More and more families commissioning memoirs of elderly relatives who were witnesses to history
Tong Xiaojun, 34, is a biographer who focuses not on the great people of history, but instead on those who make up its very fabric.
He is often commissioned by family members who want to record the contemporaneous role an elderly or deceased relative played as momentous events and change unfolded around them.
Sometimes the writing of a memoir also serves as a healing process in the loss of a loved one or to build better understanding in a troubled family relationship.
Ju Ruiqi, 41, an administrative supervisor in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, commissioned Tong to write about the life of her grandfather. The brief profile is intended to introduce the "legendary" man to his descendants and be included in the family tree, she said.
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"My grandpa's lifetime, if we look at it from a broader perspective, was a precise footnote in the dramatic changes and development of New China," Ju said.
"At first my father wanted me to write the profile, but I was worried that I might not be that professional a writer. So I searched on the social media platform Xiaohongshu (Red-Note) and found Tong," she said.
Last year, Chinese social media platforms witnessed a sudden boom in the professional writing of memoirs of the elderly, providing writers with a decent income stream and shedding light on the lives of ordinary older people who helped transform the country.
Lifting the veil
"Ordinary elders also need to be seen, understood and remembered," Ju said about the memoir-writing trend.
While the public is constantly fed stories about celebrities and their achievements, she believes that ordinary people care more about memories and emotions that are closer to home.
"It is more intimate, and resonates and connects with us as either family members, friends, or just ordinary people from similar backgrounds," she said.
She produces a photo of her grandfather, Ju Zhangyou, showing him as a handsome young man with smiling eyes. He was a military man and joined the People's Liberation Army at the age of 15, fighting in the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1931-45), the War of Liberation (1946-49), and the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea (1950-53).
During those tumultuous years, he went through family breakdowns and other hardships in his personal life as he moved from place to place.
Ju said "grandpa" was a man of wisdom, courage, perseverance and great love, adding it was her father who mainly shared her grandfather's stories with Tong.
"Their conversations also gave me the first chance to see grandpa's personal files and clearly learn about his whole life since he was a child. During the process, I felt like he was no longer my grandpa in the story. He became someone I knew as an old friend by my side," she said.
Ju's family got in touch with Tong in early December and they had many online and in-person conversations afterward.
Involved process
Tong said it takes him around three months on average to complete a memoir, which usually contains around 80,000 characters.
The process of producing a memoir involves initial communication, signing a contract, setting schedules, conducting multiple online and in-person interviews, writing sample chapters, formal writing of the document and editing, then finally getting it designed and printed.
Tong started writing memoirs in 2020, when he received a request from a company owner and designer in Dali, Yunnan province. The businessman, aged in his 50s, hoped to summarize his life experiences, thoughts and entrepreneurial strategies for both himself and his successor at the company.
Tong said over the past five years, he has finished five memoirs of older people. "Since the second half of last year, I have received more inquiries from people to write the memoirs of their elders — or for people who are about to retire themselves. During this boom, I have seen a growing will to express themselves and give them a sense of identity."
Such memoirs are not only to fulfill the needs of family elders, but also benefit their descendants.
Emotional therapy
A woman in her 30s reached out to Tong to write a memoir of her dead father in the hope it would help ease the sorrow of her mother. Another woman in her 40s who had a bad relationship with her mother, asked Tong if documenting the older woman's life could help her better understand her mom.
"I saw deep family love in such inquiries … I am also now working on the memoir of my own father," he said.
"We do not have a bad relationship, but we are not good at communicating either."
Tong said his mother was bedridden for 18 years, and after she passed away he realized he didn't know much about his father. "I remembered when I first mentioned to him writing his memoir, he choked up. It touched me a lot and I think at that moment, he knew he was seen," he said.
Many memoir writers, including freelancers and part-timers, have been flooding into the sector, and have shared their experiences on Xiaohongshu.
The price of a memoir can vary greatly based on the size, writing styles and the writers' career status and experience, according to posts on the platform.
On average, the cost of memoirs ranges from 20,000 yuan ($2,760) to 50,000 yuan, with some lengthier ones costing more than 100,000 yuan. However, with more writers entering the market and the application of AI, the sector is likely to fluctuate and prices may fall.
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"I don't think writing memoirs for older people is a shrewd or highly profitable business, as it involves much effort and energy and is actually tiring. But the social value behind it, such as showing care for the elderly, is more meaningful," said Tong.
Earlier this year, the Shanghai municipal government rolled out an action plan, encouraging volunteers and organizations to provide memoir-writing services for elderly people in nursing homes and communities.
A group of students from the city's Fudan University have formed a team to provide pro bono memoir writing for senior citizens in Shanghai.
"Running out of time is not the end of life, forgetting is. Pick up the fragments of the glittering memories and link them together in a memoir, so that the world remembers that you were here," the team from Fudan wrote on Xiaohongshu.
At the end of last year, China had 310 million people aged 60 and above, and 220 million aged 65 and older, representing 22 percent and 15.6 percent of the total population, National Bureau of Statistics data showed.
