Ах Қ-ның Шын Хикаясы: Кітап және Экрандау

Book by Lu Xun
the film adaptation

The True Story of Ah Q is an episodic novella written by Lu Xun using third person narration perspective, first published as a serial between December 4, 1921 and February 12, 1922. It was later placed in his first short story collection Call to Arms in 1923 and is the longest story in the collection. The piece is generally held to be a masterpiece of modern Chinese literature, since it is considered the first piece of work to fully utilize vernacular Chinese after the 1919 May 4th Movement in China. It was first published in the Beijing Morning News supplement as a serial. Originally Lu Xun wrote the story under the name "Ba Ren" (, "crude fellow"), and so few people knew who wrote the novella. The first installment was published on December 4, 1921, and additional installments appeared weekly or fortnightly. The final installment was published on February 12, 1922. The story had nine chapters. Furthermore, The True Story of Ah Q also achieved considerable international influence. As reported by Chinawriter, the translation of the novella began in 1925, indicating its early recognition abroad. During Lu Xun's lifetime, the work was translated into eight languages: Russian, English, French, Japanese, German, Czech, Korean, and Esperanto. Remarkably, Lu Xun personally encountered several of these translations, actively participating in the proofreading process for some. Expanding upon Lu Xun's international reach, Peng Xiaoling and Han Aili's article, "Ah Q: 70 years", found in Paul B. Foster's journal article, documents the novella's translation into over thirty languages, its adaptation into more than sixty reprints, dramatic renditions, a film, a ballet, and even its artistic expressions through cartoons and woodcuts.

The True Story of Ah Q portrays how the Xinhai Revolution did not bring about genuine reform to the countryside, and through the artistic portrayal of the impoverished hired hand Ah Q from the rural areas, it reflects the flawed roots of human nature, such as cowardice, the "spiritual victory method", opportunism, megalomania, and excessive self esteem.

Both the novella form and the low social station of the protagonist were new in Chinese literature. But the story consisted of nine serial episodic chapters (an old Chinese method for long folklore , which can consist of hundreds of chapters). This is the only novella published by Lu Xun.

Lu Xun believed that the purpose of literature was to transform the minds of and enlighten fellow Chinese. He followed the concept of "Wén Yǐ Zài Dào" (文, "literature as a vehicle for Tao (moral message)"). In Chapter One, the author ironically claims that he could not recall nor verify Ah Q's correct name, thus giving the character symbolic anonymity. "Ah" in Chinese is a diminutive prefix for names. "Q" is short for "Quei", which would today be romanized in Hanyu Pinyin as "Guì". However, as there are many Chinese characters that are pronounced "Quei", the narrator claims he does not know which character he should use, and therefore shortens it to "Q". The deliberate use of a Latin letter instead of a Chinese character is a reference to the concepts of the May Fourth movement, which advocated adoption of Western ideas. Mao Dun believed that Ah Q represented a "crystallization of Chinese qualities" of his time and that it was not necessarily a satirical work. Zhou Zuoren, the author's brother, in the article "[On] The True Story of Ah Q" (阿Q正传; "Ā Q Zhèngzhuàn") said that the work was, as paraphrased by Paul B. Foster, author of Ah Q Archaeology: Lu Xun, Ah Q, Ah Q Progeny, and the National Character Discourse in Twentieth Century China, "unequivocally satirical" and argued against Mao Dun's point of view. Mao Dun's comparison of Ah Q to Oblomov highlights the character's role as a cultural exemplar, reflecting the zeitgeist of his nation. The intricacies of Ah Q's name, including the adoption of the "Q" to signify the traditional pigtail, and "Ah", a common prefix, are laden with symbolic meaning. This name choice by Lu Xun not only anchors Ah Q in the specific historical milieu of the Qing dynasty and the Xinhai Revolution but also connects him to the broader themes of tradition versus modernity, central to the May Fourth Movement. Japanese scholar Matsuoaka Toshihiro's inquiry into the significance of the letter "Q" and Zhou Zuoren's explanation of its representation of the Qing dynasty pigtail further illuminate the depth of Ah Q's symbolic stature. Originally, the name Ah Q represented a negative Chinese national character A negative example, it served as a warning to urge Chinese to change for the "better". In 1926 Zheng Zhenduo stated his belief that Lu Xun had finished the story too quickly. In literary terms, he questioned why Ah Q would die in such a casual manner after the story had already determined that being a revolutionary was already not satisfactory. In response to Zheng, Lu Xun said "So week after week passed, and inevitably the problem arose whether Ah Q would become a revolutionary or not. To my mind, as long as there was no revolution in China, Ah Q would not turn revolutionary; but once there was one, he would. This was the only fate possible for my Ah Q, and I would not say that he has a dual personality. The first year of the Republic has gone, never to return; but the next time there are reforms, I believe there will be revolutionaries like Ah Q. I only wish that, as people say, I had written about a period in the past, but I fear what I saw was not the past but the future—even as much as from twenty to thirty years from now." Lu Xun's last response regarding Ah Q itself was his reply to Zheng. During the debates on revolutionary literature in 1928 and 1929, Lu Xun decided not to comment on the criticisms of the story. A leftist critic, Qian Xingcun, wrote an essay "The Dead Era Of Ah Q" , published in the March 1, 1928 issue of 太阳社 In it he argued that Lu Xun had belonged to a preceding historical era, the story was not a masterpiece and did not represent the current era. Zhou Zuoren, Lu Xun's biological brother, one of the authors of modern literature in China, says that Lu Xun's The True Story of Ah Q has more abhorrence but less love, which also mentions that Lu Xun overuses satire to write Ah Q and writes less about the empathy of Ah Q to represent the people in China at that moment who were also suppressed by feudalism. Personally, Zhou Zuoren believes that The True Story of Ah Q is a rational writing work, and therefore it does not contain much passion and love of the story during Lu Xun's writing. However, Zhou Zuoren still believes that his evaluation of Lu Xun's The True Story of Ah Q has both praise and criticism, praising the rationality and the use of satire to write the story, while criticizing the lack of passion and love that can be demonstrated as empathy to Ah Q in the story.