Writing his own reality

To find that byroad is not easy, but Peng says that the artists or writers he adores, such as Vincent van Gogh and Kafka, managed to keep their personal style, even if they were not acknowledged in their own time. "So what matters is to keep one's own style rather than follow the stream," he says.

In 2021, Peng won the Dianchi Literary Award. Commenting on Peng's stories, the jury said that they have two sides that contradict each other. On one hand the characters face life firmly, and on the other, they appear transient and erratic, like scattered feathers drifting in the wind of night and lonely stones rolling down a slope. The writer creates a Kafkaesque obstinacy, solitude and hollowness.

Several years ago, he rejected an invitation to join a writers' association, and recently he sold his home in downtown Changsha, the capital of Hunan, to go and live in a cheaper suburb. With more savings, "I can write whatever I like," he says.

Just like his diary entries from many years ago, which stated his ambition to transport himself not to further places, but to more remote ones.