Interviews with Mo Yan and Yan Geling at the London Book Fair
By Helen Wang, April 21, '12
Interview with Yan Geling
Interview with Mo Yan
Our News, Your News
IHT: Yan Lianke's Dark 2011 www.nytimes.com
The darkness of 2011 continued. My latest work, “Four Books” — a novel that directly confronts the Chinese people’s traumatic experiences during the Great Leap Forward of the late 1950s and the subsequent famine — was rejected by almost 20 publishing houses. The reasons I was given were all along the same lines: Anyone who dares to publish my book in China is certain to be closed down.
The novel took me 20 years to plan and two years to write. It is important to me as a writer, and I know it will be an important contribution to Chinese literature. However, I am fully aware of the realities of publishing in China, so I have no choice but to accept the fate of my book. All I can do is sigh.
China Week on Granta website, 16-20 April 2012
By Helen Wang, April 21, '12
http://www.granta.com/New-Writing
16 April - Flying Towards a Country of Rain, poem by Wang Yin (tr. Andrea Lingenfelter)
17 April - Petty Thief, short story by A Yi (tr. by Alice Xin Liu)
18 April - Shen Congwen: A Letter, tr. by Alice Xin Liu
19 April - Podcast of Mo Yan, interviewed by John Freeman
20 April - Solitude, poem by Huang Canran (tr. Judith Roche)
Science Fiction & Fantasy Translation Awards mentions Liu Cixin and Pathlight download www.sfftawards.org
Hugo Award nominated writer, Ken Liu, is also a keen translator of Chinese fiction. His latest project is “Taking Care of God” by the popular Chinese science fiction writer, Liu Cixin. You can read it in issue #2 of the free ebook magazine, Pathlight.
Influence and Independence in Chinese Poetry
By Canaan Morse, April 20, '12
An informal article by Canaan Morse on the poetry blog Metre Maids. Don't know why the site wouldn't let me newslink it.
Tibetan Writers in London on Freedom of Religion and Expression english.cri.cn
Alai remembered going to the British Museum and seeing Tibetan culture represented by the religious stuff only. "As a Tibetan I felt uneasy," he said. "Our culture is far more than just temples and lamas."
Talking about the influence of Tibetan culture by modernization, Alai said "development is good, as a culture couldn't just live in museums."
His view was echoed by Cering Norbu ［Tsering Norbu, 次仁罗布］. "This influence is not solely on Tibetan culture," he said. "It is why writers are important, as they should record the history of a nation."
Alai has a famous historical novel, the Dust Settles [Red Poppies, 尘埃落定], which follows a family of Tibetan chieftains before the democratic reform in 1959. When asked if such topic was sensitive, he laughed and voiced his confidence.
"In fact, I am free to express my innermost thoughts in China and writing itself is a happy experience," he said.
While Cering Norbu is working on a new book, which tells the change of life among Tibetans after 1959.
"Nobody has written down completely the changes Tibet experienced during the past half a century," he said.
"We are enjoying religious freedom. Our lives have been greatly improved, particularly after the reform and opening-up. I want to tell the readers our true feelings," he said.
BBC on London Book Fair - with interviews www.bbc.co.uk
Emily Buchanan reports on the London Bookfair -includes interviews with Shen Keyi, Xi Chuan and Ma Jian.
Memoir to rival Wild Swans found in attic www.thisislondon.co.uk
Memoir found in attic could be as big a hit as Wild Swans, by Louise Jury, Chief Arts Correspondent, The London Evening Standard, 19 April 2012:
A Chinese family memoir that languished in an attic for half a century is being hailed as a future hit as big as international bestseller Wild Swans. Agent Susan Mears is in talks with major publishers at this week’s London Book Fair after the manuscript documenting appalling hardship and bravery was discovered by London writer Howard Webster four months ago. It tells the story of Stephen Jin-Nom Lee, who rose from extreme poverty to become a colonel in the Cantonese Air Force, a professor, banker — and grandfather to Mr Webster’s Chinese-American wife, Julianne Lee.
Blue Door acquires The Bathing Women, by Tie Ning www.booktrade.info
Blue Door has acquired The Bathing Women, an iconic and bestselling novel by Chinese author Tie Ning which has been translated into English more than ten years after its original publication.
Editor Laura Deacon made her first acquisition for the list buying UK and Commonwealth rights through Arabella Stein at Abner Stein on behalf of Sobel Weber.
Huffington Post: Censorship = Castration? www.huffingtonpost.co.uk
From Beijing the issue is not so clear cut. The official delegation consists of some of the country's most popular authors. Examples include Internet sensation Annie Baobei, whose soulful, sad short stories are bestsellers; Man Asian Literary Prize winner Bi Feiyu; and the audacious, upcoming author A Yi, who writes dark tales about the countryside. All three deserve to be lauded - even if their journey to London is sponsored by the Chinese state.
What is clear is that censorship has a caustic relationship to creativity. China is now commanding the world's attention as an economic superpower. Its literature, however, flags behind its political clout. Censorship, it appears, is keeping the country's best writers in chains.
Shi Cheng - Short stories from Urban China
By Helen Wang, April 19, '12
Just published! Ten stories from urban China, by Ho Sin Tung, Cao Kou, Jie Chen, Yi Sha, Zhang Zhihao, Han Dong, Ding Liying, Xu Zechen, Diao Dou and Zhu Wen.
Published by Comma Press, 2012, ISBN 978-1905583461
www.commapress.co.uk
NY Review of Books: Bringing Censors to the Book Fair www.nybooks.com
What has caused a bitter public wrangle in London is that Beijing did not only choose—with the full approval of the fair itself and of the British Council—which writers to bring to the fair. In a disturbing repeat of what happened at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2009, it also excluded some of China’s best-known writers. Among these are two Nobel Prize winners: Gao Xingjian, China’s only Literature Prize laureate, who lives in nearby Paris, and Liu Xiaobo, the Peace Prize winner who is now serving out an eleven-year prison sentence. More scandalous still, not one of China’s diaspora poets and novelists was invited, even though most of the country’s most distinguished writers live abroad.
“We must be very powerful and they are frightened of us,” Qi Jiazhen, a fiery, seventy-year-old writer told me, at a meeting of Chinese writers in London to protest the fair’s corrupt invitation list. “That is why they won’t let us into the fair.”
Journal of the British Association for Chinese Studies
By Helen Wang, April 18, '12
From Michel Hockx: We are pleased to announce the launch of the JOURNAL OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION FOR CHINESE STUDIES (JBACS), the new official journal of the British Association for Chinese Studies (BACS).
Interview: Yan Lianke and his "Walden" www.chinanews.com
Yan Lianke (阎连科), author of Dream of Ding Village (丁庄之梦), speaks about the demolition of his Beijing garden-home, Thoreau's Walden and his own latest work, <北京，最后的纪念>. The interview is in Chinese.
Harvill Secker Young Translators Prize this year is from Chinese
By Nicky Harman, April 17, '12
All details here. Go for it!
Guardian newspaper chooses contemporary Chinese poem as Poem of the Week
By Nicky Harman, April 17, '12
Following the five Chinese short stories in translation which the Guardian ran last week, they've chosen a poem by Han Dong as their Poem of the Week today.
LBF Market Focus Reception: Expensive Hot Air
By Canaan Morse, April 16, '12
Had anyone doubted whether or not China would actually come to the Fair, he may rest assured. The Chinese delegation hosted a Market Focus Reception at the Mandarin Oriental last night, branded with their hallmark of unbelievable expenditure, and the British came along for the ride. Polituburo Standing Committee member Li Changchun gave the opening speech and Prince Andrew followed right after him. Substantial speeches by Mr. Wu something-or-other, the chief of GAPP, and Tie Ning, Party Secretary for the China Writers Association.
Chandelier light glossed the black silk shoulders of the security personnel in a ballroom crowded like a Beijing train platform. Amid the heavy odor of warm Chanel, the China Market Focus at the London Book Fair was rung in with forty minutes of rhetoric about the earth-shattering importance of literature by people who have never written a poem in their lives. (the exception being Tie Ning, for whom the transformation is even more remarkable.) Inspiring, truly. Meanwhile, the reading of excerpts from work by three of the Chinese authors, scheduled for the second half of the ceremony, was canceled due to time concerns.
My challenge is over!
By Helen Wang, April 15, '12
A few weeks ago I took on a challenge – to post something on Paper Republic every day until the London Book Fair (see more here). The LBF starts tomorrow, so my challenge is now over! I’ve learnt a lot in the process. If you’re interested, read on…
The British Council brings more shame on us www.guardian.co.uk
The British Council brings more shame on us - All authors are welcome to the London Book Fair… as long as they don't upset the Chinese
Article by Nick Cohen, The Observer, 15 April 2012
Dr Bethune's Children, by Xue Yiwei
By Helen Wang, April 15, '12
http://harvard.academia.edu/DavidYao/Blog
From David Yao's blog, 7 November 2011:
Dr. Bethune’s Children by Xue Yiwei
Dr. Bethune’s Children was described as a masterpiece that “would go down into history” by Shouhuo and Huacheng, two top Chinese literary magazines....