Mo's winning of the prize is by no means a sign that these barriers have been fully overcome, although it should serve as a reminder to Western literary critics that Chinese literature is worth some attention.

Compared with Chinese people's knowledge about Western literature, Western people's acquaintance with Chinese literature and culture at large is quite limited. Despite China's status as the world's second-largest economy, the cultural deficit this country suffers in cultural exchanges with its Western counterparts will continue for years to come. Hopefully, Mo's winning of the Nobel Prize in literature will usher in an era for efforts both inside and outside the country to reduce that deficit. But that still primarily depends on how hard Chinese writers work to gain an insight into the society they live in and present it in a way that can be universally accepted.

The role serious literature plays in people's lives has given way to popular culture characterized by the Internet. However, ironically, this has provided novelists with an environment where they can create works that would otherwise never be published. At the same time, the country's increasingly pluralistic society has made it possible for novelists to look at the world around them from perspectives they could never imagine before.

Drastic and dramatic changes have transformed the country over the past three decades and the complex and sophisticated changes in people's lives both materialistically and spiritually are definitely a mother lode of inspiration that novelists can mine.

A Chinese writer winning the Nobel Prize in literature does not necessarily signify the greatness of this country's literature, but the country does have great writers and it has the conditions to produce many great novels.

The author is a senior writer with China Daily. E-mail: zhuyuan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 11/07/2012 page8)