MLF and the Confucius Institute at the University of Manchester are delighted to present acclaimed author and film-maker Zhu Wen. His work has been published in China’s most prestigious literary magazines, and he has produced several books of poetry and fiction including I Love Dollars and Other Stories of China, depicting the violence, chaos and dark comedy of the post-Mao era. A frank reflection of the seamier side of his nation's increasingly capitalist society, Zhu Wen's fiction offers an audacious account of the often hedonistic individualism that is feverishly taking root. He will be reading a newly translated short story commissioned by Comma Press and discussing his work in conversation with Julia Lovell, a translator and critic of modern Chinese literature and author of The Opium War: Drugs, Dreams and the Making of China.