Reading the New Nobel Laureate

The Chinese readership in October honored the South Korean 2024 Nobel laureate Han Kang by placing ‘The Vegetarian’ on the fiction list.

At the China Shanghai International Children’s Book Fair earlier this month, attendees peruse books in the Bologna Children’s Book Fair exhibition marking the 700th anniversary of Marco Polo’s death. Image: CCBF

By Porter Anderson, Editor-in-Chief | @Porter_Anderson

See also:
Shanghai’s Children’s International Book Fair Draws 41,263 Attendees

China’s Reader’s Boost Han Kang’s ‘The Vegetarian’

It’s not always the case that a Nobel Prize in Literature shows resonance on the Chinese mainland bestseller lists, as tracked by our associates at Beijing OpenBook. But in October, the news of Han Kang becoming the first Asian woman—and first South Korean writer—to win the Swedish Academy’s accolade became quickly visible, with The Vegetarian arriving at No. 5 on the fiction list, in its Chinese edition from Sichuan Literature & Art Press.

‘The Vegetarian’ by Han Kang

In fact, that “significant surge in sales,” as the researchers refer to it, comes despite expectations among bookmakers, as reported by Alex Marshall and Alexandra Alter at The New York Times, that the Chinese writer Can Xue would be the 2024 Nobel laureate. As Publishing Perspectives readers know, of course, Mo Yan became China’s first Nobel laureate in 2012.

The current edition from Sichuan Literature & Art charting on the October list is a 2021 of The Vegetarian, which was published by Han in 2007, was not released in English until 2015 in the United Kingdom and 2016 in the United States, in its translation by Deborah Smith, who would go on to establish Tilted Axis, her independent press in the UK. The Vegetarian, in Smith’s translation, won the International Booker Prize in 2016.

And in nonfiction in October, the bestseller lists on the mainland show Zhang Jiaming and Wang Jing’s Comic: The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine at No. 1, a publication from Chemical Industry Press.

‘The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine’ by Zhang Jiaming and Wang Jing

You’ll notice the “comic” aspect of it that’s registered even in the title. While this is largely an adult book, it does indicate that the movement toward comic and graphic presentation in China is easily making the jump from primarily content for children to works for more mature readers, as well—especially as these health-oriented products are developed in part for an aging population.

The Chinese market’s strong trend in health and wellness books, according to OpenBook, has to do with the country’s aging society and interests in traditional Chinese medicine and Sinology.

Other books currently not charting but showing strength in this area are Homemade Nutritious Soup for Health Care and Dietary Therapy for Common Disease. We may well see them on the nonfiction lists soon.

Below, then, are OpenBook’s overall lists from October 2024 of bestsellers in fiction, nonfiction, and children’s books, followed by its lists of bestselling fiction and nonfiction in China by authors from outside the country. At the end of our article, as always, you’ll find notes on how the lists are constructed.

OpenBook’s Fiction Bestsellers, October 2024

OpenBook’s Nonfiction Bestsellers, October 2024

OpenBook’s Children’s Bestsellers, October 2024

Foreign Author Fiction Bestsellers, October 2024

Foreign Author Nonfiction Bestsellers, October 2024

Notes on the Charts

OpenBook is a privately owned industry-data research firm based in Beijing. It functions somewhat as Nielsen and NDP do from the West, and Nielsen Book Research International has worked with OpenBook in Asian operations. With authoritative data and information resources, OpenBook is able to deliver consulting service to partners who would like to explore the Chinese book market and identify suitable partners.

At last report, OpenBook monitored more than 18,000 online and offline bookstores.

The online channel includes digital retailers such as large self-operated online stores, platform stores, and small- and medium-sized stores. The offline channels include more than 4,800 bookstores. Coverage includes most of the state-owned and influential privately owned bookstores in 30 provinces, municipalities, and autonomous regions. Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Tibet are not included in OpenBook’s system.

In 2022, OpenBook tracked around 76.21 billion RMB in sales (US$10.62 billion).

Retail outlets include:

• Traditional bookstores
• Supermarkets
• Campus bookstores
• “Professional” stores, said to be small stores with a specific industrial or trade focus
• Airport stores

In addition, OpenBook is drawing data from online bookstores of three main types:

• The “Tmall” stores of Alibaba (Tmall is described as a marketplace of companies that create storefronts online to sell products including books)
• The “JingDong” Stores of JD.com (similar to Tmall as a marketplace of both individual companies and bookstores operated by JD.com)
• Ten independent online bookselling retailers

China has 500 or more publishers in operation today. Most of them are government-owned. Private publishers are required to generate ISBNs for their titles from a publishing company that is government-owned—which, in other words, creates a system in which all ISBNs are registered through government channels. The government approves each book published in China.

More China bestseller reports from Publishing Perspectives are here, and more on the Chinese book publishing market is here.