One Step Back

This is a collection of essays and occasional pieces by the Hong Kong scholar and essayist Fan Sin-piu. The title comes from a verse by the tenth-century monk Budai: “With hands I plant green seedlings in the field of blessing; bowing my head, I see the sky in the water. When the six senses are pure, the rice is made; stepping back is in fact moving forward.” The author does not intend to preach a philosophy of “don't get angry, taking a loss is a blessing.” What he admires is the poetic wit of the verse's final line: calling retreat a form of advance turns “what counts as advance” into a question worth asking. The pieces were written between June 2024 and April 2026, one every two weeks, forty-eight in all—the first time in the author's life he has written so regularly. Observations on life, everyday encounters, and reading that moved him are shaped into short essays covering Hong Kong's people and literary affairs, memories of teachers and friends from the past, and reflections on books. The author notes that what he first envisioned differs greatly from what he finally wrote, but he prefers ideas refined through writing; he also admits that what one can say, should say, and will not regret saying in this era are questions he worked out as he wrote, and he imagines how readers will read them. A single hardcover volume, light in length and rewarding to read.