Xu worked for Foxconn and attracted media attention after his suicide, after which his friends published his collection of poems.

[5][6] While Xu was in high school, he wanted to enter a university, but his scores on the national entrance exam were not good enough to allow it.

[5] Xu's collection of books while he was in Shenzhen included Juan Rulfo's Pedro Páramo and Adunis's My Loneliness is a Garden.

[2] Xu left Foxconn a few days before the 2014 Spring Festival and went to Suzhou to meet his girlfriend.

He lost contact with his friends until he returned to Shenzhen in late September 2014, when he signed a new employment contract with Foxconn.

[7] Ten hours after his death, on 1 October 2014, China's National Day, Xu's Weibo account released a new blog that was written in advance.

[6] Media including The Washington Post,[1] Bloomberg News[8] and Time[9] reported Xu's death.

[13] Gothic metal singer-songwriter Chelsea Wolfe's fourth studio album Abyss features a song titled "Iron Moon", inspired by Xu's writings and suicide.

[16] Antifascist black metal project Cuscuta used four of Xu's poems as lyrics for their 2015 album Fodder for the Callous.