In 2007, Han Han sparked a controversy. He wrote an article and cursed that "there is no need for modern poetry and poets to exist." He believed that "the genre of modern poetry is also meaningless." Many poets and scholars participated in the debate, which became a major event in the literary and art circles that year. The origin of this debate began when the poet Zhao Lihua was dubbed the "lihua style poet".
Three years later, Han Han apologized to his opponents in the debate on his blog: "Here I also formally apologize to modern poetry and modern poets. My views three years ago were wrong and caused great harm to you. I feel very guilty for the misunderstanding caused by the injury. I have never said anything out of shame. I hope you can forgive me and understand.”
Zhao Lihua, writer and poet. His works focus on oral style, with concise language and calm style, and outline the relationship between people and the world with a simple sense of humor. The "Zhao Lihua Poetry Incident" that originated on the Internet in September 2006 was called by the media the largest poetry incident and cultural event since the new poetry movement of Hu Shi and Guo Moruo in 1916 due to its wide spread, great influence, and long duration. Zhao Lihua's poetry works and works that imitate Zhao Lihua's poetry style are called "Pear Blossom Style" and have a large number of opponents, fans and imitators on the Internet. On June 10, 2012, Zhao Lihua switched to painting. So far, she has created about 500 paintings, some of which have been collected by netizens.