[book] dictionary of maqiao - han shaogong

[hwarium]

My summer clerk recommended this and lent me a copy!! (Alas I have not returned it). It came up because we both loved literature in translation and post-colonialism.

The book is structured as a dictionary of words used in Maqiao, a tiny village where the narrator was sent to during the Cultural Revolution. Each dictionary entry is a vignette from life and the collection of entries form a snapshot of an era, a microcosm of culture.

_{(Historical detour: In the 1970s, 17 million university students were forced to terminate their studies and relocated to the countryside for manual labour. This was part of a ‘re-education’ movement because 20th century communism valued the working class and saw academics as a privileged / corrupted / useless class. Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo also went through this)}

For example, 「甜」(sweet) is followed by a story about how the adjective is used for everything that tastes delicious: biscuits, candy, fish, meat, rice. The narrator is confused because as a city boy and a student, he had words to differentiate between everything. On reflection he realises poverty restricts your vocabulary and when something new arrives, you can only use what you already know (definition by analogy instead of accuracy). There’s also 「科学」 (scientific) which actually means lazy when used in Maqiao (from an unconscious loathing of the modern city / hate of the other into the machine). Or 「小哥」 (little big brother) which means women/big sister, and 「小小哥」 (little little big brother) which means little sister (because patriarchy).

It’s so interesting because words may not have their dictionary meaning or the standardised mandarin Chinese meaning, and through the stories, you understand how they’re used or how it came to be. Sometimes there’s a meaning specific to the history of Maqiao, rooted with inter-village/inter-family/intergenerational drama, or its a meaning that has gained personal significance for the narrator (e.g. 「他」 (him) vs 「渠」(the him standing before you)).

I got a lot out of this book! (1) You’re staring into the grassroots of modern Chinese history. Han doesn’t romanticise or moralise about village life. It’s not pastoral and beautiful and this is fresh after the civil war and in the midst of the cultural revolution (“I can’t joke about this, because I know what starvation tastes like”). There’s an entry where a child dies after stepping on a mine and a villager tell the mum to smile, because he had a 贵生 (an expensive life) (“They were unified around the belief that people should die young; it was just that they were trapped, unable to die young”). There is only suffering after a man turns 18, so mum should celebrate as her child only knew a good life. God.

(2) The verisimilitude is so thick

Ester taught me a Finnish word when I wrote once again, love — elämänmakuinen. “Tasting like life”. This book is full of it. At times it tastes like dirt but damn it is real.

My favourite scene was one where the narrator is forced to dig out an air shelter in almost complete darkness. The act of manual labour until exhaustion, living breath to breath, forgetting who you are, then bumping into the girl next to you: “You discovered you still existed, you were still a person, an actual person with forename and surname… with a gender.” / “Afterwards, as I gradually recovered my energy, she recovered her gender and retreated, far, far away.” (Reminds me of Left Hand of Darkness, Estraven and Genly on the ice, to be equals only when they are alone)

And then in the darkness, he slams his pickaxe into his foot. The pain is horrendous. He’s yowling. I feel it reading. But it’s afterwards that struck me. When they come out of the darkness and instead of being closer, they’re driven apart. He had shared an extreme point of his life with her. He had exposed himself, shared vulnerability and now it burns like the shame of an unpaid loan. Never to be spoken out loud.

( “No other woman in the world would ever be so close to me in the state I’d been in then” / “She’d seen a look in my eyes that would only return in death”)

(3) Linguistics!!!

This book is a laborious and precious task. It’s anthropological and linguistic, so every entry feels like an opportunity to reflect on life or language. The historical background could be a thesis in itself (Chinese intellectual guilt complex), but for this post, I want to highlight the author’s notes which shot an arrow into my heart.

Even if you use the exact same word, it can mean different things to different people. Words naturally are not fixed. They can be mutated, misrepresented, misused and invented. With life, words can take on a colour special to you, or a group of people. However, time can erase that nuance. So can colonisation and standardisation. Han attempts to immortalise the words in their fullest, by writing the stories behind them.

"Who knew so well the sound and smell of each type of rain and the temperature it left the skin. Because it was only on rainy days that we could haul our weary, aching bodies inside our houses, draw breath, and enjoy this precious opportunity for rest.

My daughter has never liked the rain. For her, spring rain meant inconvenience, slippery roads, the terror of thunder and lightning, and the cancellation of sports matches or excursions. She’ll never understand my feeling of uncontrolled excitement at the sound of rain. She’ll never understand why it’s bucketing down in every single one of my dreams about my time in the countryside. She has missed out on a decade of longing for the sound of rain.”

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I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone who reads for pleasure. It’s like figuring out your extended family’s side drama by listening to your grandma go on 400 tangents. Reading a few is interesting, but it took willpower to finish because there was no momentum between entries. I’m very glad I read this though, I’m conscious that I’m not very well read in terms of Chinese history and there is a lot to uncover.

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Also I caught covid!! Took a week off and as part of that I started writing up my book notes from this year. This one became 1k so it became its own post. Really hoping no other book does that…. (looking at the English Patient).

Comments

[klav]

I love the way you write about books!! This sounds fascinating and complex and tough and so rewarding... I know you said you wouldn't recommend it but something about this post still makes me want to pick up a copy asap hahah. Mostly for the linguistics of it all, but that story about the narrator digging in the darkness? Wow wow wow. Thank you for sharing this!! (+ eagerly looking forward to the English Patient - I remember loving that one in school but haven't read it as an adult) Hope you're recovered and feeling alright! <3

[hwarium]

hello klav!! thank /you/ for reading this :D

I did say not recommended for pleasure reading which leaves open a glowing recommendation for academic martyr reading hahahaha (do it for the Craft). Out of everyone I know in life, you were the one I was thinking of when I finished this. Kind of in a, 'the only other person that would put themselves through this for the payoff is klav' way. In a roundabout thought it seems like anyone who likes Ted Chiang would also like this book because it is hardcore anthropology and linguistics at its most devoted. (I can't remember if it was you who recced me Ted Chiang or the person I recced Ted Chiang to haha)

English Patient is on pause right now as I reread my dog-ears from On Earth We are Briefly Gorgeous !! I'm also rereading your janjuly post for ideas on grouping and formatting.

(Thank you! Feeling a lot better and more connected to myself than I have been in a while, a break is always appreciated)

[moonlitmelodiesfic]

hi hello! i know we haven’t really interacted at all but reading this post evoked some Emotions and Thoughts and i thought that maybe i should share. i’m a sucker for anything that deals with chinese linguistics/language/culture/history, although admittedly i haven’t read much in the area. i relocated young and lost a good portion of language and culture before i really even had the chance to learn, so often there’s this feeling of being far removed from my own culture, so i’m latching on to anything that may bridge that gap, if you know what i mean. there were so many parts that you highlighted that really hit, well, close to home haha, and the premise and historical setting reminded me of another book i came across titled “A Map for the Missing.” it’s a recent release, set in post-cultural revolution, and deals with the tough endeavor of reconnection after estrangement — the whole returning to your roots and dealing with whatever messy things you left behind. i haven’t yet read it, but i bought it out of intrigue and perhaps out of longing and after reading this post, i thought you might be interested! thank you so much for this discussion and i /do/ think i will pick up a copy if i get the chance or come across it!!

[hwarium]

hello hello!! thank you for stopping by <3 (and I know you!! modding 17hols means I know the usernames of repeat offenders very well hehe). Thank you for sharing so much, I love reflective conversations, and this makes me feel like we're in a mini book club.

I feel you, there's so much history and so much glorious /academia/ about Chinese literature and how it's linked with history, both ancient and modern. Every time I go down a wikipedia burrow everything feels so new but also so loaded (e.g. because a whole generation of students was forced into manual labour, the writing after this period is known as 'scar literature', and its super interesting to see how trauma is processed and written differently). It feels like the people we meet are full of history yet we don't realise how much change they witnessed. Every time I read about the cultural revolution I can't help but think "my grandparents went through /that/". It's also a gap I want to bridge!!

Thank you for the rec!! Let me know what you think after reading, I'll always be keen to hear :D

[moonlitmelodiesfic]

hellooo! ahahaha yes repeated offender i am indeed!!! thank you for hosting 17hols i’m eagerly awaiting this year’s, if it’s happening!

this feels like book club indeed! we have all the vibes. now we just need the seasons to fast forward to winter. thick snowfall outside the window, blankets, hot tea and chocolate…*chef’s kiss*. anyways.

i will definitely report back once i’ve read it! i’m very excited about it and i do think it will be enjoyable, albeit painful, maybe. chinese culture is very layered and complex and difficult (re: scar literature, WOW. that sounds both incredibly intriguing and difficult to read, emotionally) and the cultural revolution created some lasting scars. i do want to write about it, so maybe i’ll do a book review! anyway, thanks once again for this convo! it means a lot <3

[latespring]

!! thank you for sharing, this looks so interesting. I'm not sure I'd have the stamina to read the whole book, but reading your summary certainly made it tempting

[hwarium]

thank you for reading!! yeah yeah I get you haha, it's one of those books I read to talk about and writing it out scratched the itch.