Sealed Off

by Eileen Chang, Karen S. Kingsbury (Translator)

A short story from Love in a Fallen City.
The story takes place in Shanghai during the Japanese occupation of the city during World War II. A tramcar stops when an air raid alarm bell sounds. The city comes to a standstill and the people on the tramcar wait. Two passengers, Lu Zongzhen, an accountant with wife and children, and Wu Cuiyuan, an English instructor and single, strike up a semi-flirtatious and serious conversation. After receiving Cuiyuan’s phone number, Zongzhen abruptly leaves when the tramcar continues its journey.

Genres: Chinese Literature, Short Stories, Classics, Fiction, China, World Literature

13 pages, Unknown Binding

About the author

Eileen Chang is the English name for Chinese author 張愛玲, who was born to a prominent family in Shanghai (one of her great-grandfathers was Li Hongzhang) in 1920.

She went to a prestigious girls' school in Shanghai, where she changed her name from Chang Ying to Chang Ai-ling to match her English name, Eileen. Afterwards, she attended the University of Hong Kong, but had to go back to Shanghai when Hong Kong fell to Japan during WWII. While in Shanghai, she was briefly married to Hu Lancheng, the notorious Japanese collaborator, but later got a divorce.

After WWII ended, she returned to Hong Kong and later immigrated to the United States in 1955. She married a scriptwriter in 1956 and worked as a screenwriter herself for a Hong Kong film studio for a number of years, before her husband's death in 1967. She moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1972 and became a hermit of sorts during her last years. She passed away alone in her apartment in 1995.

Reviews

[Dmitry Berkut · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rereading Sealed Off by Eileen Chang, one is struck by how an ordinary urban scene, a stalled tramcar during a wartime blockade, gives birth to such a piercing story about loneliness and fleeting intimacy. Eileen Chang does not idealize her characters, and in this lies her particular honesty. Lu Zongzhen begins flirting with a stranger simply to avoid his pestering nephew. Wu Cuiyuan accepts the attention of a married man partly out of spite toward her own proper family. Seemingly not the noblest of motives. But it is precisely this unvarnished truth that makes their encounter so touching: two tired, lonely people who, for a brief moment, stop playing their social roles and simply exist for each other.

Cuiyuan is especially pitiable. Educated and conscientious, she has dissolved so completely into others’ expectations that she has become a person without definite features. Even her mother cannot say what shape her face is. Her life is a “translation of a translation,” in which something is constantly lost. And here, in this stalled tramcar, she suddenly feels real, when a strange man looks at her simply as a woman, not as a position or a family disappointment.

Eileen Chang works masterfully with details: a newspaper stuck to a bun, white arms “like squeezed-out toothpaste,” an old man with a face like a walnut. These small touches create a sense of reality, stuffy and cramped, from which one so badly wants to escape.

But the bitterest part is the ending. When the blockade is lifted and the city comes alive, Zongzhen simply goes back to his seat. Without explanations, without goodbyes. He silently declares that everything that happened was unreal, a dream of the sealed-off city. And Cuiyuan understands that the brief encounter in which they could both be themselves has ended. Reality demands a return to roles: he is a respectable family man and an accountant, she a lonely teacher. The blockade paradoxically freed them, while freedom returned them to the prison of everyday life.

The beggar’s song, “Sad, sad, sad! No money do I have!”, runs through the entire story as a reminder that material circumstances, social conventions, and family obligations are stronger than feelings. Zongzhen cannot afford love. Cuiyuan has no right to choose. And the city goes on living, the tram moves forward, and two people remain in their cages.

Eileen Chang writes about occupied Shanghai in the 1940s, but she speaks of something eternal. About how difficult it is to remain alive in a world that reduces us to functions. About how rare moments of genuine closeness are. About how we ourselves refuse happiness because it is “unreasonable” or “doesn’t fit.”

This is a sad, intelligent, deeply human story. It offers no answers and no consolation. But it sees us: weary passengers in the tramcars of our lives, dreaming of becoming real, if only for a moment.

Favorite quote from the story:

Life was like the Bible, translated from Hebrew into Greek, from Greek into Latin, from Latin into English, and from English into Mandarin Chinese. When Cuiyuan read it, she translated the Mandarin into Shanghainese. Some things did not come through.

[Edita · Rating 5 out of 5]

The lights inside the tram went on; she opened her eyes and saw him sitting in his old seat, looking remote. She trembled with shock—he hadn’t gotten off the tram after all! Then she understood his meaning: everything that had happened while the city was sealed off was a nonoccurrence. The whole city of Shanghai had dozed off and dreamed an unreasonable dream.

[Khloe]

Book 7 for Masterpieces of World Literature

[Hasini | bibliosini · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read the free version available on Focus Features in preparation for my edX course on World Literature.

I had no background knowledge of Eileen Chang before I dove into this story, so my mind was refreshingly blank when reading this. I found this brief slice of everyday life during this period rather interesting. I had forgotten how much I loved reading this style of writing where the story brought life into the mundane aspects of life!

My favourite bit was the beautiful and poignant writing, which just elevated the whole scene to something more interesting than what everyday interactions they actually were. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed reading this!

[Merel · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautifully written and intimate portrait of two people having a semi-flirtatious conversation. While the whole city is literally standing still, Lu Zongzhen and Wu Cuiyuan find themselves in an intimite, dream-like bubble of conversation that gets more and more amorous and serious until the moment that the city abruptly starts up again, their bubble bursts and they individually continue their journey.

[feifei · Rating 4 out of 5]

queen of metaphors & her style reminds me of 李贺 (esp. the classic《苦昼短》); sometimes reading her stuff makes me a little 胆战心惊 because she's so incisive

some fav parts:
她是一个好女儿，好学生。她家里都是好人，天天洗澡，看报，听无线电向来不听申曲滑稽京戏什么的，而专听贝多芬瓦格涅的交响乐，听不懂也要听。世界上的好人比真人多……翠远不快乐。生命像圣经，从希伯莱文译成希腊文，从希腊文译成拉丁文，从拉丁文译成英文，从英文译成国语。翠远读它的时候，国语又在她脑子里译成了上海话。那未免有点隔膜。

“叮玲玲玲玲玲”摇着铃，每一个“玲”字是冷冷的一点，一点一点连成一条虚线，切断时间与空间。

整个的上海打了个盹，做了个不近情理的梦。

[eve]

eileen chang’s writing reads like melted butter …. i need to start reading more books by her

thank you to my chinese fiction professor for introducing me to her

[Heena Rathore Rathore-Pardeshi · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good story. The story itself may seem flat if not read with the author's background and the social settings at the time. So make sure to do your research before diving into this masterpiece. Each and every line has a significance and that is what really makes it such a celebrated masterpiece of modern world literature.

[Lausbiana · Rating 3 out of 5]

Life was like the Bible, translated from Hebrew to Greek, from Greek to Latin, from Latin to English, from English to Mandarin Chinese. When Cuiyuan read it, she translated the Mandarin into Shanghainese. Some things did not come through.

[carturarul.neinteles · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 steluțe meritate din plin. Cea mai frumoasă bucățică de literatură chineză pe care am citit-o până acum. M-a încântat prin atenția la detalii, descrierea atât de frumoasă a instantaneelor din tramvai, modul în care acorda importanță unor lucruri aparent banale, dar atât de pline de consistență. Această povestioară se petrece în timpul unui bombardament în Shanghai (cred ca în perioada războaielor sino-japoneze), însă autoarea nu pune deloc accent pe acest lucru, îl tratează ca pe un simplu teatru al evenimentelor din tramvai.

[Watch Jamie Read · Rating 4 out of 5]

“He treated her like an intelligent, sophisticated person; as if she were a man.”

This short story is filled with symbolism for feminism and the power that exists in gender. It was a quick read, not too dense and quick paced. The story is told boldly and beautifully in a short time. I would honestly like to have more. 13 pages of very well, thought out ideas that have changed my perspective.

[Pritha · Rating 4 out of 5]

"She knows, without even knowing that she knows, that after a man really understands a woman, he won't love her anymore."

If someone doesn't like poetry, they should start here. The beginning was so beautifully poetic that I read it quite a few times. Cuiyuan and Zongzhen's little bubble-love story felt so real, so relatable and mesmerizing that i wished it wasn't a short story, I wished the the bells didn't go "ding, ding, ding".

[Selva · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The lights inside the tram went on; she opened her eyes and saw him sitting in his old seat,
looking remote. She trembled with shock–he hadn't gotten off the tram after all! Then she
understood his meaning: everything that had happened while the city was sealed off was a
nonoccurrence. The whole city of Shanghai had dozed off and dreamed an unreasonable
dream."

[Emily Mellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This slayed

[Kirsten Bedford · Rating 4 out of 5]

what a magical encounter…
much to unravel here

[Rach.Heast · Rating 5 out of 5]

How can someone be this real?!?!?!

[Marjan · Rating 5 out of 5]

十几年后再读中文作品，虽然读得很慢，但我依然非常享受。五页我读了个四十分钟 😂 但是中文这个语言的表达的方式真的太绝了，好独特，好有内涵。得细品。所以我决定了重新开始读中文书。而这本作品真的是完美的开始，我恨不得把真个故事都做了高光。
•

"总而言之，他别的毛病没有，就吃亏在不会做人。"
所以”做人”是做好人还是真人？

[Grace Herbst · Rating 4 out of 5]

unnerving yet cozy vibe, very interesting. short and easy

[Elizabeth A · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reviewed under Love in a Fallen City bindup

[Olivia · Rating 4 out of 5]

A story with impossible morals to follow, good versus true? I think it feels true that something surreal can happen in a matter of minutes (especially trapped on a tram car).

[Tai Belke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kind of a banger, really cool, one of the best short stories I've read.

[kyphion · Rating 5 out of 5]

i deeply understand

[Enrique LGH_ · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Life was like the Bible, translated from Hebrew to Greek,
from Greek to Latin, from Latin to English,
from English to Mandarin Chinese.
When Cuiyan read it, she translated the Mandarin into Shanghainese.
Some things did not come through."

[Hannah Bidus · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the way Eileen Chang used time and a "time bubble" to create a moving short story of two strangers sharing such an intimate connection where time seems to stop in an otherwise unremarkable depiction of reality. The deeper meaning of the story, with themes of isolation, belonging, social classes, and gender differences, along with the concept of fleeting human interactions, makes this a beautiful and moving read.

[Ksenia Kwiecińska · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chang's fiction happens over the border of senses - with a synesthetic accuracy she creates a world in which sounds have shapes and colours have smells, she serves an unbelievable feast for those hungry for sensations (bon appetit)