It is based loosely on the short story, Shifu: You'll Do Anything for a Laugh (师傅越来越幽默) by Mo Yan; the story appears in English translation in the collection of the same title translated by Howard Goldblatt.
Howard Goldblatt is a translator of numerous works of contemporary Chinese (mainland China & Taiwan) fiction, including The Taste of Apples by Huang Chunming and The Execution of Mayor Yin by Chen Ruoxi.
Translated by Howard Goldblatt New York: Harper Perennial Modern Chinese Classics, 2010.
The most recent full translation is Rickshaw Boy: A Novel (New York: Harper Perennial Modern Chinese Classics, 2010), Translated by Howard Goldblatt.
His other works available in English translation are Rice, My Life as Emperor, Binu and the Great Wall (tr. Howard Goldblatt), Madwoman on the Bridge and Other Stories, Tattoo: Three Novellas and The Boat to Redemption, also translated by Goldblatt.
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