ONE SEED CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE

Chen Hongguo might be China’s most famous ex-professor. In this Q&A for the NYR Daily, I ask him why he left academia to start a lecture space in the western Chinese metropolis of Xi’an.

This is the final part of a three-part Q&A with public thinkers in Xi’an, part of an effort I’ve been making to get out of Beijing and add geographic diversity to my eight-year series of Q&As with Chinese public intellectuals–check out the entire series here.

I also wrote a longer work of reportage for the NYRB about Xi’an, the hermits of the Zhongnan mountains, and the parallels between Buddhists in the Tang dynasty and thinkers today; check it out here.