Author: Yu Hua
Translator: Allan H. Barr
Publisher: Pantheon Books
Published Year: 2015
<aside> 7️⃣ I finished reading this novel in original Chinese version when I was in high school. Almost ten years later, I found its English translation on Amazon and bought it without hesitation. At the beginning of December in 2023, I spend about 11 hours in a train to Chengdu for my new job. During the journey, I finished reading the English version. It’s hard to believe that a decade doesn’t change my feeling to this novel: I still think this novel is the best one among Yu Hua’s works.
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[W]ealth conceded its inferiortity to power. —— The First Day
… she [Li Yuezhen] bemoaned the fact that there were more and more such woman in this society where you get more respect if you’re a whore than if you’re poor. —— The Second Day
Everyone was talking about it, saying how the police like to throw their weight around, but when it comes down to it they are all useless, even a man who’s got no balls can slash one of them to death so easily and wound another nine, two seriously. If it had been a crowd of men with balls, they could surely have massacred the entire public security bureau. …… People who arrive at the public security bureau with backpacks are normally there to deliver bribes, one policeman pointed out—who could have known that this guy would pull out a knife rather than a gift? —— The Fourth Day
“Go on over,” I said to him. “The tree leaves there will beckon you, the rocks will smile to you, the river will greet you. There’s no poverty here and no riches; there’s no sorrow and no pain; no grievances and no hate…. Here everyone finds equality in death.” “What’s the name of this place?” he asked. “The land of the unburied.”
The original Chinese version is shown below:
我对他说：“走过去吧，那里树叶会向你招手，石头会向你微笑，河水会向你问候。那里没有贫贱也没有富贵，没有悲伤也没有疼痛，没有仇也没有恨……那里人人死而平等。”
他问：“那是什么地方？”
我说：“死无葬身之地。”