Description

Yu Hua explores fifty years of change in China through ten words. He starts with the Cultural Revolution and Mao’s personality cult. He then turns to the Tian’anmen protests and economic growth. These essays deal with facts, not fiction. They help readers outside China grasp its recent past.

Each essay looks at one word, its roots and its uses. The first word is “people”; the last is “bamboozle.” Yu Hua draws on his own memories and reports. He also gives his views on politics. He writes about lost jobs and gaps between classes. He looks at corruption and waste, too. Poor farmers travel to sell their blood. In stark contrast, rich people build homes that copy the White House. These gaps raise doubts about the gains from China’s fast industrial growth. The mood shifts from humor to grief and horror.

Yu Hua brings a novelist’s sense of story to these essays. He was born in Hangzhou in 1960. He grew up in a family of doctors. The Cultural Revolution shaped his life as a child. It shaped his writing, too. He worked as a dentist for five years, then turned to writing. He first published a story in 1984. His short fiction brought him notice. In the early 1990s, he began to shift toward novels. Before that, his work had tried new forms. He has also written six books of stories and five of essays. His work has appeared in more than thirty languages. He won the James Joyce Award in 2002. He was the first Chinese person to receive it.

Mugur Zlotea translated this edition and wrote its notes. The cover shows an oil painting by Zhu Yi Yong. The 2006 work is Memories of the past series no. 17.