23 July 2021

“These three books have a lot of seditious material inside...”


Sheep Village

Five people who created children’s picture books were arrested in Hong Kong yesterday and charged with sedition. Police accused the five — all members of the General Union of Hong Kong Speech Therapists, which published the books — of producing subversive literature to undermine national security.

The three books in question are all set in a sheep village (羊村), which serves as a metaphor for contemporary Hong Kong in a political satire in the tradition of George Orwell’s Animal Farm. More than 500 copies of the books were seized and, at a press conference after the arrests, superintendent Steve Li said: “These three books have a lot of seditious material inside.”

One of the titles, The Guardians of Sheep Village (羊村守衛者), is an allegory of Hong Kong’s 2019 pro-democracy protests. Another, The Twelve Warriors of Sheep Village (羊村十二勇士), refers to a dozen Hong Kongers who were arrested in 2020 when they attempted to escape into exile by speedboat. The last book in the series, The Cleaners of Sheep Village (羊村清道夫), is a reference to medical workers who went on strike in an attempt to force Hong Kong to close its border with China at the height of the coronavirus pandemic.