China to spend £70 million sprucing up Nobel Prize winner's hometown Mr Fan has earmarked the family home as the main attraction of the "Mo Yan Culture Experience Zone," but also has plans to create a theme park based on Mr Mo's 1987 work, Red Sorghum. Unwanted and unprofitable, Sorghum is no longer planted in the area, but this not regarded as an obstacle. Mr Fan said the "Red Sorghum Culture and Experience Zone," which includes the "Red Sorghum Film and Television Exhibition Area," would see villagers seed 1,600 acres of the crop. " (We need to grow it) even if it means losing money," he told the Chinese media. He noted that the prize had been a big boon. Without a mountain or a river, Gaomi had previously been too plain to be a tourist destination. As Gaomi's restaurants rush to add "Red Sorghum" to their signs, villagers have been instructed to raise a glass to Mr Mo before meals, and Li Danping, a local poet, said the county is now "the higher ground of Chinese literature, the sacred land of the country." Mr Mo's books are widely sold-out and his fans are already descending in droves, suggesting there will be demand for the proposed development. "One visitor dug up a radish [from Mr Mo's vegetable patch]," reported the Beijing News. He slipped it into his coat and showed it to villagers afterwards, saying: 'Mo's radish! Mo's radish!'  A visiting mother picked some yams and told her daughter: 'I'll boil them, so you can eat them and win the Nobel prize too!' Mr Mo's brother, Guan Moxin, was forced to intervene to stop the family's corn harvest, which was left lying out in the sun to dry, being swept away by the village tidying committee. Mr Mo himself has been non-commital amid the excitement. Asked by China Central Television whether he was happy, he responded: "I do not know." Asked by Xinhua, the state news agency, whether his win would ignite a passion for literature in China, he said: "I think it will last for a month at most, maybe less, then everything will return to normal." He said he planned to use his £750,000 of prize money to buy a "big house" in Beijing. But then he realised that property prices have soared so high he could only afford a two-bedroom apartment. His brother, however, suggested that he is unlikely to be thrilled at the plans for a tourist park. He will oppose any renovations even though he has won the award. It is too public, people should be low-key," Mr Guan said to a Chinese paper. Mr Mo's wife, Du Qinlan, said the writer had not earned very much money over his career, and his biggest treat is "a plate of dumplings." The British author David Mitchell also recently tasted the zeal of China's literature fans. When Mr Mitchell visited Shanghai on a book tour in August he was chased down the street by a mob of fans desperate for him to sign copies of his novel, Cloud Atlas. One particularly dogged admirer blocked his path and forced him to sign a life-size portrait of himself. "This has never happened before," Mr Mitchell said at the time. I have no idea why the book is so popular. If you find out can you let me know?" he added.