BEIJING, Dec. 27 (Xinhua) -- Being both a delivery courier and a poet need not be a contradiction. In the pauses between orders, 56-year-old Wang Jibing turns the grit of daily work into poems he calls "sweet candy."
His poem "At Three in the Afternoon," capturing a tender snapshot of a small eatery owner resting with her child, has resonated far beyond its original setting. Popular not only in China, it has also been published in Italian, and a related documentary was recently aired in Italy.
Earlier this month, Wang recounted the experience in an article for China's flagship newspaper, People's Daily. "I am filled with pride," he wrote.
Stories like Wang's point to a broader cultural change unfolding across China, where more ordinary people are stepping into the role of creators rather than just audiences. From memoirs by migrant workers to villagers staging self-written plays in public squares, grassroots creativity is increasingly visible.
Previously, artistic creation in China was largely the domain of a select few, with works often confined to galleries, theaters, or academic circles. Such everyday scenes as depicted in "At Three in the Afternoon" would have been hard to imagine.
Experts say that as China's economy and society continue to develop, people are no longer satisfied with improvements in material living standards alone. Increasingly, they also seek emotional expression, cultural participation, and a richer spiritual life, creating fertile ground for everyday creativity to take root and flourish.
Earlier this year, an exhibition on workers' literature opened in Dongguan, a manufacturing hub in south China's Guangdong Province, showcasing cultural expressions shaped by more than 40 years of industrialization -- a period during which over 200 million people have lived and worked in the city since China's reform and opening up.
Zheng Xiaoqiong, once an assembly-line worker in Dongguan, still regards the city as one of the roots of her creative work. She said that the city's transition from labor-intensive manufacturing to high-tech industries, combined with rapid urban and demographic changes, has informed her recent novels.
"In this community, a group of migrant worker writers has emerged, and Guangdong was the first to see this phenomenon -- it was historically inevitable," Liu Dongwu, an expert on migrant worker literature, said, noting that the vitality of today's popular literature lies in its resonance with the times.
This wave of creativity has been enabled by long-term progress in education, literacy, and public cultural infrastructure. Over the past seven decades, China's illiteracy rate has fallen from more than 80 percent to 2.67 percent, while new entrants to the workforce now receive an average of more than 13 years of schooling.
Public cultural services in the country have expanded as well, with community institutions, libraries and museums spreading across cities and rural areas -- most of them free to the public.
"Creativity does not belong to a few," said Xie Youshun, chairman of the Guangdong Provincial Writers Association. "Anyone curious about life has the potential to turn feeling and imagination into art."
For Wang Jibing, this potential has never dimmed. He left middle school early and worked a series of jobs before becoming a part-time food delivery courier in Kunshan, east China's Jiangsu Province, in 2018. To date, he has written over 6,000 poems and published five poetry collections.
"I've always loved literature, and I write whenever I get a chance," Wang said, adding that his daily deliveries expose him to people from all walks of life and give him a constant source of inspiration.
The rise of the internet further fueled Wang's creativity and helped him reach a wider audience. Around 2010, he found a community in online literary and poetry forums, where fellow poets encouraged him and offered guidance. His work soon began winning awards and appearing in publications.
In 2022, his poem "Rushing against Time" was noticed by a media professional, shared on the Chinese social media platform Weibo, and attracted 20 million views. At 53, Wang was finally "seen" as a writer.
Breaking the boundaries of time and space, these stories not only document life but also inspire others. Recently, 70-year-old Wang Yuzhen from Hebei Province serialized a nearly 15,000-word account of her late husband's life, touching thousands of young readers online.
"I discovered that my life held so much that was worth writing," she said. "If the stories I write can convey some warmth and move young readers, this is a ray of light in my later years."
Today, Wang has over 100,000 followers on the Chinese lifestyle-sharing platform Rednote. More and more young readers, born in the 1990s and 2000s, are drawn to her words. In the comments section, many seek her advice on life and writing, and Wang responds in detail, bridging generations through her experiences and reflections.
China's digital culture is booming. According to a 2024 report, the country's online literature user base has reached 575 million. By June 2025, users of short videos and mini-dramas numbered more than 1 billion and 626 million, respectively.
Hu Yifeng, deputy director of the theoretical research office at China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, said that economic and social development has placed new demands on culture and art while also opening up broader space for their growth. Literature and art, he noted, are increasingly becoming a daily necessity, bringing more people the dual pleasure of enjoyment and creation.
As listed in a national social and economic development blueprint for the next five years, a flourishing culture is a hallmark of Chinese modernization. Experts noted that only by fully unleashing the creative and innovative potential of the whole society can cultural vitality be sustained and cultural prosperity further advanced.
Wang Jibing sees this moment as a "golden age" for the new forms of literature and art for the general public.
"I believe that literature, rooted in everyday life, will eventually become as essential as food and household necessities -- bringing people not only a means of expression, but also a deeper sense of happiness," he said. Enditem
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