New wave of Chinese sci-fi takes shape

However, it is also a way to reflect on history, "drawing inspiration from the sci-fi boom of the early 1920s and our hopes for a bright future after the founding of the nation", he said.

"Many events have unfolded since then, and this history is closely connected to our present. Bringing all these elements together is my ambition," he added.

Liang Qingsan, speaking online, discussed his novel Kaishi De Jieshu Zhi Qiang (The Gun of the End of the Beginning), which aims to prompt the reader to reflect on war.

Set against the backdrop of Northeast China during the Russo-Japanese War from 1904-1905, the work blends elements of history, science fiction, and espionage to tell the story of the protagonist, Zhang Ju, as he seeks a mysterious firearm capable of ending the war and even human civilization.

"In today's world, it's even more crucial for us to reflect on and contemplate the nature of war," Liang Qingsan said. "No matter which side claims victory, humanity as a whole ends up losing. So, who is the real enemy in a war? This is a question I pose in my novel — who is your true enemy? Who are you really trying to defeat?"

Chinese authors speak with such earnest passion about the genre's philosophy and practice that science fiction seems intrinsically more relevant to contemporary China than to the West, said Nicolas Cheetham, managing director of the British publishing house Head of Zeus. Head of Zeus has published works by several Chinese sci-fi authors, including Liu Cixin, Chen Qiufan, Baoshu, and Hao Jingfang.

Cheetham shared insights into the success of Liu Cixin's The Three-Body Trilogy in the United Kingdom, despite unpromising factors.

After 2009, due to the overwhelming popularity of fantasy series like Game of Thrones, science fiction print sales dropped by 50 percent.

Moreover, due to its much higher cost, only a small fraction of translated fiction reaches English readers, with even fewer works from Chinese authors, and even less in the science fiction genre. For most of the past century, the flow of science fiction has been predominantly from the West to China. Despite China's global market dominance in other sectors since the 1990s, this specific trade imbalance in science fiction remains largely unchanged, Cheetham said.

However, Western science fiction's golden years have shown that technologically induced economic booms are beneficial to the science fiction imagination and science fiction sales, he said.

"When the technological and economic changes that took generations in the West occurred almost within a single generation in China, you might well expect a Chinese science fiction bubble, a vibrant modern science fiction scene that reflects a vibrant and modern China."

He noted that science fiction is inherently export-ready, because it is a literature of possibilities, embracing the new and different, and challenging readers with alien concepts.

Moreover, unlike other popular Chinese genres like historical fiction, science fiction's reliance on universal scientific concepts makes it more accessible internationally. Other genres often rely on heavy cultural references that can be difficult to translate without extensive explanation, he added.

"Liu Cixin himself really puts this particularly well when he says that science fiction is the most global, most universal storytelling vessel, with the capability to be understood by all cultures," he said.