TWIB-III 15
Jan. 26th, 2009 10:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
akujunkanBetween the Hong Kong visit and reading reams of articles in preparation for my final semester report, I only managed to read one book this week, but it was a good one.
1) Empress - Shan Sa
What a stellar book. Empress is the fictionalized biography of Wu Zetian, the only woman in China's history to rule as emperor. Although the novel was originally penned in French, the English translation reads as smoothly as if it had originally been written in English; along with that of My Life as Emperor, it's the best translation of any book I've read. Indeed, my only complaint is that the horribly mangled transliterations of Korean kingdom names...but this a truly minor aspect of the novel.
Wu comes alive thanks to Shan's observant but reserved prose, which brings the Tang-dynasty Chinese court to life without ananchronism or unnecessary exposition. And although Wu's values and thought processes are far removed from those of any present day reader, Shan nevertheless allows us to see what makes Wu tick. I really cannot overstate how thankful I am that Shan lets the story speak for itself instead of assuming that her readers will want their hands held as they encounter the unfamiliar characters and settings.
But best of all, Shan truly inhabits Wu, so that the narrative never explicitly acknowledges the empress's hypocrisy or, often, her true motivations for acting, just as we all are incapable of doing with respect to ourselves. This in turn lends a greater level of immediacy and realism to the novel. If you've an interest in China or historical fiction, read this book.
That will be all.
1) Empress - Shan Sa
What a stellar book. Empress is the fictionalized biography of Wu Zetian, the only woman in China's history to rule as emperor. Although the novel was originally penned in French, the English translation reads as smoothly as if it had originally been written in English; along with that of My Life as Emperor, it's the best translation of any book I've read. Indeed, my only complaint is that the horribly mangled transliterations of Korean kingdom names...but this a truly minor aspect of the novel.
Wu comes alive thanks to Shan's observant but reserved prose, which brings the Tang-dynasty Chinese court to life without ananchronism or unnecessary exposition. And although Wu's values and thought processes are far removed from those of any present day reader, Shan nevertheless allows us to see what makes Wu tick. I really cannot overstate how thankful I am that Shan lets the story speak for itself instead of assuming that her readers will want their hands held as they encounter the unfamiliar characters and settings.
But best of all, Shan truly inhabits Wu, so that the narrative never explicitly acknowledges the empress's hypocrisy or, often, her true motivations for acting, just as we all are incapable of doing with respect to ourselves. This in turn lends a greater level of immediacy and realism to the novel. If you've an interest in China or historical fiction, read this book.
That will be all.