Review
Occasionally a writer comes along who truly makes a difference, inaugurates changes, and sets new literary standards. Huang Fan is one of these, and he's done it more than once. This book is a must read.
(Howard Goldblatt, University of Notre Dame, coeditor of * _Loud Sparrows: Contemporary Chinese Short-Shorts and The Columbia Anthology of Modern Chinese Literature* )
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No writer better epitomizes the uncertainty and tumult of the 1980s in Taiwan than Huang Fan, an author whose work runs the gamut from poignant and subtle political critique to postmodern metafictional experimentation and finally futuristic, visionary science fiction. Few translators are up to the task as well as John Balcom, a seasoned and sensitive wordsmith who combines an understanding of the shades of meaning in the Chinese language with decades of experience in Taiwan and an artist's facility in English.
(Christopher Lupke, Washington State University )
This is Huang Fan's fiction at its finest. These subtly crafted stories leave a lasting impression that deepens with time. Zero immerses the reader in a society that simultaneously entices and entraps, inciting real confusion as to its actual workings. Written in the early 1980s when Taiwan was an autocratic regime embedded in neoliberal globalization, the story transcends identifiable times and locales to masterfully query global power structures.
(Robin Visser, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, author of Cities Surround the Countryside: Urban Aesthetics in Postsocialist China )
About the Author
Huang Fan (b. 1950) is a prominent Taiwanese writer who gained recognition in the 1980s with his short story "Lai Suo." From 1993 to 2002, he retreated to a monastery to study Buddhist scripture, refusing all contact with the outside world. He subsequently recaptured the world's attention with the publication of "Impatient Country," "College Thief," and "Surmising a Cat," and has since won every major literary award offered in Taiwan.
John Balcom is an award-winning translator of Chinese literature, philosophy, and children's books. He teaches translation at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, where he ran the Chinese program for many years. Publications include Taiwan's Indigenous Writers: An Anthology of Stories, Essays, and Poems, and There's Nothing I Can Do When I Think of You Late at Night by Cao Naiqian, both of which won a Northern California Book Award.
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