Ai Weiwei has signed a memoir deal. Crown Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, will publish the English language edition of this book.
Ai (pictured, via) has become well-known in his native China as a controversial artist and political activist. Throughout his lifetime, he has been highly vocal with his criticisms towards the Chinese government.
Here’s more from The New York Times: “Mr. Ai’s own widely publicized but little-understood 81-day detention in 2011 at the hands of the Chinese authorities will also be a subject of the book, as will his development as an artist in New York in the 1980s and his time working in Beijing since then. In a statement, he said, ‘I write about my father, his generation, and my own experience, our struggle for individual freedom and self-expression in this old society.'” (via Vulture)