Lu
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Post by Lu on Jul 16, 2011 9:17:35 GMT -5
I have an italian edition and I hope it's not too different from yours. Here's a tentative shedule: Chapter 1 and 2: start discussion on August 12. Chapter 3: start discussion on August 17. Let me know what you think.
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Post by pia on Jul 24, 2011 4:05:15 GMT -5
First of all, I need to get my hands on a copy of the book ;D I'm not sure if I'll be ready by the 29th, as I'm having the colloquium of my bachelor thesis next week, but you guys can definitely go ahead and I'll catch up with you
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Lu
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Post by Lu on Jul 25, 2011 14:10:58 GMT -5
I've read only a few pages, so I really wouldn't mind starting the discussion a bit later.
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Post by Pilleriin on Jul 28, 2011 9:04:52 GMT -5
I would love to discuss it with you guys, but I accidentally left the book in the city (80km), and I won't go back there until the 5th of August.
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Lu
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Post by Lu on Jul 29, 2011 3:03:24 GMT -5
We could start two weeks later (on August 12), so we're all ready. It's a week after August 5th and maybe others will join the discussion. I'll modify the schedule.
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Post by pia on Jul 29, 2011 3:16:44 GMT -5
Great, thank you Lu!
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Post by Pilleriin on Jul 29, 2011 9:42:46 GMT -5
Thanks Lu !! A week is more than enough
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Post by pia on Aug 12, 2011 7:05:22 GMT -5
I won't be able to post anything until monday again, as I'm on a vacation over the weekend. However, we won't start with chapter 3 until the 17th, so I think we have enough time to catch up
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Lu
Administrator
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Post by Lu on Aug 14, 2011 4:15:53 GMT -5
Hope you'll catch up soon! I've been working a lot lately and haven't had time to collect my thoughts about this book until now. This is my second time reading Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress and I have to say I'm enjoying it more than the first. I haven't read many books set in China (the first i can think of is Snow Flower and the Secret Fan) and I find it an interesting setting, although somewhat hard to picture. I need to read more books set there. The thing that struck me the most is, unsurprisingly enough, the relationship between the two young boys (especially Luo) and the Little Seamstress. Luo wants to raise her from her lack of education and I keep wondering if he's really in love with her or with his idea of her, with her "thirst for knowledge". Hope it makes any sense. The narrator says Luo's a very good storyteller and the Little Seamstress's reaction after he narrates her Ursule Mirouet must have been really gratifying for Luo. I also found Four Eyes an interesting character, although an obnoxious one. It's weird that he's risked bringing forbidden books and then it looks like he just wants to hide them…why taking the risk in the first place, if not to read those books?? Well, LUCKILY I have no experience living in a place where books are forbidden! Even if I read this book before, I don't remember exactly the ending, so I won't spoil it for you guys. I was really worried!
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Post by Pilleriin on Aug 14, 2011 10:55:10 GMT -5
I'm reading this for the first time. I have to say, that it is different from what I expected. I pictured it to be set in the 19th century. This spring I had to study Asia and Middle East in the 20th century for national examination in History, so I know actually quite lot about Mao and the communism in China and the cultural revolution. And for me, it was quite easy to picture the setting and everything. I found it interesting that Dai Sijie chose Balzac to be the most influential and most intriguing author, the first western author the boys learned about. I actually don't like Balzac and his style, but now having read through this part I want to read his books, at least try to give him another chance. I never really liked Four Eyes. He seemed a bit off the first time he was introduced. I think that maybe he brought the books with him, because his parents asked him, and he liked to please people. He seems like the person, who wants to be on everyones good side, at least until it brings him also some use. I still have not fully understood the meaning of Luo's and the Little Chinese Seamstress's relationship. Is this feeling they have really love or is it something else. Right now I almost done with the book. I have liked it so far, and I hope to finish it tonight.
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yara
First short story featured in regional newspaper
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Post by yara on Aug 14, 2011 14:53:41 GMT -5
i've read this book for the first time and i loved it! It makes you understand how important book and culture are, how they can change and affect your life, i thinks that it only through them that the autor and Lu could survive and have a decent life. I don't think that the feeling between Lou and the little chinese seamstress was really love, i think that he used her because he need to prove himself he was superior because of is education changing her and she used him to lern something totally new that could "save" her from her life
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
Posts: 7,214
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Post by Kristie on Aug 17, 2011 19:53:05 GMT -5
Parts I & II I've found this book to be very interesting so far. I haven't really spent a lot of time in communist China in books before, so it is very interesting to read about that time. My book's blurb about the author says that he was re-educated between 1971-1974. And I think that makes me more intrigued by the story--the fact that it's semi-autobiographical. Or at least that mountain villages and people are somewhat accurate in representation, since he experienced them first-hand.
I, of course, enjoy the fact that much of the story centers on Luo and the narrator (I don't recall his name being mentioned yet) attaining forbidden books. One has to wonder, would they want to read them if they were allowed to? Or, given the chance, would they read Eastern classics over Western ones? Personally, I've never read anything by any of these authors except Dumas. (Authors mentioned were Balzac, Hugo, Stendhal, Dumas, Flaubert, Baudelaire, Romain Rolland, Rousseau, Tolstoy, Gogol, Dostoyevsky, Dickens, Kipling and E Bronte.)
I have to say that I'm a little surprised that the narrator and Luo didn't fight over the Little Seamstress. And Luo is the more confident one, as far as the storytelling goes. I can't help but wonder, if the Little Seamstress is so beautiful, how the narrator has no feelings of wanting her at all. It's a little strange that we don't really know anything about Luo's and the Little Seamstress's relationship--but all of the sudden, the narrator mentions that they had sex (and even a little detail, at that!). It makes me wonder whether or not that relationship really means anything. But, then again, the narrator just might not relate everything Luo says.
Oh, and I'm wondering if there's any significance to that rooster clock. If the villagers went through all the belongings that the two boy brought with them and saw anything of value, they could've taken it and made it "community property", couldn't they? (If they were true communists and shared everything, that is.) Or maybe they were just supposed to take away anything "revolutionary". Either way, it seems like the headman, who so admired the clock, could easily just take it away from the boys. What role will the clock take later, I wonder...
On a previous note, I wonder why the narrator has no name. Even when asked his name by Four-Eyes' mother, he replied with Luo's name. What's the significance to this?!
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
Posts: 7,214
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Post by Kristie on Aug 17, 2011 20:04:05 GMT -5
The thing that struck me the most is, unsurprisingly enough, the relationship between the two young boys (especially Luo) and the Little Seamstress. Luo wants to raise her from her lack of education and I keep wondering if he's really in love with her or with his idea of her, with her "thirst for knowledge". Hope it makes any sense. The narrator says Luo's a very good storyteller and the Little Seamstress's reaction after he narrates her Ursule Mirouet must have been really gratifying for Luo. I have to admit that I don't actually find the Little Seamstress-Luo relationship that important. I suppose I've been focusing more on the narrator-Luo relationship. But you bring about a good point. Maybe Luo just likes that he's more civilized than Little Seamstress and likes that he can better her more than love her. And, of course, he's a boy of 19 so he just has to be interested in a little sex
I think that the narrator feels inferior to Luo, but he's okay with that. Which I find a little strange. Maybe something that happens later in the book will explain this for me.
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
Posts: 7,214
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Post by Kristie on Aug 17, 2011 20:10:11 GMT -5
I found it interesting that Dai Sijie chose Balzac to be the most influential and most intriguing author, the first western author the boys learned about. I actually don't like Balzac and his style, but now having read through this part I want to read his books, at least try to give him another chance. I've never read any Balzac, but I've wanted to lately. I don't know why, exactly. But that's that. Why didn't you care for him?
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