2018: Chinese fiction in translation
Our reviews of Chinese fiction—novels and short story collections—in translation this year.
[gdgallery_gallery id_gallery=”10″]
Related
“Discovered but Forgotten: The Maldives in Chinese History, c 1100-1620” by Bin Yang
China has been one of the leading sources of overseas visitors to the Maldives in recent years. Bin Yang, a professor of history at City University of Hong Kong, makes the argument in Discovered but Forgotten that this is to some extent a rerun of the situation in the 14th and 15th centuries when the…
“The Antagonists” by Tina Biswas
Fans of political skulduggery will appreciate this satirical tale of double-dealing, media manipulation and murder among the ruling classes of West Bengal.
“Strange Beasts of China” by Yan Ge
The unnamed narrator of Yan Ge’s novel Strange Beasts of China, a former zoology student-turned-fiction writer, resides in the fictional city of Yong’an, somewhere in southern China, described as “a huge, filthy, ungovernable city, full of all sorts of beasts of unknown origin, and secrets, likewise.” Yong’an perhaps resembles the concrete jungles of nearly every…
“Other Moons: Vietnamese Short Stories of the American War and Its Aftermath” & “The Republic of Vietnam, 1955–1975”
For my generation, born after the “Renovation” reform of Đổi Mới in 1986, “The War”—as most Vietnamese call what almost everyone else calls the Vietnam War—only exists in history books.
Why the 16th century still matters: China, Spanish America and globalization
Andrés de Urdaneta is a name that few other than specialist historians will immediately recognise. He was one of the last of the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century explorers and navigators from the Iberian peninsula whose voyages resulted in redrawing the globe in more or less the form we know it today. Christopher Columbus has a country…
“Awesome Art Indonesia: 10 works for the archipelago everyone should know” by Yvonne Yanmei Low
In children’s literature and in young adult fiction, food is often used to bridge cultures—“dumplings are the great social equaliser” says the protagonist in the YA novel The Surprising Power of a Good Dumpling as an example. And while food might be one of the easier entries into a culture, there are other ways too….
