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3.7 AVERAGE
3.7 AVERAGE
La lumière déchirante du crépuscule et les éphémères nuages du couchant enluminent la grande terre qui souffre et gémit, jonchée des cadavres entassés pêle-mêle des enfants du canton nord-est de Gaomi. Ils ont grandi nourris de sorgho rouge comme le sang, le leur coule en ruisseaux, qui confluent et se font fleuve. Appâtés par l’odeur, les corbeaux, pour qui se repaître de la chair des morts est devenu une seconde nature, en oublient de regagner leurs nids et restent à planer au-dessus du champ de bataille. C’est autour des chevaux, pour la plupart, que ces charognards se concentrent : en bons goinfres ils s’attaquent d’abord à ce qu’il y a de plus gros.Ceci est mon avis sur la traduction française EXCLUSIVEMENT.
Chinois :
生存在这块土地上的我的父老乡亲们，喜食高粱，每年都大量种植。八月深秋，无边无际的高粱红成洸洋的血海，高粱高密辉煌，高粱凄婉可人，高粱爱情激荡。秋风苍凉，阳光很旺，瓦蓝的天上游荡着一朵朵丰满的白云，高粱上滑动着一朵朵丰满白云的紫红色影子。一队队暗红色的人在高粱棵子里穿梭拉网，几十年如一日。他们杀人越货，精忠报国，他们演出过一幕幕英勇悲壮的舞剧，使我们这些活着的不肖子孙相形见绌，在进步的同时，我真切地感到种的退化。Anglais :
The people of my father’s generation who lived there ate sorghum out of preference, planting as much of it as they could. In late autumn, during the eighth lunar month, vast stretches of red sorghum shimmered like a sea of blood. Tall and dense, it reeked of glory; cold and graceful, it promised enchantment; passionate and loving, it was tumultuous. The autumn winds are cold and bleak, the sun’s rays intense. White clouds, full and round, float in the tile-blue sky, casting full round purple shadows onto the sorghum fields below. Over decades that seem but a moment in time, lines of scarlet figures shuttled among the sorghum stalks to weave a vast human tapestry. They killed, they looted, and they defended their country in a valiant, stirring ballet that makes us unfilial descendants who now occupy the land pale by comparison. Surrounded by progress, I feel a nagging sense of our species’ regression.Français :
Ceux qui y sont nés se nourrissent du sorgho que tous les ans ils plantent. Au cœur de l’automne ses vastes champs ne sont plus qu’océan de sang, sorghos serrés resplendissants, sorghos frêles et gracieux, fougueux et émouvants. Quand le vent fraîchit, quand la lumière éclate, des nuages pommelés flottent dans le ciel tuilé de bleu. Des ombres pourpres glissent sur les épis. Inlassablement, les taches sombres d’hommes en groupes tendent leurs filets entre les tiges. Capables de tuer pour voler, entièrement dévoués à leur patrie, ils ont été les acteurs de tragédies héroïques et nous, petits enfants indignes, savons le fossé qui nous sépare d’eux. En même temps que nous progressons, clairement je nous sens en régression.Traduction française, elle est évidemment la pire du lot. Roman original : cinq étoiles.
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Cursing, Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Medical trauma, Suicide attempt, Murder, War, Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Gun violence, Infidelity, Colonisation
adventurous
dark
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Read for country challenge, and because Mo Yan won the Nobel. An interesting book, too, on topic I don't really know much about.
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
informative
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Red Sorghum is a novel about red sorghum and the evolution of a family around it. The novel unfolds nonlinearly, giving the reader a sweeping view of the lives of the characters. The novel is incredibly graphic and violent, yet I found the novel's bluntness reveals much about the human subject, replacing heartwarming characters with harsh, violent human beings. Throughout the novel, Mo Yan and Howard Greenblatt possess a blunt and surrealist control over language, allowing for the novel to be told in a wide array of colors and feelings, and the structure of Mo Yan's narrative is brilliant and engaging. Quite the literary accomplishment.
challenging
dark
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
challenging
reflective
slow-paced
CW: anything. Literally anything traumatic you can think of, it's in this book.
This book follows one family through the Japanese occupation of China and the Chinese civil war, flitting back and forth across three generations to explore both the brutality of the invasion and the violence that these villagers enacted on each other under those circumstances. It's bleak. Like, really bleak. I've read books about the Japanese occupation of China, Malaya, and Korea respectively, and all were pretty bleak, but this book made those look like picture books. But the writing is GORGEOUS, and it's a very surreal, disconcerting contrast - this poetic, evocative language being used to describe violence and decay and atrocities.
Case in point: "A year earlier, the bloated carcasses of dozens of mules had been found floating in the Black Water River, caught in the reeds and grass in the shallows by the banks; their distended bellies, baked by the sun, split and popped, released their splendid innards, like gorgeous blooming flowers, as slowly spreading pools of dark-green liquid were caught in the flow of water."
And, I mean, that's just mules.
Reading this was a strange experience - it was not an enjoyable read at all, but it was beautiful.
Side-note, though: I categorised this as men's fiction, because the way it treats women is Very Bad. Just as a heads-up.
This book follows one family through the Japanese occupation of China and the Chinese civil war, flitting back and forth across three generations to explore both the brutality of the invasion and the violence that these villagers enacted on each other under those circumstances. It's bleak. Like, really bleak. I've read books about the Japanese occupation of China, Malaya, and Korea respectively, and all were pretty bleak, but this book made those look like picture books. But the writing is GORGEOUS, and it's a very surreal, disconcerting contrast - this poetic, evocative language being used to describe violence and decay and atrocities.
Case in point: "A year earlier, the bloated carcasses of dozens of mules had been found floating in the Black Water River, caught in the reeds and grass in the shallows by the banks; their distended bellies, baked by the sun, split and popped, released their splendid innards, like gorgeous blooming flowers, as slowly spreading pools of dark-green liquid were caught in the flow of water."
And, I mean, that's just mules.
Reading this was a strange experience - it was not an enjoyable read at all, but it was beautiful.
Side-note, though: I categorised this as men's fiction, because the way it treats women is Very Bad. Just as a heads-up.