Qiu Xiaolong has gained international fame as the author of the Inspector Chen novels, a series of nine detective novels set in Reform and Opening-era Shanghai. Their protagonist, Chief Inspector Chen Cao, often draws upon his knowledge of literature for insight into cases set amidst Shanghai’s fast-vanishing traditional lilong and in the shadows of the soaring tower complexes arising from China’s new prosperity. Inspector Chen shares his scholarly love of poetry and translation with Qiu himself, who first visited the United States to work on his translations of T.S. Eliot’s high-modernist masterpieces.

Introduction and moderation of the Q&A by Ezra Claverie and David Perry, Lecturers in the Writing Program.