Can Xue, a Chinese novelist who started writing again at age 30

 Can Xue, a Chinese novelist who started writing again at age 30

She is a Chinese novelist who is little known in her own country and was widely predicted to win this year's Nobel Prize in Literature.

Even though Norway's Jon Fosse ultimately took home the prize, Can Xue's name is now much more well-known.

One of the most chaotic times in the 20th Century helped to mold her early years.

Can Xue, one of eight children, was a teenager when the Cultural Revolution began, plunging China into almost a decade of anarchy and carnage.

Her father, an editorial director for a newspaper, was condemned to the countryside and had to do menial labor during the Communist purge. The same was required of her mother, who worked for the same magazine.

She, her brothers, and their grandmother were forced to fend for themselves when her parents were taken away. They subsisted on weeds collected from the highlands and pumpkin blossoms. They eventually resorted to eating old garments from Can Xue's father, including a mink coat. Her grandma suffered from malnutrition and overwork before passing away from an oedema.

Can Xue only completed elementary school since she was unable to continue her studies. She didn't start writing again until she was approaching 30.

Deng Xiaohua, better known by his pen name Can Xue, was born in Hunan province in 1953. Can Xue is a fusion of East and West.

She was up surrounded by philosophical books that belonged to her father, a Marxist scholar.

But all changed with the Cultural Revolution, which was an initiative of the country's then-leader Mao Zedong to purge society of anti-communist economic, traditional, and cultural forces.

Her parents were one of the millions of victims of a broad variety of atrocities committed all around the nation, including public humiliation, arbitrary detention, torture, and property confiscation.

the guy who captured the Cultural Revolution in China on film

Cultural Revolution: A forgotten memory

This meant that she was no longer given the chance to pursue formal schooling. She still enjoyed reading and writing, however. As she worked at numerous professions, she started teaching herself English and started reading a lot of Western literature. She worked as a teacher, a tailor for herself, and even as an unregistered "barefoot doctor" in a Chinese town.

Her avant-garde writing style, which has distinguished her from other Chinese writers and mostly barred her from success, did not emerge until the 1980s.

According to Chen Xiaozhen, a reporter at her publisher Hunan Wenyi, "[Her] style [puts off] many readers, but also making Can Xue unique," according to a South China Morning Post story.

She has hundreds of published novels, novellas, and short tales to her credit today, many of which have been translated into English.

Her fiction book The Last Lover took home the Best Translated Book Award in 2015. Her work of fiction Love in the New Millennium had previously on the International Booker prize longlist.

She cites famous Western authors including Dante, Kafka, Tolstoy, and Shakespeare as key inspirations.

She reportedly said, "My ideas grow up in the West, but I dig them up to transplant in China's deep soil, a rich history of 5,000 years," in an essay published on the government-run website China Internet Information Centre.

"My creations are entirely original; they are not like those from the West or from China. My heart belongs to Chinese culture. I was created here. I'm a local. I don't have to learn what my heart already knows.

Can Xue would have been the second Chinese author to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, after writer Mo Yan, who took home the award in 2012.

Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, and Haruki Murakami were among the giants she faced up against, yet Can Xue was one of the betting favorites this year.

The winner gets 11 million Swedish kronor ($999,399; £822,000) and is described as "the person who shall have produced in the discipline of literature the most outstanding creation with an ideal direction" by the award committee.

The literary scene in China

Can Xue has not had the best words to say about China's literary landscape when questioned about it.

She once said, "I've said it before, I have no hope," in an interview with Chinese news organization Sixth Tone from 2016. "Everyone in China merely preserves the old. If you don't return to tradition with them, you are the anomaly, which implies that others ignore and marginalize you.

Can Xue, a Beijing resident, however, said that she would keep on writing for the nation's youth.

"At the moment, there are relatively few progressive Chinese individuals, therefore I place my expectations in the next generation. Now in their 20s," she said.

"In another 20 years, while they encounter problems spiritually, or when consumerism cannot meet their needs, they could decide to pick up one of my books."