Winner of the 15th Golden Comic Awards – Grand Prize & Comic of the Year (2024)
Renowned Taiwanese comics artist Ruan Guang-Min, celebrated for his sensitive portrayals of everyday life and finely observed emotional detail, reinterprets “A Lever Scale”, the classic short story by Lai He, known as the “Father of Modern Taiwanese Literature” during the Japanese colonial period. Through delicate visual storytelling and a vivid sense of time and place, Ruan brings new life to this literary masterpiece.
The story follows vegetable vendor Chîn Tit-chham and his wife Chhun-lian as they struggle to pursue a small happiness of their own under the shifting tides of history and the pressures of colonial rule in Japanese-era Taiwan. Between moments of tenderness and cruelty, laughter and sorrow, Ruan expands upon Chîn Tit-chham’s brief and tragic life, using the language of comics to evoke new layers of emotion and imagination—creating a deeply moving and distinctive reading experience.
A vegetable vendor who is kind-hearted and deeply principled. When faced with injustice, he never hesitates to stand up and argue for what is right, believing that fairness—like the sun—always exists.
Chîn Tit-chham’s wife. Gentle and soft-spoken, she wishes only for her husband’s safety and the simple happiness of their family.
