Market Street: A Chinese Woman in Harbin

by Xiao Hong, Howard Goldblatt (Translator)

Overview

Back in print - Market Street

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780295994239
Publisher:	University of Washington Press
Publication date:	01/01/2015
Series:	Studies on Ethnic Groups in China (Paperback)
Edition description:	revised edition
Pages:	160
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.60(d)
Lexile:	820L (what's this?)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Xiao Hong (1911–1942) is best known for her two short novels, Field of Life and Death and Tales of Hulan River. Howard Goldblatt has translated numerous works of contemporary Chinese fiction, most notably the novels of Nobel Prize winner Mo Yan.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vii

Translator's Preface to the 2015 Edition ix

Translator's Introduction xi

1 The Europa Hotel 3

2 A Snowy Day 7

3 He Goes Job Hunting 10

4 The Tutor 12

5 Visitors 19

6 The Basket Carrier 20

7 Hunger 23

8 The New Apartment 29

9 The Last Piece of Kindling 33

10 Black Khleb and White Salt 35

11 Hard Times 37

12 Snow Flurries 38

13 Frost Covered His Upper Lip 42

14 The Pawnshop 46

15 Borrowing 48

16 Buying a Fur Cap 52

17 The Ad Man's Dream 54

18 New Acquaintances 60

19 "Ox Tether" 63

20 A Ten-Yuan Bill 66

21 A Like-Fated Fish 69

22 A Few Carefree Days 74

23 The Female Tutor 80

24 Spring Appears on the Branches 83

25 The Carter, the Thief, and the Old Men 86

26 The Park 88

27 Summer Night 91

28 The Tutor Is a Criminal 96

29 The Book 97

30 The Drama Troupe 102

31 Pale Faces 106

32 Winter Again 109

33 A Black Shape in Front of the Gate 112

34 The Decision 115

35 A Young Woman from the South 116

36 The Stranger 119

37 Spring Again 120

38 Illness 122

39 Thirteen Days 126

40 Selling Off Our Belongings 28

41 The Final Week 130

Afterword (Langhua) 134

Editorial Reviews

"The dialogue is absolutely convincing and the author’s ability to present daily adventure profound. In its specificity, Market Street offers an ultimately universal lesson about freedom and oppression."

Boston Globe

"First published in 1936, "This simple little book has the irresistible appeal of all narratives of survival, and it is also an interesting account of the times, which included the Japanese occupation of China in 1931. Later Xiao Hong became an anti-Japanese writer of considerable celebrity . . . [until] her death at age thirty."

Booklist

"Market Street, first published in China in 1936, was written by the young woman writer Xiao Hong, who is best known for her two short novels, Field of Life and Death and Tales of Hulan River. In Market Street, the twenty-year-old author recounts in fictional autobiographical form two years of her short life when she lived in Harbin between 1932 and 1934. . . . Goldblatt has furnished a translation up to his usual high standard."

Pacific Affairs

Market Street, this hole in the wall in a Manchurian city, is a state of mind.... Even in translation [Xiao Hong’s] voice is that of a true original.

Far Eastern Economic Review

Intensely personal, lyrical, evocative, these poignant sketches detail with urgent beauty two years in the life of a young writer who confronts, first, the misery of hunger and cold, and later, the fear of seizure by the occupation police. The book is powerful in its confinement, vivid in its simplicity.... Howard Goldblatt has preserved in graceful, supple, often poetic English the acuity of insight and the nuances of tone.

|Los Angeles Times

Intensely personal, lyrical, evocative, these poignant sketches detail with urgent beauty two years in the life of a young writer who confronts, first, the misery of hunger and cold, and later, the fear of seizure by the occupation police. The book is powerful in its confinement, vivid in its simplicity. . . . Howard Goldblatt has preserved in graceful, supple, often poetic English the acuity of insight and the nuances of tone.

Los Angeles Times

First published in 1936, "This simple little book has the irresistible appeal of all narratives of survival, and it is also an interesting account of the times, which included the Japanese occupation of China in 1931. Later Xiao Hong became an anti-Japanese writer of considerable celebrity . . . [until] her death at age thirty.

Booklist