Chinese flute), and his interactions with fellow prisoners.
The book also touches on Liao's life before and after prison, including his struggles with the Chinese authorities and his eventual exile to Germany.
The book provides a personal and poetic account of life in a Chinese prison, highlighting the cruelty, compassion, and complexities of human behavior under totalitarian rule.
It includes detailed descriptions of prison life, the author's learning to play the Xiao (a Chinese flute), and his interactions with fellow prisoners.
The book also touches on Liao's life before and after prison, including his struggles with the Chinese authorities and his eventual exile to Germany.
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Liao Yiwu
Revisited: Two poems, four years in detention: the Chinese dissident who smuggled his writing out of prison
