Chinese novelist Han to sue over ghost-writer claim
One of China's most famous young writers, Han Han, is planning to sue an academic fraud campaigner nicknamed "science cop" who accused him of using ghost-writers, state media said Friday.
Han, a 29-year-old blogger and novelist, has found fame through the Internet with his witty, scathing critiques of China's corrupt officials and social issues.
The accusations about his popular works have circulated on the Internet and were taken up by Fang Shimin, a self-proclaimed "science cop" who made a career out of attacking academic fraud under the online pen name Fang Zhouzi.
Han's lawyer on Friday filed a lawsuit with a local Shanghai court, the official Xinhua news agency said. The Putuo District People's Court has a week to review the materials before deciding whether to accept the case.
State media has previously said Han is seeking 100,000 yuan ($16,000) in damages for libel.
"The lawsuit is to let my manuscript and evidence offer ample, ironclad proof," Han said separately on his blog Friday.
"So the lawsuit will allow my readers and loved ones, when later asked by others, to give a simple answer: He has been treated unjustly."
Han could not be reached, while a court official declined comment.
Fang, who has carried on his campaign through postings on his microblog, said he was examining Han Han's early works, which he claims were written by his father, retired newspaper editor Han Renjun.
"Han Han has been portrayed as a literary genius for over 10 years, no one has dared expose the myth," Fang said in a posting on Wednesday.
The fight, which has received widespread media attention, has played out largely on the Internet in recent days with Han and Fang trading barbs.
Han has achieved huge fame in the country's tightly monitored cyberspace, accumulating more than 540 million hits on his blog.
A top-earning author with a dozen titles under his belt, Han was named by Time magazine as among the world's 100 most influential people in 2010.
He shot to fame in 2000 after he published his first novel "The Triple Gate", based on his own experience as a school drop-out in Shanghai, which mocked China's rigid education system.
