Chinese farmer Yu Xiuhua reads her poems in her home. [Photo/Xinhua]

Journalists have flooded to interview her since she gained her fame, but some of her newly gained fans worry that too much media involvement will downgrade the quality of her work.

"If you keep silent, even the howling sea will calm down," Yu said in resposne.

When she was told she was compared to the famous American poet Emily Dickinson, she said she didn't know who that was.

In fact, the only thing the two have in common is probably their love of reading.

Often she will pull a chair in the yard to read in the daylight, or sit by a plain wooden table in her simply equipped bedroom and drown in a sea of words under the bright light of her energy efficient bulb.

She also keeps several rabbits and she has two loyal dogs, who have accompanied her through the darkest moments of her life. She cares for them with kindness and sometimes treats them to "fresh meat". 

She married a man 12 years her senior, and describes what has become an unhappy marriage as "Youth rendered to an engagement of sin."

Her son, a freshman at the University in Wuhan, says his mother has a peaceful heart, yet she always prefers to show her tough side.

Showing her weakness to the world has never been on Yu's list. In her words, "To make heard my physical disability is redundant as the teeth say it aches."