“If ever a nation was forged by literary writers, it was the People’s Republic of China”, writes Granta editor Thomas Meaney in his introduction to the recent issue dedicated to writing from that country. The Granta selection is an excellent read, yet it lacks the literary heights reached by Ten Thousand Miles of Clouds and Moons (Honford Star, 192pp, £14.99) edited by Zuo Fei, Xiao Yue Shan and Simon Shieh.
The stories included in this anthology graft traditions and myths on to innovative forms of storytelling. Within Mass In Dream Of The Red Chamber by Chen Chuncheng, translated by Xiao Yue Shan, Cao Xueqin’s great novel has been lost and must, through elaborate means, be re-created because a secretive subculture believes that everything we know, “the collapse of galaxies, each significant conversation, each ripple in every teacup”, originates in the novel.
San San’s Lady Wei’s Dream, translated by Michael Day, is another intricate story in which a dream foretelling the future leads to a discussion about free will until, in a beautifully tragic unfurling, the dream itself disintegrates. All of the stories in this collection are exceptionally good; fresh and invigorating in their ambition and reach; forging new paths through the mountains of the past.
One of the writers included in the China issue of Granta is Yu Hua, whose novel City of Fiction (Europa Editions, 428pp, £14.99) translated by Todd Foley, is an engrossing story that, in its early chapters, has a Hardyesque plot in which a farmer is visited by a man and woman who claim to be siblings. Because she becomes unwell, the woman stays behind while the man continues his journey. She remains for several weeks, and a relationship develops which leads to the birth of a daughter who is soon abandoned by her mother.
The man’s search for Xiaomei, the child’s mother, in a town to the south of his farm is only the beginning of an expedition which exchanges the bucolic for a beneficent life within the town that is eventually threatened by the violence of marauding bandits. It makes for a terrifically entertaining novel. Yu Hua’s well-judged decision to delay all of Xiaomei’s story until the second part of the novel adds an effective layer of intrigue and anticipation, returning us to the emotional core of a time-honoured story.
Felix Nesi’s strategy is especially effective in undermining the assumptions of the reader’s emotional responses
There is a robust, ribald humour and attitude freely expressed in City of Fiction, which is also true of People From Oetimu (Archipelago, 304pp, $20) by Felix Nesi, translated from Indonesian by Lara Norgaard, which begins as a group of men gather to watch a World Cup final. At the same time, the family of one of the men is taken hostage by a gang because of his involvement in torturing one of their number during Indonesia’s war against East Timor.
For a novel of its length, the developments from that moment are hugely impressive, encompassing the complex colonial history of Indonesia and the legacy of Dutch and Portuguese occupation of the territory, as well as the country’s brutal treatment of the people of East Timor. That the novel also details the abuse of women and girls and the persistent brutality of the military and police suggests a grim read, but it is infused with moments of profound humour that provide a compelling contrast and lightness.
All of this is achieved while successfully shifting between narratives and chronology. Felix Nesi’s strategy is especially effective in undermining the assumptions of the reader’s emotional responses. We are amused, infuriated, surprised and shocked, all within short sequences of the novel, through to an ending that has to be read at least twice to understand the full implications of its satirical intent. The translator’s informative afterword is a valuable addition to this excellent novel.
Portents of impending threats are addressed in a very different manner in The Unworthy (Pushkin Press, 188pp, £16.99) by Augustina Bazterrica, translated by Sarah Moses. In the aftermath of a cataclysmic environmental event refuge is sought in a convent. But, as is immediately established, there is more to fear within the confines of this community than there is outside.
The stratification of power into hierarchies assures rivalry and resentment, all of which is overseen by a sadistic Superior Sister and “Him”, a male presence who remains unseen. The narrator records these occurrences on pages that must be hidden and are often unfinished. She was originally among the wanderers who occasionally enter the grounds in hope of sanctuary. Another such is Luciá, whose simmering desires are reciprocated by the narrator, putting both women at great risk.
A funeral, at which drinking coffee is permitted unlocks a treasure of memories for the narrator: “I saw my mother dancing barefoot in the kitchen.” At times, the writing can be overwrought and heightened in style but the tension is well-sustained and there are many startling sequences within this finely translated book.
There are also several unsettling scenes in Hunchback (Viking, 98pp, £12.99) by Saou Ichikawa, translated from the Japanese by Polly Barton, narrated by a woman with myotubular myopathy who, because of her condition and Covid-19, is forced to live in isolation, with only her carers for company.
Having had to undergo a tracheostomy, she has to regularly insert a suction catheter to drain the mucus from her windpipe. The repetitious exigencies of her body can only be escaped through extravagant imaginings such as writing pornographic fantasies which also earn her an income. Unfortunately, the examples we read are as flavourless as the writing in the novel as a whole. The dearth of psychological insight into the humiliations endured by the narrator, whose “ultimate dream is to get pregnant and have an abortion, just like a normal woman”, is disappointing.
The narrator’s perspective is singular but is too often disconcerting in its lack of discernment. Also puzzling is her anger at the publishing industry’s “ableist machismo” – because she finds books difficult to hold – given that she could download thousands of ebooks on to the iPad she uses. Perhaps then it is deliberate that the book – longlisted for the International Booker Prize – is, in every sense slight, closer to a short story than a novel.
Described as an “autobiographical novel”, the classification of The Propagandist (Swift, 192pp, £14.99) by Cécile Desprairies, translated from the French by Natasha Lehrer, could also be questioned, as it is really a memoir with invented dialogue.
Irrespective, this account of the life of the author’s mother, Lucie, during and after Vichy France is superbly well told. Lucie’s fervent belief in the Nazi ideology met its perfect match in Friedrich, a German party member and aspirant Mengele whom she married. Their seriousness of purpose occupied every aspect of lives lived in unquestioning expectation of a glorious, fascist future.
When Hitler was defeated and Friedrich died in an apparent accident Lucie was bereft and never recovered despite remarrying some years later. In the postwar years, Lucie and her family and friends were preoccupied with the possibility that they could at any time be denounced for their collaboration. But the postwar government never sought to probe the country’s compromised past too assiduously. Desprairies tells these stories in an assured style, with occasional moments of unexpected lyricism through Natasha Lehrer’s resourceful translation. When did you last find the word “callipygous” in a book?
