The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast

Just as Nga-Yee thought everything was going back to normal, Siu-Man stepped from the window of their twenty-second-story flat

In the sixtieth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are solving the case of Second Sister (網內人 / Wǎng Nèi Rén), penned by crime connoisseur Chan Ho-kei. Logged on with guest-level access and ready to follow the trail wherever it leads is 3-time visitor to the show Michelle Deeter. In the events that follow we hack into moral frameworks, digital archives, memory glitches, and urban navigation.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• Gŵyl Haf & Borderless Book Club - International Translation Day event
• AI 2041: Why the Future is Already Here, with Kai-Fu Lee
• Chen Qiufan does an animated TED video to help promote AI 2041
• a TrChFic 80 minute breakdown of ChQF’s Coming of the Light
• Dark as a Boy - an excerpt of Ho Fok Song’s Maze Carpet, tr by Natascha Bruce

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// WORD OF THE DAY //

(人肉搜索引擎 - rénròu sōusuǒ yǐnqíng - human flesh search engine)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• Stress in Hong Kong
• Social engineering within hacking
• Jung’s concept of the persona
• Form and Ideology in Crime Fiction by Stephen Knight
• The Untouched Crime by Zijin Chen
• A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

It is a long and painful process to see oneself clearly, as is the process of returning to one’s childhood.

In the fifty ninth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are talking with someone who is More Than One Child (隐形小孩 / Yǐnxíng Xiǎohái), a woman as friendly as she is fearless: Shen Yang. She’s here on this episode, and so is her translator, friend-of-the-pod, and returnee guest Nicky Harman. The book is forthcoming from the excellent publisher Balestier Press.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• From July 2nd: PEN Translates awards announced, including two titles from the PRC

• Dylan Levi King tries out movie commentary for Obsession 疯狂的代价 (1988)

• New book from Astra House: Yu Xiuhua’s Moonlight Rests on My Left Palm

• Publisher’s Weekly shares a Spotlight on Six Contemporary Chinese Fiction Writers

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// WORD OF THE DAY //

(葳蕤 - wēi ruí - lush, burgeoning foliage)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• '琵琶語 Pipa Yu' by 林海 Lin Hai - Shen Yang’s musical pairing

• When Everything Is Green by Julie Christmas & All The World is Green by Tom Waits - Angus’ musical pairings

• The One Child Policy

• The Liar’s Club by Mary Karr

• Our Story: A Memoir of Love and Life in China by Rao Pingru, trans. Nicky Harman

• Leftover in China: The Women Shaping the World's Next Superpower by Roseann Lake

• Robert Winston’s BBC program on memory… sadly it’s not streaming anywhere

The moment I was bitten, I died and became another thing. Now I am loitering on the other shore of the Styx, listening to the past from beyond its waves.

In the fifty eighth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are picking Flower of the Other Shore (彼岸花 / Bǐ'àn Huā), a romantic(!) zombie short story by A Que. Here to help me find sympathy for the undead is the tale’s translator, Xueting Ni. The story will feature in her anthology of translated Chinese sci-fi: Sinopticon.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• Hao Jingfang’s Vagabonds shortlisted for the 2021 Arthur C. Clarke Award
• Leeds Centre for New Chinese Writing launches new journal & calls for papers
• TrChFIc Meta News: Ximalaya feed censored, stoopid Lu Xun meme blows up

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// WORD OF THE DAY //

(丧尸 - sàngshī - zombie)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• Intertextuality - big word for a simple concept
• World War Z - the book & the film
• Xueting’s From Kuan Yin to Chairman Mao: The Essential Guide to Chinese Deities
• The Reincarnated Giant: An Anthology of Twenty-First-Century Chinese Science Fiction
• Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse

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// Handy TrChFic Links //

Episode Transcripts // Help Support TrChFic

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‘Chopin always reminds me of being lovelorn in Penang’

[ this is episode 5 of our Taiwan Season ]

In the fifty seventh episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are suffering from Home Sickness (匿逃者 / Nì Táo Zhě), a short story collection by Chih-ying Lay. Here to ease this terrible affliction is the book’s translator: reformed Buddhist and agile herper Darryl Sterk.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• Healing with Poisons - a book on the interwining of classical Chinese medicine & poison
• Ketamine and the Return of the Party-State - DLK’s political history of ket vs the CCP
• A&Qs on 'Sinofuturisms' - compiled in Verge: Global Asias by Virginia L Con & 胡子哥
• TrChFic bags a spot in the Feedspot Literature Podcasts list

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// WORD OF THE DAY //

(亲源关系 - qīnyuán guānxì - phylogenetic relationship)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• Herping - not a word I’d heard before!
• Small publishers Honford Star, Balestier Press, and Linda Leith
• Sailing to Ireland: Essays on W. B. Yeats and the Celtic Renaissance
• Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale
• Lessons in Essence by Dana Standridge
• The Mystery Religions of Gladovia by Bradley Winterton
• Kant’s noumena & the Buddhist concept of ‘convenient means’

‘According to the ancient precepts, grief supersedes all formalities’

[ this is episode 4 of our Taiwan Season ]

[full episode transcript]

In the fifty sixth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are introducing ourselves to the Taipei People (台北人 / Táiběi Rén), as written by Pai Hsien-yung. Joining me to question the merits of nostalgia and muse aimlessly on umbrellas and the like is a genuine Taibei ren; the effortlessly hip Nadia Ho.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• Issue One of ‘Jintian’ - the legendary Chinese lit magazine
• READ: The Killer 撞死了一只羊 by Tsering Norbu
• Two Poems by Bei Dao - commemorating June 4th

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// WORD OF THE DAY //

(夢 - màng - dream)

Note I’ve used the character’s traditional form and local Taiwanese pronunciation here!

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• The Taste of Apples by Huang Chun-Ming tr. Howard Goldblatt
• Dubliners by James Joyce
• Kun opera - Mr Pai’s favourite style
• The May 4th Movement & Battle of Tsingtao
• The Paramount Ballroom in Shanghai

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// Handy TrChFic Links //

Episode Transcripts // Help Support TrChFic

INSTAGRAM // TWITTER // DISCORD

‘Only if you go to places nobody’s ever been can you see the colours nobody’s ever seen’

[ this is episode 3 of our Taiwan Season ]

In the fifty fifth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are meeting The Man with the Compound Eyes (复眼人 / Fùyǎn Rén). Brace yourself for the impact of an ecological, apocalyptic, and internationalist vortex of literary weirdness. Joining me to weather this storm at the limits of anthropoid cognition is Sinophone-sci-fi-studier Cara Healey.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• The Secret Talker by Geling Yan
• Queer Taiwanese Literature: A Reader By Howard Chiang
• The Rainbow of Time by Jimmy Liao

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// WORDS OF THE DAY //

(涡流 - wōliú - vortex, whirlpool)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• Waste Tide by Chen Qiufan
• the Indigenous people of Taiwan
• David Mitchell and impending doom
• The Reincarnated Giant: An Anthology of Twenty-First-Century Chinese Science Fiction

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// Handy TrChFic Links //

Episode Transcripts // Help Support TrChFic

INSTAGRAM // TWITTER // DISCORD

‘Some desires, once formed, are impossible to fulfil, so they become frustrations instead. That’s the problem with going forth into new worlds’

[ this is episode 2 of our Taiwan Season ]

In the fifty fourth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are thumbing through the Notes of a Crocodile (鳄鱼手记 / Èyú Shǒujì). Joining me on the lookout for the shy and elusive reptiloid is Conor Stuart.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• How a Polish Master Brought Lu Xun's Madness to Life

• 11th Chinese Nebula Awards Winners – list shared in English by Locus

• NEA Big Read 2021: China’s Literary Giants: The Legacy of Yu Hua

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// WORDS OF THE DAY //

(三八 - Sānbā - usually derogatory adjective used to describe ‘frivolous’ women)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• Crystal Boys by Pai Hsien-yung

• LGBT rights in Taiwan

• ‘Addiction’ webseries

• ‘Lala/lazi’ slang for ‘lesbian’

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// Handy TrChFic Links //

Episode Transcripts // Help Support TrChFic

INSTAGRAM // TWITTER // DISCORD

‘Two peach trees, two entirely different universes.’

[ this is episode 1 of our Taiwan Season ]

In the fifty third episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are peeling back The Membranes (膜 / Mó). Joining me at their respective computer terminals in the ocean floor biodome are its author Chi Ta-wei and translator Ari Larissa Heinrich.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• PANEL: Exploring Chinese Science Fiction Multi-Dimensionally

• PREORDER: Vessel - a memoir by Cai Chongda

• UPCOMING: The London Chinese Science Fiction Group to have Han Song on as a guest

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// WORDS OF THE DAY //

(赞 - zàn - ‘like’, as in Facebook, Wechat etc)

(情 - qíng - emotion, affection, sentiment)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• 80s & 90s sci-fi and cyberpunk: should it be left behind?

• the hole in the ozone layer

• chickens with teeth

• queer parenting in Taiwan

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// Episode Sponsor //

Buy Paul French’s Destination Peking here:

https://www.blacksmithbooks.com/books/destination-peking/

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// Handy TrChFic Links //

Episode Transcripts // Help Support TrChFic

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‘An unruly monkey like you has to be restrained somehow, otherwise you’ll never reform’

In the fifty second episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are departing from the Tang Empire on a haphazard Journey to the West (西游记 / Xī Yóu Jì). Talking me through the transformations is Julia Lovell, translator of JttW’s latest, extremely readable English translation.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• A new Can Xue translation is on the way

• Yang Lian and Brian Holton win first Sarah Maguire Prize

• ‘Jia Pingwa: Master Storyteller of Rural China’ event, Fri 9 Apr

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// WORD OF THE DAY //

(游 - yóu - journey)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• Can’t Get You Out of My Head, (Dir. Adam Curtis, 2021)

• The Sinister Way by Richard von Glahn

• Transforming Monkey by Hongmei Sun

• The Four Masterworks of the Ming Novel by Andrew Plaks

• Cultural Syncretism (in a silly video game)

• (Breaking the) rules of fantasy fiction

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// Handy TrChFic Links //

Episode Transcripts // Help Support TrChFic

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'I stand alone on the earth, unable to bring the show to an end'

In the 51st episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we're heading into the far west to come face-to-face with Li Juan, a Han Chinese writer who has found some degree of fame writing soulfully about her experiences living among the Kazakh herders of Xinjiang Province. Braving the frontier with me are two of her translators, TrChFic returnee Christopher Payne and friend-of-the-pod Jack Hargreaves. The former translated Li Juan's Distant Sunflower Fields and the latter is one of the two co-translators of her Winter Pasture.

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// NEWS ITEMS //

• Closing the China Channel

• Vector Magazine issue on Chinese SF

• Ding Ling, Boiling Milk | prchistory.org

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// WORDS OF THE DAY //

(“Koychy!” - a versatile Kazakh exclamation, often meaning “no way,” “no thanks,” “get out,” “leave it out” )

( 荒野 - huāngyě- wilderness)

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// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

• Opinion | The Real Censors of China - NYT

• China 'to let thousands of ethnic Kazakhs leave Xinjiang' - The Guardian

• Wolf Totem by Jiang Rong

• Lei Diansheng’s ‘completionist’ trek around the borders

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// Handy TrChFic Links //

Episode Transcripts // Help Support TrChFic

INSTAGRAM // TWITTER // DISCORD