Chinese students honor Israeli writer

Amos Oz. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Amos Oz, an acclaimed Israeli writer, came to Beijing this week to receive an award given by Chinese students on Wednesday and to release the Chinese edition of his novel Scenes from Village Life on Friday.

Oz was the recipient of The 21 University Students International Literary Award, which was set up by Renmin University of China. The award had a jury of 21 Chinese students, ranging from undergraduate to doctoral students in the School of Liberal Arts, and it was co-hosted by Tencent Culture.

"I have received in my life maybe 40 or 50 literary prizes, all of them are from a jury of professors and scholars. This is the first time I get a prize from students. This is very special for me," Oz told China Daily after the award ceremony.

Speaking of the Nobel Prize for Literature, of which Oz has long been considered a possible winner, Oz said humorously that "I can assure you, if they never give me the Nobel Prize I am not going to die an unhappy man."

This is Oz's second visit to China. "I have read Mo Yan and some other Chinese writers in translation because I am intrigued by this country. Particularly Mo Yan's work on World War II, on the experience of Chinese people under the Japanese occupation."

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