Gao Xingjian: Exiled Writer Finds Politics Hard to Avoid In China Visit

Gao Xingjian, the exiled Chinese writer who won the Nobel Prize in Literature last year, likes to steer clear of politics. But as Mr. Gao makes a three-day visit to Hong Kong this week, he is finding controversy impossible to avoid on the doorstep of the country he fled in 1987.

Even before he spoke at a university here today, Mr. Gao had whipped up a tempest in this former British colony. Pro-Beijing figures warned him to watch his tongue, while pro-democracy leaders sharply criticized Hong Kong's government for snubbing the first Chinese novelist to win a Nobel Prize.

''Literature is above politics,'' Mr. Gao told a crowded lecture hall at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. ''It does not serve politics. For the past century, politics has interfered with literature.''

As if on cue, Mr. Gao was asked by a journalist in the audience to comment on reports that Hong Kong's chief executive, Tung Chee-hwa, and other dignitaries had declined to attend a reception in his honor. ''We're here to talk about literature,'' Mr. Gao said doggedly. ''I try my best to isolate politics from literature.''

Moments later, another questioner asked the writer how he could avoid talking about politics, given that he had been driven to leave China because of harassment by the Communist Party. ''Writers need freedom of expression,'' Mr. Gao replied in the closest he came to a political statement. ''They pay such great importance to freedom of expression. That's why they go into exile.''

Mr. Gao, who is 60 and lives outside Paris now, is a playwright and artist as well as a novelist. Although he has not lived in mainland China in the last 14 years (and his works have been banned there since 1985), Mr. Gao has been a regular visitor to Hong Kong. Until the Nobel Prize turned him into a sudden celebrity, his visits here passed unnoticed.

But Mr. Gao's triumph struck a nerve in Beijing. The Chinese government denounced the Nobel Committee for having ''ulterior political motives.'' ''China has had an outpouring of outstanding literary works and literary giants,'' the foreign ministry said, making it clear that in its view Mr. Gao was not among them.

In 1983, a senior Communist official condemned his celebrated play, ''Bus Stop,'' as ''the most pernicious work since the establishment of the People's Republic.'' Mr. Gao, who renounced his party membership after the massacre in Tiananmen Square in 1989, became a French citizen in 1998.

Beijing's hostility put Hong Kong in an awkward spot. Under the terms of Hong Kong's return to Chinese rule in 1997, the city is guaranteed a high degree of autonomy. It remains open to visitors like Mr. Gao, and to members of the Falun Gong spiritual movement, who are persona non grata on the mainland.

Initially, Hong Kong seemed eager to play host to the Nobel laureate. Paul Leung, the director of leisure and cultural services, told the government-run radio station in October that Mr. Gao would be invited to a literature festival ''so that we can benefit from his experience as a writer.''

But the government later backtracked. A spokesman, John Tam, said today that the leisure and cultural services bureau was reorganizing the festival, and that Mr. Gao might no longer be a suitable participant. He denied that the author's political problems with the Chinese government were the reason.

With no official invitation in the mail, Mr. Gao was invited instead by the Chinese University and the City University. The government tried to cushion the snub by sending the director of home affairs, Lam Woon-kwong, to attend the lecture. But Mr. Tung, the Beijing-appointed chief executive of Hong Kong's government, declined to meet Mr. Gao, citing a previous obligation to meet with civil servants.

''The government won't have anything to do with him, to avoid angering Beijing,'' said Lau Siu-kai, a professor at Chinese University. ''But they have to allow him to come or else they'll be accused of suppressing free expression.''

Hong Kong navigated similar shoals earlier this month when it allowed a protest by Falun Gong. Officials said the Chinese government was furious at the decision, though it made no effort to reverse it.

For the hundreds of students who flocked to hear the playwright who wrote ''Bus Stop'' (a collection of Mr. Gao's plays were published in English by the Chinese University Press in 1999) and the author of the 1989 novel ''Soul Mountain'' (published in English in 1999 by HarperCollins) the chance to see the Chinese writer of the moment overwhelmed any political considerations.

''I know he's under a lot of pressure from the Chinese government,'' said Brenda Ng, 17, a student who showed up with several friends. ''But we came because of his literature, not because of his politics.''