Book reveals humble past of MIT postdoctoral fellow

Chinese author He Jiang and his book Zouchu Zijide Tiankong (Walking Out a Way of My Own). The book's English version will be published shortly in the US in novel format. [Photo provided to China Daily]

"It's not just a memoir about myself, but about my family and the rural life I lived in the village.

"With the modernization of China, some traditional lifestyles have fallen by the wayside. People living in the city may have a sense of curiosity and alienation about country life," He says.

"So by writing this book, I answered two simple questions: How did country folks live a life? And what is the real rural life?

"I hope the rural life and people I wrote about in the stories could arouse the nostalgia of those who are rural-to-urban migrants and might be able to record the era that is now closing."

He atypically wrote the draft in English. "Because translating English into Chinese would be easier," He says.

After finishing the draft, He translated it into Chinese himself. Editors in China and the US advanced the draft in different directions.

The prose style of the draft has been kept for the Chinese version; for the English version, "the book will be adapted into a novel in consideration of American readers' preference, which will be published as a co-written novel", says He.

In May 2016, the biochemistry PhD delivered a speech representing Harvard's 13 graduate and professional schools at the commencement.

"After only five years, I changed, the people I mentioned in my stories changed, and the rural life in China changed," He says.

"For those who know only the China of present-day Beijing and Shanghai, He Jiang's memoir is a vivid introduction to the (almost) lost world of rural China," writes Ferguson.

"His own story is an inspiring one of academic ascent, from his father's farmyard to Harvard Yard. But it is his vivid portrayal of the life he left behind that I most admire. Although a scientist by training, He is a memoirist of great skill, whose light and yet affecting touch put me in mind of the young Chekhov."

McGrath says: "He Jiang has accomplished a most spectacular and wonderful memoir that will soon become a cultural classic, telling of how it is that education changes lives."

"The book is a beautifully rendered account of a rural childhood and the mystery of human ambition; it speaks of how a young man became one of the leading research scientists in our postmodern world," McGrath writes.