The publication of Hard Like Water marked a milestone in literature about the Cultural Revolution. It constituted an original iteration of “scar literature,” a genre popular in the calamity’s wake in which, through the melodramatic recounting of trauma, victim and — frequently — victimizer alike find redemption, their roles blurred. Scar literature’s question of moral responsibility persists in Yan’s novel.

attached to: Jianying Ru Shui