Raise the Red Lantern

Read a Chinese movie about concubines and the changing of the guard in Chinese history. It's a novella collection by Su Tong. Su Tong is known for his magic realism style of writing and these three novellas are filled with magic realism and historical motifs. The three novellas are Raise the Red Lantern, 1934 Escapes, Opium Family.

Raise the Red Lantern

Raise the Red Lantern is the only story that has been turned into a movie. It follows a young girl that was taken as a concubine by a rich man. The story shows the deterioration of the man's household and the deterioration of the last concubines' mind. There is deceit and gossip and murder and planning among the women.

I like the way Su Tong weaves history with his story. The changes that China is undergoing and wher eChina is headed. Although there are things lost in translation the heart of the story still reveals itself in the prose. The two other stories revolve around a village and what transpires inside the minds of its characters. It shows the transformation of China.

Chinese literature has a deep history maybe it's about time the rest of the world saw through Chinese eyes.

Brothers

Rarely does a translation do justice to the original text but for Brothers this might have to do.

Brothers

My Chinese is rusty and not as proficient as I'd like it to be so settling for a translation of this book by Yu Hua will do.

The book has high aspirations to be satire mixed with raunchy comedy and cultural undertones. Chinese as a language does speak a lot of its eloquence through non-verbal lingo so reading this book was a chore but I think I could grasp what it was trying to say.

The story is about half-brothers Song Gang and Baldy Li. Their travails show a back drop of what China went through before and after the Cultural Revolution. The relationship of the two brothers is not all lovey but is filled with bumps and contradictions. They both set out in different paths after falling in love with the same woman, Lin Hong. Song Gang a life of subservience and destitution as he tries to preserve his rustic ideals in a booming economic China. On the other hand Baldy Li, did all he can to become a tycoon in the new China. It is a struggle between old and new and urban and provincial. The winner is not clearly spelled out since both brothers ended up with nothing but each other.

There are several undertones that the story does not tell you outright. The context is very Chinese unwittingly subtle and unobtrusive. Why not figure those out for yourself?

Tinkers

Once in a while you run into a book that catches you off guard. One of the books that caught my attention was Tinkers by Paul Harding.

Tinkers by Paul Harding

Tinkers is a special book that was written beautifully. The prose just fluttered in your ears with a distinct sound that is like poetry. Its obscure size and all white design is easy to miss but once you start reading you will be captured by the writing style and imagination of Paul Harding. He is a new writer with his first published book. The book was passed by several major publishing houses before Bellevue decided to publish the book with a limited number of copies. As it turned out the book was good enough to bag a Pulitzer Prize which it deserved.

SPOILER ALERT! READ ON AT YOUR OWN PERIL!

The story is a parallel between father and son that were on their deathbeds and had a serious illness at the later parts of their life. The book started with Howard Crosby and his son George Washington Crosby. The book takes you on a ride with a multitude of memories of both men that are intertwined into one story. Although the book was non-linear the fragments of memories put the whole piece together. There is a touch of humanity that is at the heart of the book. I especially liked the way the author mixed the story of how clocks were formed and even how to make a nest. It somehow makes you feel that he was trying to say something more about the life of the two men and nature.

Nature was an integral part of the story and how small man can be at times with nature's regal presence. The story moved from one perspective to another but somehow you feel that it is the same person but the main difference is that they are in two different points in time. The life of Howard and George are told in a pastiche of time segments.

I won't divulge any further you have to judge the book yourself to find out.

4 out of 5 stars for Tinkers by Paul Harding

Outliers

I've read a book about success. It was Malcolm Gladwell's book 'Outliers'

This book is interesting because it points out details that can make or break a person's life in general. Just because you met this particular person, you were born on a particular year, you were in a specific community that had this specific machine or building or whatever minute detail such as the year you were born. The book opens a new perspective on how success is perceived. We thought that successful people had just talent or had money or had connections or whatever that they have going for them. That the individual was the only indicator of his or her own success.

But little did we know that there is more to success than just individual effort. It is the combination of all these little details that converge and peak at the right time. There is this cliche that says that a person is made through nature and nurture. A cliche is cliched for a reason.

The book states that a person much reach the ten thousand hour threshold in order to become a master of their art. That's close to 8 hours a day for around four to five years on a consistent basis. But the trick is there is also a certain point in time wherein you have to hit this threshold to make it big. Its a convergence of a lot of small details to work in order for you to achieve ultimate success.

And the environment you live in must make it possible for you to focus all of your efforts to achieve the ten thousand hour threshold. The people around you also play a very crucial role they must make compromises so that a successful person can just keep their mind on a particular career and avoid unnecessary distractions. It can be in the form of relationships, poverty, bills to pay or whatever. A successful person must also have the right opportunities to strut their stuff. Here comes another crucial role of the people you surround yourself with. We are never alone now are we? It seems like we all need somebody in some way. An individual's success looks like a team effort based on what I understood from this book.

The examples that were laid out on the book were very compelling. Malcolm Gladwell offers great insight. This book is definitely a must read.