Born in Shanghai, Yi-chang Liu witnessed the burgeoning and development of modern Chinese literature. In the late 1940s the war broke out. LIU stopped his editing job and publishing business, moving to Hong Kong in 1948 and later Singapore and Malaysia. In the new city, LIU experienced rises and falls in his career as an Editor in Chief of newspaper supplements. In 1957, he returned to Hong Kong and began his most productive era as a writer. It was during this time, in 1963, that the highly acclaimed novel Drinker was published. It was China’s first, and one of the most important, stream of consciousness novels. The book, together with the life of its author, later inspired the making of the movie Fa yeung nin wah (2000). According to the Hong Kong-based director Kar-Wai Wong, it was his homage to the generation of war era writers to which LIU belongs.