Chinese food delivery rider Wang Jibing wins Lu Xun Literary Prize
Kunshan delivery rider-poet Wang Jibing won the Lu Xun Literary Prize for Flying Low, putting labor, migration and daily precarity at the center of Chinese literature.
Wang Jibing, a 56-year-old food delivery rider from Kunshan, won the Lu Xun Literary Prize in July for his poetry collection Flying Low. The award put a working-class writer inside one of China’s most prestigious literary institutions, with his poems about delivery work and life on the road drawing national attention far beyond the arts world.
The 9th Lu Xun Literature Prize was announced on Wednesday in July 2026, after Wang had already been shortlisted on July 14. The prize, organized by the China Writers Association, is one of China’s top four literary prizes and has been awarded every three years since 1995. Wang’s win for Flying Low, also rendered in one report as Low Flight, gave official recognition to a body of writing shaped by the rhythms of courier labor, urban transit and the pressure of making a living in motion.
Xinhua described Wang as a man “racing against time” who learned to capture those fleeting moments on paper. That framing matched the story that has followed him as his literary profile rose: a delivery rider in Kunshan, where he has lived for more than 20 years, turning routine work into poems about hustle, resilience, hope and the quiet strength of ordinary workers. Kunshan officials said those years on the road inspired his writing.
His output has become part of the reason he stands out. One account said Wang has written more than 6,000 poems about delivering food, while another said he has written nearly 6,000 poems and published six poetry collections. Sixth Tone placed him among a growing cohort of grassroots Chinese writers whose work comes from labor rather than literary salons, reflecting a broader shift in who gets to be seen as a serious voice in contemporary Chinese culture.
Wang said the prize “will never change who I am.” A China Daily excerpt said his first reaction was joy and relief, adding that he felt he could finally breathe “a long sigh of relief.” The reaction fits the scale of the moment: a food delivery rider from Kunshan has now been folded into the canon of a prize named for Lu Xun, the writer long associated with modern Chinese literary conscience, while the lived experience of workers like Wang moves closer to the center of national cultural prestige.
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