Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #54169 in Books
• Published on: 1996-02-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 322 pages

From Publishers Weekly
In contrast to the utopian official literature of Communist China, the stories in this wide-ranging collection marshal wry humor, entangled sex, urban alienation, nasty village politics and frequent violence. Translated ably enough to keep up with the colloquial tone, most tales are told with straightforward familiarity, drawing readers into small communities and personal histories that are anything but heroic. "The Brothers Shu," by Su Tong (Raise the Red Lantern), is an urban tale of young lust and sibling rivalry in a sordid neighborhood around the ironically named Fragrant Cedar Street. That story's earthiness is matched by Wang Xiangfu's folksy "Fritter Hollow Chronicles," about peasants' vendettas and local politics, and by "The Cure," by Mo Yan (Red Sorghum; The Garlic Ballads), which details the fringe benefits of an execution. Personal alienation and disaffection are as likely to appear in stories with rural settings (Li Rui's "Sham Marriage") as they are to poison the lives of urban characters (Chen Cun's "Footsteps on the Roof"). Comedy takes an elegant and elaborate form in "A String of Choices," Wang Meng's tale of a toothache cure, and it assumes the burlesque of small-town propaganda fodder in Li Xiao's "Grass on the Rooftop." Editor Goldblatt has chosen not to expand the contributors' biographies or elaborate on the collection's post-Tiananmen context. He lets the stories speak for themselves, which, fortunately, they do, quietly and effectively.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
The 20 authors represented here range from Wang Meng, the former minister of culture, to Su Tong, whose Raise the Red Lantern has been immortalized on screen.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: Chinese

Customer Reviews

Colossal Disappointment
This book provides an awful snapshot of modern Chinese fiction. With a few notable exceptions--Mo Yan's muscular, hard-hitting story 'The Cure' primary among them--the selected pieces are overwritten to the point of nonsense.

Consider this brain-bending sentence from Bi Feiyu's "The Ancestor": "The sky secreted a viscous historical atmosphere."

Awkward phrasing and mistranslated phrases make nearly every story in this collection painful to read. I got the sense that the Chinese authors are begging to be taken so seriously that they fill the stories with big words strung together to the point that they end up incomprehensible.

How does a sky secrete anything? And how is an atmosphere viscous?

Chairman Mao most certainly would not be amused.

In fact, he'd probably send Comrade Goldblatt in for some re-education.

A Good Collection of Stories and Authors
A read the stories in this book as part of my training before a month long journey to China.

This is a very interesting book if you are interested in views of modern China. If you are not into Chinese culture, you will probably not find these stories interesting.

The translation is good and easy to follow. The story shows many different points of view regarding life in China today.

So again, if you like Chinese culture you will really enjoy these short stories.

Eerie, funny, fascinating.
I picked this up because I'm going to China next month. This isn't a tour book, but it has gotten me excited about seeing the people and the place. It's almost like science fiction without the science -- stories from an alien culture.