绿化树

by Zhang Xianliang, 张贤亮

Publishing Group, Pub Date :2013-07-01 336 Guizhou Publishing Group " Xianliang Collection · novella Green Tree" collection liang early 1980s by the creation of the novella Representative "Green tree " ," Dragon Seed "and" t...

Genres: Asia, China, Fiction

330 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1985

About the author

Zhang Xianliang (Chinese: 张贤亮; December 1936 – 27 September 2014) was a Chinese author and poet, and former president of the China Writer Association in Ningxia. He was detained as a political prisoner during the Anti-Rightist Movement in 1957, until his political rehabilitation in 1979. His most well known works, including Half of Man is Woman and Grass Soup, were semi-autobiographical reflections on his life experiences in prison and in witnessing the political upheaval of China during the Cultural Revolution.

(from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Lorna · Rating 4 out of 5]

A long story how I stumbled into this beautiful book by Zhang Xianliang, Mimosa. This is a novella with the book completed by two other short stories, Bitter Springs and A Herdsman’s Story. Mimosa is one part of an autobiographical series of novels describing the main character’s experiences over a 2-month period in 1961 when he is released from a prison camp and sent to a State Farm. The author talks about the period in 1958 known as the Great Leap Forward as they dreamt of soaring overnight into a ‘communist paradise” but in reality they paid the penalty exacted by economic laws and ultimately plunged into hell as the country suffered from a dreadful famine. As Mimosa begins, this period of famine is already nearing its end.

Zhang Xianliang was born in Nanjing in December 1936. During the political movement of the late 1950s he was labeled a “rightist” and detained for over ten years. At some point following his release, he joined the Chinese Writer’s Association. His anthology of short stories Body and Soul was published in 1981. His novelette Mimosa has won wide acclaim since its publication in 1984.

Mimosa is set on the vast landscape of China’s northwestern loess plateau, a moving story of a young man’s experiences after being release from a prison camp. Mimosa is essentially a love story and humanity and struggle and joy. It is the first in a series of novels to be set against the dramatic backdrop of struggle and change in China during the last half-century. It is said that Zhang Xianliang’s realistic themes and fluid, personal style have made him one on the most popular authors to emerge in China during the early 1980s. In the words of the author:

“I salute the lovely, sacred mimosa trees growing over the whole length and breadth of our land!”

[Joanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this book because I had a reading challenge that related to letters of the alphabet for author names and finding X and Z was very helpful. I knew nothing of the book or author before getting it from my library. I was surprised to find how compelling these stories were. The title novella, Mimosa, was particularly good. The stories told of life for political prisoners in China, but the stories were also a musing about communism, individuality, intellectual vs. working man, urban vs. rural. So many of these themes seemed relevant to this U.S. reader decades later. Glad to have stumbled upon this collection.

[Moran · Rating 3 out of 5]

Despite the difficult personal story of the author, which understandly suffered and was under scruteny even when writing these stories, I couldn't completely distinguish between irony and plain communist propaganda that feels naturally outdated and naive. And yet, I understand that it's completely possible that that's the author's real belief, which testifies for the merits of the Chinese terror regime of the fifties and sixties.

Anyway, I did learn a bit, and one of the stories was actually kind of good, but the communist naivité of these stories was simply disappointing.

[Ram · Rating 4 out of 5]

A refreshingly cute and innocent book. Includes 3 stories filled with love optimism and hardship. I was most impressed with the first (and longest), Mimosa. Two of the stories focus on the hard life for political prisoners in China of the late fifties to the middle of the 70's of the 20'Th century.
All the stories include some kind of clash between the intellectual and the uneducated, and in all three the simple country people with their street sense and instincts have some advantage over the intellectual. I am looking forward to reading more of this author

As I understand the book is loosely based on the author's autobiography, and that makes it more interesting.
I read the book in Hebrew translated from the English version. The book included accounts from the translator's meeting with the author in a literature conference in 1985.

[Danu Thung · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a collection of three stories by Zhang Xianliang, set in rural China between the late 1950s and the late 1970s. They all feature that East Asian brand of stoicism in the face of hardship that I love about many Chinese and Hong Kong movies I've seen, and at times it works really well here, too. Especially the story Mimosa, which occupies most of the book, has some very nice bits. On the other hand, there are other parts of this story which seem to consist essentially of a bunch of dated communist propaganda. It was quite a strange experience reading extended quotes from Marx' Capital, surrounded by comments like "Marx analysed this so clearly, I was only sorry that I'd read it too late" or "I was starting to read Capital seriously as a fine work of literature, in which I admired each sentence".

Similar sentiments are expressed in slightly less cringy fashion in the other stories too. Most often, they take the form of praise of the simple and hard-working nature of the peasant population:

What he had now acquired after more than twenty years of hardship, were the feeligns and the understanding of a laborer. This was his treasure. Profoundly moved, he felt his eyes watering.

The obvious conclusion to draw is that Zhang Xianliang, an intellectual who remained in mainland China, having finally been rehabilitated in 1979 after spending about 22(!!) years in prisons and labor camps, was afraid to criticise Chinese leadership. That can't be the full story though, since Xianliang published other books, such as Grass Soup, which are reputed to be strongly critical of Mao's policies. So could it be that, despite rejecting the political course of the country, Zhang Xianliang's year of hard labor truly did teach him to value the simple laborer's work ethic above all? I guess I'll never know...

[Philip · Rating 3 out of 5]

Despite it's settings of labor camps and hard-scrabble villages, Xianliang took pains to show that even though monsters existed, usually depicted as those who took advantage of their fellow political prisoners, one could have faith that humanity could still produce saviors, taking the image of our titular character who saves our protagonist from starvation and a life of misery. By introducing the concept of love into our characters lives, we can have an interesting and hopeful drama even with the backdrop of extreme poverty. Usually these saviors take the form of blue collar workers, and we get the sense from Xianliang that he doesn't expect too much in the way of heroics from intellectuals. In this way, we can see a streak of hopeful communism in this work, of the working class being able to discover a vibrant personal life even under the pressures of an overzealous regime. However, the other side of this strain, aside from lionizing the working class, you have the more intellectual promotion of communism, which in my mind hampered the work. You have these beautiful descriptions of the Chinese countryside, and an interesting love triangle forming between our major characters, suddenly interrupted by a quotation from Marx along with a discussion of its meaning. It's something that really kills the mood for the reader, and two of the stories contained within this volume suffer from it (The latter story having a character use a political slogan as a touchstone). However, this being the case, the allusions towards communism provide a level of authenticity and realism considering the novel's intended audience and time of release, a good counterbalance to the fantasy like brush Xianliang uses to paint the outskirts of China and it's denizens.

[Taylor Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

The title novella stands out amongst the three short works in this collection as an especially clear-eyed depiction of daily life in early communist China. Each instance is an excellent portrayal of a different, foreign world, whose heart beats, to the ears of a liberal democratic audience, to a strangely different political rhythm. The work 'Mimosa,' a very sympathetic and especially engrossing depiction of the narrator's life as a 'reformed' intellectual set to hard labor by the communist state, is particularly successful in marrying Marxist idealism (granted, a throughly materialistic idealism) with the earthiness of simple, hard living. Through and through, these stories are deeply human and optimistic, simple, and in their own way liberating. The oft-repeated 'transcend self' perhaps best describes Xianliang's attitude, impregnating each narrative, toward, in his perspective, the ultimately salutary worker's lifestyle of simple living.

[Randomerde · Rating 4 out of 5]

survival at stake
arrives & finds food love Marx
welcome gratitude

[Ashish · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful stories filled with true love and emotions, enjoyed reading the first story Mimosa a lot.