Book titiles (From left to right): Faust by Johann Wolfgangvon Goethe, War and Peace by LeoTolstoy and A Hero of Our Time [Photo/China Daily]

Once he walked 30 kilometers to borrow Faust from another zhiqing and then another 30 km to return it.

When talking about Russian literature, he thought Fyodor Dostoevsky's writing was very deep, and Leo Tolstoy's works were very broad, and he liked Tolstoy more.

Xi specifically mentioned Tolstoy's War and Peace and also nodded to Mikhail Lermontov's A Hero of Our Time.

He said he also liked Mikhail Sholokhov's And Quiet Flows the Don.

He said the book contains a very in-depth depiction of the transformation of times and human nature.

Xi also acknowledged the "inspiring" character of Jean Valjean in Victor Hugo's Les Miserables.

He recalled visiting the place where Ernest Hemingway wrote The Old Man and the Sea during his first trip to Cuba and the bar Hemingway frequented during his second trip.

While the trips were 10 years apart, he reportedly said, the sea and sky were equally vast each time.