Platinum Bible of the Public Toilet

Cui Zi’en is a film director, writer, and activist. He is Associate Professor at the Film Research Institute of the Beijing Film Academy.Petrus Liu is Associate Professor of Chinese and Comparative Literature at Boston University.Lisa Rofel is Professor Emerita of Anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

• Series Editors’ Introduction / Carlos Rojas  viiEditors’ Introduction / Petrus Liu and Lisa Rofel  xiPreface / Translated by Petrus Liu  xxiiiUncle’s Elegant Life / Translated by Lisa Rofel  1Intrigue Like Fireworks / Translated by Fran Martin  10Some Admire Wisdom, Others Do Not / Translated by Derek Hird  20Orphans of the Japanese Empire / Translated by Elisabeth Lund Engebretsen  45The Silent Advent of the Age of Sexual Persuasion / Translated by Petrus Liu  71Men Men Men Women Women Women / Translated by Yizhou Guo  82Men Are Containers / Translated by Casey James Miller  117Fire and Wolf Share a Fondness for Male Beauty / Translated by Yizhou Guo  129Teacher Eats Biscuits Thin as Parchment / Translated by William F. Schroeder  141Platinum Bible of the Public Toilet / Translated by Wenqing Kang and Cathryn H. Clayton  153Interview with Cui Zi’en / Petrus Liu and Lisa Rofel  257Appendix: Works by Cui Zi’en  273Bibliography  279Contributors  283Place of First Publication  285

“Artist, activist, pioneer, and provocateur, Cui Zi’en is known for shaking up the world of Chinese queer cinema and standing at the forefront of the queer rights movement in China. Now, for the first time, a selection of his avant-garde literary works is available in English. This collection reveals Cui Zi’en’s strange literary universe, brimming with the uncanny, the philosophical, and the beautiful.” - Michael Berry, author of (Enter the Clowns: The Queer Cinema of Cui Zi'en) “In Platinum Bible of the Public Toilet Cui Zi’en invites readers into an enchanted world of childhood innocence, family legends, and young love. Through vivid language and skilled storytelling, Cui creates a queer utopia where gender and sexual fluidity are celebrated in ways that challenge the patriarchal, heterosexual, and homosexual norms of our times. This collection showcases Cui as one of the most talented and original queer writers in the world today.” - Hongwei Bao, author of (Contemporary Chinese Queer Performance) "The volume’s abundant supplementary material includes meticulous footnotes, a lengthy interview with the author, and an appendix that illustrates the diversity of his artistic output. Throughout, Cui’s impulses to provoke the forces that repress sexuality and uphold literary conventions are grounded in joie de vivre. Reminiscent of the writings of Pier Paolo Pasolini, this is an indelible portrait of an artist." (Publishers Weekly)