     There were two methods he regularly employed.  By one method he would set up some preliminary guidelines and keep his writing within those limits.  When he had finished a work, he would ask around to see whether the content of what he had written fell within the limits of toleration.  His other method was to finish a work in accordance with his own ideas and keep it in reserve until some day there might be an opportunity to publish it.  His T'ai-wan lien-ch'iao (Taiwan Forsythia), for example, was not published until after his death.
Owing to the fact that this author over-emphasized the extraordinary conditions of society at the time, and to the fact that he was fond of venting his opinions, he naturally tended to neglect the rules of literary expression.  Therefore, strictly speaking, one has to say that, as works of literature, his writings are flawed.

     Turning now to the works of Li Ch'iao, we find that, like Wu Cho-liu, this author also is intensely dissatisfied with society;  his mode of procedure, however, is quite different.  Li Ch'iao uses indirect methods;  he tries to conceal the author's intention.

     Li Ch'iao has written a work entitled Jen-ch'iu (The Human Ball), which describes a man who comes under very heavy pressures from this society, fails to adapt, and wants only to escape.  Ultimately he realizes that the most secure place to be is in the womb, that the most secure and comfortable condition is to be a fetus inside the womb;  and so he changes into a human ball in the shape of a fetus, rushes outdoors alone in the night when there is absolutely no pressure, rolls about in the fields hither and yon, and, relaxed in mind, finally breaks into song.

     Li Ch'iao has another work, entitled Hsiu-lo-chi (The Asura Sacrifice), which tells the story of an unorthodox dog.  Everyone says that dogs are the most submissive animals and the most faithful friends of mankind.  But the dog described by Li Ch'iao is a creature that brims over with rebelliousness.  The careful reader, when he gets this far into the story, knows what the author wants to communicate:  that a highly rebellious dog is doomed to have an appointment with the cooking pot.

     We can see from these two works that Li Ch'iao also is an author with an elevated social consciousness.  The time when Li Ch'iao wrote these two works was also a time when the freedom to write was extremely limited.  Li Ch'iao steered clear of trouble and made his way through by using indirect methods and symbolic methods.  This is where Li Ch'iao proved his brilliance.  This is what enhances the artistic level of a literary work.

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