You might’ve heard of Annie Lu ’26 from her various music performances. However, underneath her melodic mastery, she is deeply devoted to creative writing. Let me introduce you to the story of Che Lu — a side of Annie you might have never imagined.
Since Che’s youth, she’s had a delicate sensitivity to words and a devout yearning for the grand and powerful.
Her creativity sparked in middle school, when she encountered a classical Chinese prose that simply, yet forcefully wove the individual with the nation’s destiny. Reading moved her for the first time. She was struck by the spirit of the “shi” — scholars who take unyielding commitments to their beliefs. Specifically, a line from Mencius, a Chinese Confucian philosopher, stayed with her: “Though ten thousand stand in my way, I will go forward,” (虽千万人，吾往矣). From that moment, she became a writer.
This encounter shaped her earliest sense of literary aesthetics. “I want my writing to carry power,” she told me. “The power of ideals, and the courage to put them into practice.” For Che, literature is not only a mirror of reality — it also transforms reality, reveals truth, and guides people toward it.
The road, however, was never easy. Through her teenage years, Che often felt torn between lofty expectations and the reality of her skillset. The more she admired the genius of ancient masters, the more she doubted herself, sinking into cycles of nihilism and self-doubt. Then one day, her Chinese literature teacher encouraged her to write. With vast knowledge, piercing insight, and a fearless, elegant presence, the teacher ignited Che with reverence and aspiration. Under her guidance, Che devoured books, confronted her fears, and gradually began to find her own literary voice.
At that time, Che’s love of writing was so intense that it frightened her. She feared losing her teacher’s mentorship, falling short, being blinded by ignorance, and, most of all, abandoning writing altogether. But love, too, gave her courage. She faced those fears, pushing beyond silence until her words came alive. She grew to believe that “as long as one has once chosen the pen, one will never put it back down.”
To this day, Che still hasn’t taken any creative writing classes at Swarthmore, as these classes are taught in English. The distance from home has only sharpened her sense of connection to her language and her country. Instead, she decided to continue her craft quietly in Chinese. She immerses herself in classical Chinese texts, intent on reviving their unique expressive force. “If I switched to English creative writing, my Chinese voice would inevitably be weakened,” she says.
Her intellectual curiosity extends beyond literature. Che has long loved Chinese philosophy, studying Confucian, Daoist, and Buddhist traditions. One formative summer, she read “The Doctrine of the Mean” (中庸), which she describes as a guiding light for her path. To her, the “mean” is about grasping a dynamic balance while holding firmly to one’s independence, seeking ceaselessly, and reminding oneself to return to the Dao whenever straying from it.
She is also fond of Mencius’s claim that “all people can become Yao or Shun”（人皆可以为尧舜) — the legendary sage-kings of ancient China. At first glance, human differences seem too vast for such an ideal to be possible. But, as she explains, “within the dialectic of unity and opposition, everything ultimately belongs to ‘one.’ Every person has the capacity to ‘hold fast to the center,’ walking their own diverse paths toward the same destination.”
At the same time, she has expanded her studies to economics, politics, and history, seeking to understand her place as a Chinese writer in the global landscape.
With this stability, Che embraces some new experiences at Swarthmore — studying Japanese, German, and linguistics; performing in the Taiko ensemble; and continuing her long-standing passion for vocal performance.
Music, unexpectedly, has become another center of her artistic life. In high school, she could never have imagined how a German singer could change her life. His voice, unlike the rich, rounded Italian Bel Canto style, appears serious and rational, yet captures all shades of emotion. His interpretation of songs, which focuses on the crisp diction and musicality, shows Che again the beauty of simplicity without pretension. Undoubtedly, she fell in love with the form of art songs, where poetry and music seamlessly intertwine. One night, she dreamed of this singer telling her it would be a pity if she abandoned music. After much hesitation, she made the bold decision to pursue a graduate degree in vocal performance.
For her, music and literature breathe life into each other.
Her most recent work, “Guangling Zhixi,” is a short story that wove together her reflections on the “Doctrine of the Mean” and her musical training in the summer of 2024, clearly justify this point.
Similarly, during a vocal retreat in Vienna and Germany, she composed “Ständchen,” a modern poem modeled on a song suite. It tells the story of a man exchanging songs with a ghost, meditating on the trinity of homeland, afterlife, and present world.
Over time, her style has shifted. “At first I always wanted to write something avant-garde, obscure, to flaunt my vocabulary and emotions,” she admits. “But later I realized that writing in a way that people can’t understand is really a form of self-insecurity.” With the realization, her writings now strive for clarity, as she seeks a voice that is accessible and inclusive. “In the future, whether in realism or fantasy, philosophy or lyricism, I hope my work will be vast and inclusive, yet inwardly subtle.”
For Che, writing remains her truest calling. But in music, philosophy, and language, she continues to find the forces that sustain it.
She seeks to become a more harmonious and unified self.
