The True Story
of Ah Q
For more than a year or two I have been wanting to write the true story of Ah Q, but while, on the one hand, I was desirous of doing it, on the other, I vacillated in my purpose. This proves that I am not the sort of person whose name can depend upon his writing for preservation, because in times past it has been necessary that an immortal pen preserve in writing the memory of a person who is to be of imperishable fame; therefore, it is not clear which is dependent upon the other, whether the person is propagated by the pen, or the pen by the person, the point in question becoming more and more unsettled. Yet, my thoughts would inevitably return to Ah Q with such persistence that it seemed as if some supernatural power within my mind kept goading me to the task.
However, on placing my writing brush down to the paper to compose this soon-to-be-forgotten
