Published by The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, From Hopscotch to Sitting on a Flying Carpet: Reflections on Xi Xi was edited by The Xi Xi Foundation, and comprises articles by a group of authors who want to honour her life and creative spirit.
Xi Xi’s real name was Zhang Yan; she chose Xi Xi (literally “west west”) as her pen name because she thought the Chinese character for west resembled a girl playing hopscotch, her favourite childhood game – a fact reflected in the book’s title – and that repeating the character evoked the girl’s movement.
The Xi Xi Foundation was founded in August by her close friends and is supported by the Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation Hong Kong.
“The conservation of Xi Xi’s life is a long-term endeavour, for which we’ll use the next 21 months to build the infrastructure,” says author Law Lok-man, a board member of The Xi Xi Foundation.
Law says that the team will start by evaluating, organising and archiving the contents of the late author’s former home in To Kwa Wan, in East Kowloon, from manuscripts to collectibles such as her handmade stuffed toys.
Then they will interview people in Xi Xi’s life to learn more about her relationships through these artefacts.
The layout of her home, where she lived for the last 25 years of her life, has been reproduced in miniature – a poetic gesture, Law says, given Xi Xi had a passion for toy houses.
“We named it ‘The Xi Xi Space’ … because we didn’t want the space to feel like a grand memorial, nor would she have liked it.
“The space is an attempt to reimagine the environment in which she wrote, to depict her down-to-earth, resilient, intelligent and artistic personality to young people.
“What we’re documenting is not only the life of a late Hong Kong writer but her personal history – a big part of Hong Kong’s cultural history, which may serve as inspiration for the generations to come.”
While working as a teacher in the 1960s and 70s, Xi Xi was both a prolific writer and an editor for several Hong Kong Chinese literary publications.
She dabbled in film criticism and scriptwriting for Hong Kong-produced movies too, notably adapting Louisa May Alcott’s 1868 novel Little Women into a screenplay for Four Sisters (1967), and rewriting the 1967 US film Wait Until Dark, starring Audrey Hepburn, for The Window (1968).
In the 1980s, her writing began to be recognised in Taiwan and mainland China.
She was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1989. Although she recovered after surgery and chemotherapy, the surgery brought on nerve-injury complications that resulted in the gradual loss of function in her right hand over the next decade; she switched to writing with her left hand.
Documenting her struggle with breast cancer and its aftermath, she wrote Mourning a Breast (1992), which was listed as one of the 10 best books of the year by Taiwan’s China Times newspaper. The novel inspired the 2006 romantic comedy 2 Become 1, starring Miriam Yeung Chin-wah.
As part of physiotherapy for her right hand, she began making stuffed toys in 2000. She made gifts of many of them for people close to her. She continued writing and her international recognition continued to grow.
The Xi Xi Space is expected to open to the public in the second half of 2025. Relevant literary lectures and workshops will be held at the space after it opens.
