"I am so desperate to know how it feels to read the most complicated book in the world, " said He Kuang, a 50-year-old civil servant in the coastal city Xiamen, who bought the translation.

WSJ: 'Finnegans Wake' Is Greek to Many; Now Imagine It in Chinese

China's state-run news agency, Xinhua, said investigators had handed Mr Lai over to prosecutors in the city of Xiamen, in Fujian province.

BBC: China

Mr Jia was the party secretary of the coastal province of Fujian during the emergence there in the 1990s of a huge smuggling ring in the port city of Xiamen.

ECONOMIST: China's new line-up

Local officials cleared out the city's only five-star hotel, the Xiamen Mandarin, for him.

CNN: THE MAN WITH THE IRON FACE

They seem to like Chen's declaration that Taipei may support Beijing's bid to host the 2008 Olympic Games. (Lee's government had opposed China's bid for this year's Games.) And on July 3, Xiamen Mayor Zhu Yayan invited his Kaohsiung counterpart, Frank Hsieh Chang-ting, to visit his city on the coast of Fujian province, opposite Taiwan.

CNN: Did He Say 'One China'?