The True Story of Ah Q

The True Story of Ah Q is an episodic novella by Lu Xun, first published as a serial between December 4, 1921 and February 12, 1922, initially under the pen name Ba Ren. It was later placed in Lu Xun's first short story collection, Call to Arms, in 1923, as the longest work in that collection. The novella is generally held to be a masterpiece of modern Chinese literature, considered one of the first major works to fully utilize vernacular Chinese after the 1919 May Fourth Movement, and was published in nine weekly or fortnightly installments in the Beijing Morning News supplement. The True Story of Ah Q was listed by the BBC as one of the 100 greatest tales ever told, at number 43.