Nanjing 1937 by Ye Zhaoyan was published in 1996; this edition 2003; translated from Chinese by Michael Berry.
Ding
Wenyu, almost forty, is married and a womaniser; he’s a college professor
proficient in English, French, German, Spanish, Italian and Romanian; his ‘legendary’
language abilities come in useful from time to time. When in his late teens he
was banished to France as a result of a misguided pursuit of a young woman. In
Paris he crossed paths with Ernest Hemingway, Vladimir Nabokov and Jorge Luis
Borges, among others. Indeed, the book is deliberately scattered with
name-dropping, notably the hierarchy of China at the time (there’s a helpful
glossary of historical figures). Wenyu does not appear to be a likeable fellow,
though he is amusing and his conceit in disavowing the mores of his times
evokes sympathy.
Whether
a fault of the translator, the editor (if any) or the author, the text is
peppered with far too many clichés: ‘hold a candle’, ‘between a rock and a hard
place’, ‘a piece of cake’, ‘the short end of the stick’ to list a few. As the
book contains irony as well as humour, perhaps this is intentional. Besides humour, there are a few scenes of farce, too.
Wenyu’s
life is changed when he beholds the younger sister of the girl he’d pursued
twenty years earlier: At her wedding to a popular fighter pilot, Yuyuan
captures Wenyu’s heart. He is smitten with ‘a kind of adoration of the utmost purity’.
Unlike his encounters with married women and prostitutes, he does not lust
after her. [Yuyuan is also an exotic garden in the Old City of Shanghai.]
‘In
this world there are many mistakes committed due to a lack of love, but love
has the power to purify. It can make someone forget themselves and all their
inhibitions. Before he met Yuyuan, Ding was a pathetic orphan, lost in a desert
without an oasis in sight… Orphans to love are stranded at an eternal impasse;
to pursue a woman without love will never quell the loneliness in one’s heart.
Love is humankind’s starting point and its final resting place.’
So,
he becomes obsessed with Yuyuan. He writes love letters (not lewd or salacious,
just full of praise) to her every day. Perhaps nowadays he would be arrested
for stalking. ‘True love is based on giving and not taking. Only a love based
on giving is true love.’ In the final event, he follows that dictum, giving of
himself.
In
parallel – deliberately – the author juxtaposes Wenyu’s pursuit of his love
against the threat of Japanese invasion – both seeming leisurely in pace,
though that same pace quickens towards the end. There are some interesting
snippets about the military situation, for example: ‘According to intelligence
reports at the time, the Japanese military’s primary future target was not
China but Russia. Moreover, if the Japanese navy wanted to conquer the Pacific,
a direct conflict with America would be inevitable….’
This
is, just, a love story; the blurb calls it ‘epic’ but it isn’t. Its emotional
punch is weakened by the omniscient point of view, so as a result the ending
was disappointing.
Some
critics have mentioned ‘explicit’ scenes and ‘raunchy sex scenes’; these are
minor, and most of the sex (there isn’t much) is handled without graphic detail.
There is one curious item regarding women without pubic hair being called ‘white
tigers’; the legend has it that white tigers can harm men, so apparently many superstitious
Chinese men will not bed a ‘white tiger’. Another minor though dubious incident involves an acquaintance of
Wenyu indulging in necrophilia.
The
book is enlightening about the culture and attitudes of the time in China. What
comes across most forcefully is the universality of the human condition,
irrespective of culture. In 1937 Nanjing there was a cult of personality; the
rich and notable craved to be seen at events; divorce was considered a scandal
but accepted; and young girls attempted to marry older rich men.
Hanging
over the leisurely and sometimes farcical courting by Wenyu is the oppressive
knowledge that Japanese forces would prevail and Nanjing would fall. The
Chinese saying is perfectly apt: ‘If good fortune awaits there is no reason to
hide – if disaster awaits there will be no place to hide.’
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