Still on the Earth
by Yu Xiuhua
Still on the Earth is the first novel of Yu Xiuhua the poet. Taking Yu Xiuhua as the archetypal character, the novel has depicted the story of a disabled woman who suffers, fights and chooses “being-towards-death”. As she is ill with cerebral palsy, Zhou Yu, the heroine, has been ignored and even discarded by nearly everyone and the whole society. However, she yearns for being treated as a healthy and normal person instead of being offered with any pity or disdain. All she wants is just equality. Driven by the lack of love, the misfortune of family as well as various encounters in life, Zhou Yu employs poems to express her feelings. Finally she creates a literary realm with her poems and gets acknowledged. The author calmly narrates the unfortunate life of disabled people and turns the darkness and love deep down in her heart into the nutrients for growth, thereby achieving the spiritual state featured with reality, optimism, braveness and calmness.
