Cheng, Ah: - Ah Cheng, born in Beijing in 1949, is the pen name of Zhong Acheng. An accomplished fiction writer, painter, and screenwriter, Ah Cheng spent the Cultural Revolution in a small village in Inner Mongolia, where he painted the sheep and grasslands, and then on a State Farm in Yunnan province. During the 1980s he came to prominence as a member of the "primitive" or "seeking roots" literary movement. In 1992 he received the Italian Nonino International Prize for his writings, and in 1995 his Venetian Diary was honored in Taiwan. He has lived in several countries including the U.S., often not writing and working various jobs such as fixing bicycles and house painting. In recent years he has lived on the outskirts of Beijing and though he refuses to publish, he continues to write.