Bi Shumin (

Chinese Chinese may refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people identified with China, through nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **Han Chinese, East Asian ethnic group native to China. **'' Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic ...

: 毕淑敏; born 1952 in

Xinjiang Xinjiang,; , SASM/GNC romanization, SASM/GNC: Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Sinkiang, officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People' ...

) is a Chinese novelist, self-help writer and

psychiatrist A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in psychiatry. Psychiatrists are physicians who evaluate patients to determine whether their symptoms are the result of a physical illness, a combination of physical and mental ailments or strictly ...

Biography

Born in Yili to a

Shandong Shandong is a coastal Provinces of China, province in East China. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history since the beginning of Chinese civilization along the lower reaches of the Yellow River. It has served as a pivotal cultural ...

family, she grew up in

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

and as a young woman served as nurse and psychiatrist in

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ), or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups s ...

. Her first published work was a novella, "Kunlun Shang" ("昆仑殇; Death in

Kunlun The Kunlun Mountains constitute one of the longest mountain chains in Asia, extending for more than . In the broadest sense, the chain forms the northern edge of the Tibetan Plateau south of the Tarim Basin. Located in Western China, the Kunlu ...

"), based on her experience as a

People's Liberation Army The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is the military of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the People's Republic of China (PRC). It consists of four Military branch, services—People's Liberation Army Ground Force, Ground Force, People's ...

medic. She is noted for her women-focused narratives, often surrounding women in the Chinese military on the Tibetan plateau in her earlier work and on urban medical professionals in more recent work. She is also a well-known media presence, based according to one academic analysis on the "charismatic authority claim" that she lives a "balanced and happy life." Her 2003 novel '' Save the Breast'' (''拯救乳房'') "relates an experimentation of talk therapy with a group of patients to deal with the biopolitics of breast cancer as both social stigma and physio-psychic trauma against the tide of medical marketing in today's China." Her 2012 novel ''Coronavirus'' (''花冠病毒'') drew attention during the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. The title and "much of the novel’s source material came from Bi Shumin’s own observations during the anti-SARS (

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) is a viral respiratory disease of zoonotic origin caused by the virus SARS-CoV-1, the first identified strain of the SARS-related coronavirus. The first known cases occurred in November 2002, and the sy ...

) battle of 2003 in China." Several examples of both fiction and essays have been translated into English, and her work has attracted critical attention especially from those interested in gender in contemporary Chinese literature and the depiction of medicine and illness. Prizes she has won include the

Chen Bochui Children's Literature Award The Chen Bochui Children's Literature Award (陈伯吹儿童文学奖) is a major award issued in China, with the aim of promoting excellence in children's publishing and cultural diversity. It was originally called the Children's Literary Garden Pr ...

References

{{authority control 1952 births Living people 21st-century Chinese novelists Chinese psychiatrists Writers from Beijing People's Liberation Army personnel Chinese women novelists Chen Bochui Children's Literature Award winners