Excerpt from 1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows by Ai Weiwei, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

I tried to build us a stove, so that we could get heat and boil water. But the stove leaked smoke from everywhere except the chimney, and tending it made my eyes smart and left me choking, until I realized that air had to flow freely into the chamber. Then there were the other daily chores, like fetching water from the well, picking up meals from the canteen, feeding the stove with firewood, and shoveling away the cinders. Someone had to do these things, and more often than not that someone was me.

Excerpted from 1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows by Ai Weiwei. Copyright © 2021 by Ai Weiwei. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.