WRITER

Ha Jin

1956 - Today

Photo of Ha Jin

Icon of person Ha Jin

Jin Xuefei (simplified Chinese: 金雪飞; traditional Chinese: 金雪飛; pinyin: Jīn Xuěfēi; born February 21, 1956) is a Chinese-American poet and novelist using the pen name Ha Jin (哈金). The name Ha comes from his favorite city, Harbin. Read more on Wikipedia

Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Ha Jin has received more than 274,714 page views. His biography is available in 25 different languages on Wikipedia (up from 24 in 2019). Ha Jin is the 5,597th most popular writer (down from 5,258th in 2019), the 951st most popular biography from China (down from 868th in 2019) and the 113th most popular Chinese Writer.

Memorability Metrics

  • 270k

    Page Views (PV)

  • 45.67

    Historical Popularity Index (HPI)

  • 25

    Languages Editions (L)

  • 3.03

    Effective Languages (L*)

  • 3.04

    Coefficient of Variation (CV)

Notable Works

Waiting
Fiction, Physicians, Married people
The Crazed
Literature teachers, Cerebrovascular disease, Fiction
Ocean of Words
Short stories, Chinese short stories, Social life and customs
*Winner of the PEN/Hemingway Award* The place is the chilly border between Russia and China. The time is the early 1970s when the two giants were poised on the brink of war. And the characters in this thrilling collection of stories are Chinese soldiers who must constantly scrutinize the enemy even as they themselves are watched for signs of the fatal disease of bourgeois liberalism. In *Ocean of Words*, the Chinese writer Ha Jin explores the predicament of these simple, barely literate men with breathtaking concision and humanity. From amorous telegraphers to a pugnacious militiaman, from an inscrutable Russian prisoner to an effeminate but enthusiastic recruit, Ha Jin's characters possess a depth and liveliness that suggest Isaac Babel's Cossacks and Tim O'Brien's GIs. *Ocean of Words* is a triumphant volume, poignant, hilarious, and harrowing.
In the Pond
Communes (China), Working class, City and town life
A Free Life
Poets, Literature, Chinese
From Ha Jin, the widely-acclaimed, award-winning author of Waiting and War Trash, comes a novel that takes his fiction to a new setting: 1990s America. We follow the Wu family--father Nan, mother Pingping, and son Taotao--as they fully sever their ties with China in the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre and begin a new, free life in the United States.At first, their future seems well-assured--Nan's graduate work in political science at Brandeis University would guarantee him a teaching position in China--but after the fallout from Tiananmen, Nan's disillusionment turns him towards his first love, poetry. Leaving his studies, he takes on a variety of menial jobs while Pingping works for a wealthy widow as a cook and housekeeper. As Nan struggles to adapt to a new language and culture, his love of poetry and literature sustains him through difficult, lean years. Ha Jin creates a moving, realistic, but always hopeful narrative as Nan moves from Boston to New York to Atlanta, ever in search of financial stability and success, even in a culture that sometimes feels oppressive and hostile. As Pingping and Taotao slowly adjust to American life, Nan still feels a strange, paradoxical attachment to his homeland, though he violently disagrees with Communist policy. And severing all ties--including his love for a woman who rejected him in his youth--proves to be more difficult than he could have ever imagined.Ha Jin's prodigious talents are evident in this powerful new book, which brilliantly brings to life the struggles and successes that characterize the contemporary immigrant experience. With its lyrical prose and confident grace, A Free Life is a luminous addition to the works of one of the preeminent writers in America today.From the Hardcover edition.
The Bridegroom
Social life and customs, Fiction, Short Stories
A collection of short stories, brilliantly exploring the lives of ordinary Chinese, as their constricted society begins to open up to the West, from the author of Waiting, confirming Ha Jin's reputation as a master storyteller.This new collection of short stories by the award-winning author of Waiting confirms Ha Jin's reputation as a master storyteller, as well as a master of the miniature.In The Bridegroom, the twelve stories capture a China in transition, moving from Maoism towards a more open society. For these men and women, starting to feel the influence of the West, the daily dramas of a system that still struggles to control their every move and thought are made all the more painful by this. As his characters, from an entrepreneur, transformed from black-market criminal to free market hero, to the workers at Cowboy Chicken, to the professor mistaken by the police for a saboteur, continue to struggle against petty injustices and heartbreaks, Ha Jin celebrates their lives and humanity with the understated humour and simplicity that has won him widespread acclaim.

Among WRITERS

Among writers, Ha Jin ranks 5,597 out of 7,302Before him are Fang Fang, Åsne Seierstad, J. Slauerhoff, Marilyn Ferguson, Otokar Březina, and Cassandra Fedele. After him are Whittaker Chambers, L. J. Smith, James C. Collins, Mark Haddon, Domiziana Giordano, and Rıfat Ilgaz.

Most Popular Writers in Wikipedia

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1956, Ha Jin ranks 384Before him are Hussein Ahmed Salah, Anders Tegnell, Barbara Bonney, Melissa Belote, Henriette Reker, and Kim Jong-hun. After him are David M. Brown, Kelly Curtis, Vladimir Konstantinov, Wendy Crewson, Liam Brady, and Lee Ranaldo.

Others Born in 1956

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In China

Among people born in China, Ha Jin ranks 951 out of 1,610Before him are Feng Xiaogang (1958), Hu Chunhua (1963), Frank Shu (1943), Liu Chao-shiuan (1943), Fang Fang (1955), and Ma Lin (1980). After him are Ma Long (1988), Li Shufu (1963), Huang Xiaoming (1977), Guo Jinlong (1947), Paul Shan Kuo-hsi (1924), and Xu Qiliang (1950).

Among WRITERS In China

Among writers born in China, Ha Jin ranks 113Before him are Zhu Ziqing (1898), John Hersey (1914), Wang Meng (1934), Ingrid Noll (1935), Jiang Rong (1946), and Fang Fang (1955). After him are You Xie (1958), Ma Jian (1953), Liao Yiwu (1958), Su Tong (1963), Liu Xia (1961), and Chen Danqing (1953).