Ep 79 - Mu Ming and Express to Beijing West Railway Station

‘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 whether Shakespeare and Lu Xun would make good Netflix writers (see Patreon feed). Long-time TrChFic listeners will also already know all-too-well: you’re going to hear me enthuse about trains. Sorry.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• WATCH: Qiufan Chen on How Chinese Science Fiction Imagines Our Future
• WATCH: Gloria S Tseng on Biblical Imagery in Early Twentieth-Century Chinese Literature
• READ: a new issue of Chinese Literature and Thought Today with a newly translated Han Song story & an essay on Little Smarty Travels to the Future

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// WORD OF THE DAY //

(想象力 - xiǎngxiànglì - imagination)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• Mu Ming’s musial pairing: The Grandmaster OST
• Angus’ musical pairing: The End Where We Start by The Black Queen
• The Art of Doing Science and Engineering by Richard Hemming
• The Dragon by Ray Bradbury
• Good Hunting by Ken Liu
• The Serpentine Band 宛转环 by Mu Ming herself
• The Snow of Jinyang 晋阳三尺雪 by Zhang Ran
• Vital: The Future of Healthcare - a sci fi anthology
• Kaili Blues 路边野餐 (2015, dir Bi Gan)