Paperback. Pub Date :2011-07-01 252 Chinese Beijing October Arts Press p As far traveled ( 2011 edition ) is mainly recorded her in Central and South America and mainland travel knowledge and experience. as readers . we wish to follow her footsteps . but also to do a paper travel. The book narrates the trip to Mexico . Honduras trip . trip to Panama . etc. . on the road saw and heard . customs which in turn brings Sanmao feel it ? In this wonderful travel essays . we will find the answers . ppp
I finished my third book of 三毛, a Taiwanese author who chronicled her travels in South America back in the 1980s. She backpacked for six months.
Sanmao had a peculiar personality and a wanderlust life. Traveling makes her feel alive and connected to the earth. In her early days, she lived in the Sahara desert, and then in the Canary Islands with her husband. She’s a pioneer of travel writing, her free spirit and passion for life most evident in her writing.
Yet, I feel like she’s not a good role model- she had many flaws, and was very unconventional, for better or for worse… (conformity is not a bad thing). She sees a lot of things that ordinary people don’t see, and that’s her anguish. She is a writer blessed with vivid memory of her childhood. Where few people remember their childhood, she claims: to remember her own birth.
In the book, the parts I liked most were her interactions with the indigenous people. They actually hired a photographer and assistant 米夏 to follow her throughout the trip, but I never saw any of her pictures from this trip, which was puzzling.
The parts disliked most was really, everything. This is NOT a bad piece of work. It made me cry and I think I was touched at some parts. But it also made me feel so sad and troubled and overwhelmed at times. To quote one of our reviewers, "這些文章的字裏行間還給我一種感覺:三毛此時的精神狀態好像不太對勁,但我也說不出具體是哪裏不對。可以這麼說:從《撒哈拉的故事》中我感受到許多靈氣,而《萬水千山走遍》則體現出種種「靈」氣……" I also felt like, something was off about her mentally then. As I reader I felt this spirit from her writing and it was scary at times.
In one essay I feel the emptiness, her emptiness, strongly — and in another about her childhood home I felt the nostalgia and longing for place (which is pretty a constant theme in her works). I wish I never read it because now I feel like I have to cleanse my mind.
This is probably the last book of sanmao I’ll ever read, although her writing is brilliant. I remember reading my first sanmao book / it was 温柔的夜 (Gentle Night), followed by 撒哈拉沙的故事 (Stories of the Sahara). I was enthralled. I might have felt she wasn’t depressed then, I think, so I enjoyed the two previous books better, where there is a clear narration and lighthearted style flowing from her pen. "是三毛在荷西去世后写的,他和助手米夏踏上了南美洲的旅行。整本书充满了对荷西的怀念,文字没有了以前的无忧无虑无所顾忌。万水千山走遍仍在怀念荷西。" Then I read my last Sanmao book 千山万水走遍. Whether or not I'll revisit her works in future, I do not know, but I think I probably will, especially 温柔的夜 which is quite close to my heart.
Fun fact: she actually came to Singapore twice before! And even gave a seminar at NTU. They have an article about it here: https://www.zaobao.com.sg/zlifestyle/...
First book I read from Sanmao. She loves the life, the kind people, the secrets of human, the Chinese culture. I also love the way she telling stories and the way she see the world.