★A Book of Clarity for Young Readers!
Positive answers to life's contradictions: With a clear mind, it untangles the complexities of the world.
Seeing through the essence of life, it captures the changes of the times and society through the myriad aspects of human existence.
★Aphorisms That Illuminate Life.
Each story leaves readers with a sense of sudden clarity. The stories, rich in the diversity of human life, feature Liang Xiaosheng's sharp personal style. He points out, for example, that "unfulfilled long-term desires can become more intense and turn into a tormenting longing" and "people live in reality." These pithy sentences resonate strongly with readers and offer profound insights.
★Includes Original Works of Film and Television: The book vividly brings to life its characters, making it highly readable.
It includes excellent works such as "Zhai Ziqing" and "Ulcer". Among them, "A Street in the Western Suburb" was adapted into the TV series "Inside and Outside the City", and "Zhai Ziqing" was adapted into the TV series "Annihilation", both of which received good ratings and critical acclaim!

Revealing the true meaning of life amidst the ups and downs of time.
Highlightsing the pursuit and awakening of the next generation through grand history and the joys and sorrows of life.

This book collects short stories by Liang Xiaosheng, including "Life Is Not a Dream", "A Street in the Western Suburb", "Zhai Ziqing", and "Long-term Desire". It tells the stories of people from different eras and backgrounds, their ideals and pursuits, and the twists and turns of their fates. Through scenes of unity, mutual help and joyful farces, it portrays the struggles of ordinary people under the vast changes of times, their hardships and tears in their own historical eras.
Even in the face of life's helplessness and tricks, they still hold on and fight, showing a glimpse into the subtleties of human nature and filled with thoughts and expectations for society.

Liang Xiaosheng

He was born in 1949 in Harbin with ancestral roots in Rongcheng, Shandong. He is a renowned contemporary Chinese writer and scholar. Currently, he serves as a senior professor at the School of Humanities of Beijing Language and Culture University, a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), and a researcher at the Central Research Institute of Culture and History. To date, he has authored over ten million words of literary works, including essays, novels, commentaries, and documentary literature. His representative works include "Tonight There’s a Snowstorm", "The Rings of Time", and "Educated Youth". In 2019, he won the 10th Mao Dun Literature Prize for his novel "A Lifelong Journey".

Life Is Not a Dream
Long-term Desire
Complaining
Certificate
A Question
A Car
The Remains of the Old House
Zhai Ziqing
Ulcer
In the City
The Citizens of Building No. 7
A Street in the Western Suburb

In this life, it's almost inevitable that one will be muddled a few times. When older folks get muddled, they can be quite stubborn about it, and there's really no cure for that!
After waking up from his nap, Ma Defu sat on the edge of his bed with his legs dangling, staring blankly as if in a daze. Suddenly, tears streamed down his aged face, and he began to sob audibly. He had a dream in which he became young again, playing with his childhood friends under the Hulu Mountain behind his old village, herding cattle, playing the flute while riding on the animal's back, splashing in the river, climbing trees to pick wild fruits, and searching for bird eggs — what joy and freedom! But upon waking, facing the white wall, everything vanished. He was alone on the bed, holding not a bamboo flute but an itch-scratcher, a so-called "old man's joy". Realizing that he was already sixty-seven and unsure when he might return to his hometown again, a wistful longing for his hometown touched him deeply. He felt that in his late years, everything seemed to go against his wishes. A wave of desolate, sorrowful melancholy washed over him, and he couldn't hold back his tears. Strong-willed all his life, he couldn't control himself at this moment.
This retired construction worker hadn't been back to his hometown in a full forty-eight years. His hometown was a small village near the sea in Shandong. The villagers both fished and farmed. His family had been a single heir for several generations. When he was six, one day his parents set out to sea in a rickety boat to fish and encountered a typhoon; they never returned. More than a dozen poor families in the village swore an oath, each taking turns to raise him for half a year, determined to bring up this poor orphan until he could support himself. At the age of twelve, he began working part-time for a wealthy household. At fifteen, he rolled up his tattered bedding and secretly followed a traveling circus that passed through the village, heading to the Northeast.
In the Northeast, he dug for ginseng, panned for gold, and was conscripted as a laborer by the Japanese. He had been to the deep forests and old towns, as well as the large and small cities of the three northeastern provinces, wherever the railway reached. He had even been to places that no railway line could reach. Yet no matter where he wandered, he never forgot his hometown or the people there. He endured much hardship and could bear all sorts of suffering. He aimed to exchange his hardships for a better life. He wanted to earn a considerable amount of money through his own strength, return to his hometown to buy a house and land, and become the first wealthy person in his family. Only by becoming rich could he repay his fellow villagers and help the poor. This principle seemed so simple and clear to him back then. For this, he wasn't sure exactly how much money he needed to earn. Anyway, he saved every penny he earned through hard work and sweat, except for the most frugal food and clothing. The poor called this way of saving "pinching and saving."
Forty-eight years passed. From the puppet state to socialism, he hadn't managed to save any money. Nor had he been able to return to his hometown once. Although the purpose of saving money was no longer to buy a house and land in his hometown and become wealthy, but simply to fulfill a long-cherished wish — to go home and visit those relatives who had raised him. The older he got, the more he longed to do so, almost as much as he missed his own parents.
In those forty-eight years, how many opportunities to return to his hometown did he miss or lose! The first time was in Jiamusi, where he encountered a young countrywoman holding a child, with a grass tag in her hair, selling herself and her child. The woman wasn't particularly beautiful, but her facial features were decent, with distinct facial features. And she was crying as if her heart would break. She sobbed and told her story: she was from Jilin Province, with the surname Guan. Her husband had gone to the city looking for work but hadn't returned in three years, with no news at all. Her hometown was suffering from a disaster, and the peasants couldn't survive. She had been deceived by someone who promised to help her find her husband, only to be sold to a brothel. She had only three days left to pay the ransom; otherwise, she would be forced into prostitution. She would rather die with her child than go to such a place. She was willing to be a servant for life to whoever would pay her ransom...
Feeling a fellow wanderer's plight, the man from Shandong was moved by compassion. He took the woman and her child back to his shabby mud hut, tore open his pillow, and took out the money he had painstakingly saved over the years.