The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast

‘I wrote the asinine words ‘liquor is literature’ and ‘people who are strangers to liquor are incapable of talking about literature’ when I was good and drunk, and you must not take them to heart.’

In the ninety ninth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we’re taking a lengthy holiday with Mo Yan in The Republic of Wine, so get your visa stamped and your baijiu in hand. This time there are two discussions. First, sober,...

I supposed every last one of this country’s 1.3 billion inhabitants all had their own obsessions with the giant germ cell.

In the ninety eighth episode of the Translated Chinese fiction podcast I am joined by two fine fellows, Shi Yifeng and contributing translator Carson Ramsdell. All a-puff with imperial gusto, we leaf through The Book of Beijing to discuss three of the stories collected within: Han Song’s Reunion ( 北京西站，春节之前 - bě...

‘Starting to write a suicide note would be too melodramatic. If she wrote it, it would only contain one line: This love makes me so uncomfortable.’

In the ninety seventh episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we are passing the gates of Fang Si-Chi’s First Love Paradise (房思琪的初戀樂園- fáng sī qí de chūliàn lèyuán), an all-too-real #MeToo novel by the late Lin Yi-han, centred around the titular girl and the cram school teache...

‘the man spun instinctively to face them, both hands covering his chest, looking almost sorrowful as blood glazed his fingers’

In the ninety sixth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are entering into dialogue with bioscientist-turned-historical-fictioneer Chen Yao-chang and translator Chen Tung-jung to learn how they cultivated Puppet Flower: A Novel of 1867 Formosa (傀儡花 - kuǐlěi huā), to see if we can arrive at a ...

Trembling hands seem to check for the forgotten secret language. Withered bodies, like finding some long-forgotten receipt. Where have you been all these years? The mountains echo again, spring’s call is finally answered: I am the secret language you forgot. You are my lost credentials.

In the ninety fifth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are embarking on My Travels in Ding Yi (我的丁一之旅 - wǒ de dīng yī zhīlǚ). This...

‘It’s just life, right? One place is as good as another’

In the ninety third episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are Running through Beijing (跑步穿过中关村 - pǎobù chuānguò zhōngguāncūn) in the loping style of 70后 hero Xu Zechen. At the fabled finishing line – observing us wryly, beer and chuan’er in hand – is the translator, Eric Abrahamsen of Paper Republic fame. Insert your porn DVD, stamp your hukou, and - most import...

‘I’ve never broken any rules, not even rules at school. Why would I blackmail someone?’

’In the ninety second episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are getting duped by Bad Kids (坏孩子 - huài háizi). Fleeing the proverbial orphanage with me is the book’s translator, Michelle Deeter, here to mark a breadcrumb trail through the dark children’s palace that author Zijin Chen has constructed for the benefit and perturbation ...

‘The “exquisite bridges and flowing water” one finds in poetry are not written by real farmers, but those who claim to love rural life when they most fear it.’

In the ninety first episode of the Translated Chinese Podcast, we are travelling half across China to pod you. The writer in question is rural/online star Yu Xiuhua and my guest is her translator, the thoughtful and particular Fiona Sze-Lorrain. The art in question is Yu’s co...

‘The man in the bed looks at her. An enormous force seems to be pulling him into a world behind him, a world whose gates will soon be shut forever. She strokes his forehead gently.’

In the eighty ninth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are enfolding ourselves within Cocoon, the dreamlike and sometimes upsetting dual-bildungsroman and return to realism by post-85 author Zhang Yueran. Lost with me (yet ever so far a...

‘The final cut – the coup de grace – entered Qian’s heart, from which black blood the colour and consistency of melted malt sugar slid down the knife blade'

In the eighty fifth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we are experiencing the lacerating pains of Sandalwood Death, as dealt to us by Nobel literature prizewinner Mo Yan. It’s time to rip Shandong Province apart in a rebellion for the songbooks. Weapon in hand, ...

‘Generation after generation, people have lived in this massive sick ward we call the universe ’

In the eighty fourth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we are lost deep inside Hospital, the first entry in an abyssal trilogy by show favourite Han Song. Old-time wardmates Michael Berry and Mingwei Song are here too, groaning in the darkness.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

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‘If you lived in one of the lanes of Puxi, the moment you stepped out your door, you would find yourself in the thick of urban life in all its boisterous variety.'

In the eighty second episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we are paying a visit to The Sanctimonious Cobbler (骄傲的皮匠 / Jiāo'ào de Píjiàng), a novella by Wang Anyi which can be read in By the River: Seven Contemporary Chinese Novellas. Wandering with me down t...

A star’s coming of age was the process of slowly getting uglier.

In the eighty first episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, writer/researcher Yen Ooi and I are gazing up at The Stars We Raised (逃跑星辰 / táopǎo xīngchén), a short story by Xiu Xinyu featured in the all-women + nonbinary anthology The Way Spring Arrives. Once more, a Chinese science fiction story is taking us down to the countryside for melancholy reflections...

‘In the same spot where Father died, the dead body of a deer lay prostrate in the rain.’

In the eightieth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, it’s Raining Zebra Finches (斑胸草雀 / bān xiōng cǎo què). Blame for this troubling meteorological occurrence falls upon Taiwanese author Chiou Charng-Ting; it’s her story. Under the weather with me is her translator, May Huang. In our discussion we’ll be testing the limits of our e...

‘History is nothing more than a complex construction of records and observations’

In the seventy ninth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction podcast, we’re riding the Express to Beijing West Railway Station (开往西站的特别列车 / kāiwǎng xī zhàn de tèbié lièchē), and I’ll be buying my ticket from none other than the author herself, Mu Ming. En route we’ll be passing by the scenic works of William Blake and Christopher Nolan, and pondering...

‘Then each Boxer lad who loves fighting and fun, let him follow the bonnets of bonnie Prince Tuan’

In the seventy eighth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are riding to war behind Bonnie Prince Tuan, a poem by a Chinese Scotiaphile that draws a parallel between two sets of rebels: the Jacobites of the Scottish highlands and the Boxers of northern China. Here to lend some Boxer brawn to my Jacobean jesting is Lee M...

“You can give me your empty words if you like; I’ve come to fill out the forms permitting us to withdraw from society.”

In the seventy seventh episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are turning our cheek to Lenin's Kisses (受活 / shòu huó) by Yan Lianke. Yes, I’m finally dealing with him – and not alone. Piotr Machajek is here to show me how to Liven, as we look into the pros and cons of entering and retreating from a so...

“Unmasking a universally accepted lie or overturning an irreplaceable idol will produce something akin to a mental collapse.”

In the seventy sixth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are hitting Zero (零 / líng). Joining me on deck are The Hugonauts, as we navigate a dystopian world that might be a postmodern riff on 1984 by amorphous author Huang Fan, or might be something far more sinister. All seasoned rebels know...

“Are you going to let your son die for nothing?”

In the seventy fifth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are surviving The Curse (杨村的一则诅咒 / yáng cūn de yī zé zǔzhòu). My partner for this investigation is literary Sinologist Jeffrey Kinkley. What exactly are we dealing with here? A tale of a backfiring curse, or a backfiring society? For realist writing to penetrate our often nightmarish world and scratch The Real, ...