lexicona's review against another edition
adventurous
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
shonatiger's review against another edition
3.0
Really enjoyed 2 essays in here:
• Net Novels and the "She Era": How Internet Novels Opened the Door for Female Readers and Writers in China | Xueting Christine Ni
• Writing and Translation: A Hundred Technical Tricks | Rebecca F. Kuang (whose book, Babel, was just published)
• Net Novels and the "She Era": How Internet Novels Opened the Door for Female Readers and Writers in China | Xueting Christine Ni
• Writing and Translation: A Hundred Technical Tricks | Rebecca F. Kuang (whose book, Babel, was just published)
shaffe71's review against another edition
3.0
3.5 overall
Some of the stories didn't work for me, but others I really enjoyed. I don't think any of them were bad.
There are five essays sprinkled in amongst the stories, and I felt like only two of them were actually good with the collection. The Futures of Genders in Chinese Science Fiction was a good introduction to this book, though it was weirdly not the fist thing. There are five stories and then, when you're nearly 100 pages in, an essay describing what the anthology is about.
Writing and Translation: A Hundred Technical Tricks was a nice essay to end with. The other three I could honestly do without. It's also odd that there were two in a row at the end.
An overall enjoyable read and I would recommend.
Some of the stories didn't work for me, but others I really enjoyed. I don't think any of them were bad.
There are five essays sprinkled in amongst the stories, and I felt like only two of them were actually good with the collection. The Futures of Genders in Chinese Science Fiction was a good introduction to this book, though it was weirdly not the fist thing. There are five stories and then, when you're nearly 100 pages in, an essay describing what the anthology is about.
Writing and Translation: A Hundred Technical Tricks was a nice essay to end with. The other three I could honestly do without. It's also odd that there were two in a row at the end.
An overall enjoyable read and I would recommend.
trashthatmatters's review against another edition
challenging
slow-paced
4.0
The essays were just as impactful as the stories
angielucy's review against another edition
4.0
Extraordinary. The translations are as smooth as one can be, the stories are utterly engrossing and vital pieces of culture. To list my favourites: "The Stars We Raised"" was hauntingly beautiful. "Restaurant at the End of Universe: Tai-Chi Mashed Taro" I think is one of the best things I've read in a while. "The Woman Carrying a Corpse" felt like a folktale I had long forgot. Every minute reading this book was joyous.
noahcantor's review against another edition
adventurous
informative
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
4.0
speculativeloaf's review against another edition
5.0
When I heard about this anthology of Chinese science fiction and fantasy by women and nonbinary authors, it immediately went to the top of my TBR list. The Way Spring Arrives did not disappoint – it was a really engaging collection as a whole and there were a number of standouts that left me thinking for a long time.
In her essay “The Futures of Genders in Chinese Science Fiction”, Jing Tsu writes “If today's sci-fi writers, exemplified in the current volume, decide to seek new linkages with China's past, it is not for the sake of a nostalgic return but to reinvent a path of discovery through myth and folklore.” There isn't really a single uniting theme to these stories, other than the shared nationality and genders of the authors, but many (perhaps most) of them are in conversation with Chinese myth, folklore, and other storytelling forms.
Not only do many of these stories twist, subvert, or draw upon mythology, but the act of translation itself changes them as well. As Yilin Wang writes in her essay describing translation of two stories, “When a story is translated from Chinese into English, it is never an exact replica; it undergoes transformation, however subtle, as it is recreated in a new language and cultural context.” Though I mainly bought the book for the stories, I also really appreciated the essays giving translators a chance to discuss language, their process of translation, or comment on the state of Chinese literature in general. As a Chinese person who grew up in the U.S. with little cultural context of China, knowing about the translators’ intentional choices was super valuable – I would've even been happy with more of it.
“Dragonslaying,” written in Chinese by Shen Yingying and translated to English by Emily Xueni Jin, was devastating and one of my favorites of the collection. It challenged the (Western, masculine) assumptions that I had about stories with that title. It's the story of Su Mian, one of few women doctors from the city, who travels to a distant province to learn about the art of dragonslaying. It's dark, brutal, and intimate, yet also clinical at times, interspersing narrative with excerpts from medical textbooks on the nature of the jiaoren. The change in tone highlights the banality of violence as accepted fact. In Western mythology, dragonslaying is often a celebrated act by a singular (male) hero – defeating the monster, slaying the beast, rescuing the princess. Without spoiling too much, this “Dragonslaying” is not that dragonslaying.
Ultimately, all of the stories were worth reading, and it’s hard for me to pick favorites. For example, the opening story “The Stars We Raised” captures the careless possibility and cruelty of youth, and “What Does the Fox Say?” is a lovely piece of flash fiction exploring meaning and storytelling. “The Restaurant at the End of the Universe: Tai-Chi Mashed Taro” references the Douglas Adams setting of course, but it's also a meditation on memory and beauty and life and the origins of a particular painting and poetic passage, flipping between the lives of a couple people in Ming Dynasty China and the end of the universe. “The Way Spring Arrives” tells an epic tale of the arrival of spring rains, warmer weather, and the tilting of the earth's axis by way of the actions of a few dedicated deities. “A Brief History of Binakan Disasters as told in a Sinitic Language” hearkens to a somewhat different sci-fi subgenre. It features a self-destructive species (surprisingly not human!) which deals with ecological crises with wildly oppressive (even geocidal) methods. On a slightly lighter note, I thought “The Mountain and the Secrets of their Names” did a great job of highlighting the contradictions of a small village with its own traditions and ancestral practices against the backdrop of a modernizing Chinese state launching satellites. The idea of a oral naming tradition as an algorithm is meaningful to me as well as someone who works with computer algorithms, and I will likely return to it for some further reflection.
Overall, I would highly recommend this book for anyone interested in science fiction, fantasy, and mythic retellings written and translated by an amazing group of Chinese women and non binary people. The way it interpolates past and future translates to a unique and fulfilling reading experience.
5/5 stars
It is not for the sake of a nostalgic return but to reinvent a path of discovery through myth and folklore.
In her essay “The Futures of Genders in Chinese Science Fiction”, Jing Tsu writes “If today's sci-fi writers, exemplified in the current volume, decide to seek new linkages with China's past, it is not for the sake of a nostalgic return but to reinvent a path of discovery through myth and folklore.” There isn't really a single uniting theme to these stories, other than the shared nationality and genders of the authors, but many (perhaps most) of them are in conversation with Chinese myth, folklore, and other storytelling forms.
Not only do many of these stories twist, subvert, or draw upon mythology, but the act of translation itself changes them as well. As Yilin Wang writes in her essay describing translation of two stories, “When a story is translated from Chinese into English, it is never an exact replica; it undergoes transformation, however subtle, as it is recreated in a new language and cultural context.” Though I mainly bought the book for the stories, I also really appreciated the essays giving translators a chance to discuss language, their process of translation, or comment on the state of Chinese literature in general. As a Chinese person who grew up in the U.S. with little cultural context of China, knowing about the translators’ intentional choices was super valuable – I would've even been happy with more of it.
“Dragonslaying,” written in Chinese by Shen Yingying and translated to English by Emily Xueni Jin, was devastating and one of my favorites of the collection. It challenged the (Western, masculine) assumptions that I had about stories with that title. It's the story of Su Mian, one of few women doctors from the city, who travels to a distant province to learn about the art of dragonslaying. It's dark, brutal, and intimate, yet also clinical at times, interspersing narrative with excerpts from medical textbooks on the nature of the jiaoren. The change in tone highlights the banality of violence as accepted fact. In Western mythology, dragonslaying is often a celebrated act by a singular (male) hero – defeating the monster, slaying the beast, rescuing the princess. Without spoiling too much, this “Dragonslaying” is not that dragonslaying.
Ultimately, all of the stories were worth reading, and it’s hard for me to pick favorites. For example, the opening story “The Stars We Raised” captures the careless possibility and cruelty of youth, and “What Does the Fox Say?” is a lovely piece of flash fiction exploring meaning and storytelling. “The Restaurant at the End of the Universe: Tai-Chi Mashed Taro” references the Douglas Adams setting of course, but it's also a meditation on memory and beauty and life and the origins of a particular painting and poetic passage, flipping between the lives of a couple people in Ming Dynasty China and the end of the universe. “The Way Spring Arrives” tells an epic tale of the arrival of spring rains, warmer weather, and the tilting of the earth's axis by way of the actions of a few dedicated deities. “A Brief History of Binakan Disasters as told in a Sinitic Language” hearkens to a somewhat different sci-fi subgenre. It features a self-destructive species (surprisingly not human!) which deals with ecological crises with wildly oppressive (even geocidal) methods. On a slightly lighter note, I thought “The Mountain and the Secrets of their Names” did a great job of highlighting the contradictions of a small village with its own traditions and ancestral practices against the backdrop of a modernizing Chinese state launching satellites. The idea of a oral naming tradition as an algorithm is meaningful to me as well as someone who works with computer algorithms, and I will likely return to it for some further reflection.
Overall, I would highly recommend this book for anyone interested in science fiction, fantasy, and mythic retellings written and translated by an amazing group of Chinese women and non binary people. The way it interpolates past and future translates to a unique and fulfilling reading experience.
5/5 stars
detailsandtales's review against another edition
5.0
A fantastic short story anthology of fantasy and science fiction, all translated from Chinese by a group of translators, some of whom are authors themselves. The authors and translators are all women or nonbinary as well. I like nearly every story in this collection, and it was fascinating to read so many stories that took Chinese settings - contemporary, futuristic, historical - for granted. There are also essays about translation and how gender impacts authors in China, among other topics interspersed throughout. Some of these were not of interest to me because I was there for the stories, but they may be of interest to other readers.