[4] His father was a Communist revolutionary who worked under Pan Hannian and served as a government official in Shanghai.

After Pan Hannian was purged in March 1954, Jin's father was stripped of his post and was also placed under investigation.

[4] In July 1969, during the Cultural Revolution, Jin and his brother worked as sent-down youth at Nenjiang Farm in Heilongjiang.

He entered a Youth Writing Workshops, which was set up by the Shanghai Writers Association.

In 1988, his novel, The Wind Birds, won a fiction Award sponsored by Shanghai Literature.