Winner of the New England Book Show Award
It's been a pilgrimage for Annie Dillard: from Tinker Creek to the Galapagos Islands, the high Arctic, the Pacific Northwest, the Amazon Jungle-and now, China. This informative narrative is full of fascinating people: Chinese people, mostly writers, who encounter American writers in various bizarre circumstances in both China and the U.S. There is a toasting scene at a Chinese banquet; a portrait of a bitter, flirtatious diplomat at a dance hall; a formal meeting with Chinese writers; a conversation with an American businessman in a hotel lobby; an evening with long-suffering Chinese intellectuals in their house; a scene in the Beijing foreigners' compound with an excited European journalist; and a scene of unwarranted hilarity at the Beijing Library. In the U.S., there is Allen Ginsberg having a bewildering conversation in Disneyland with a Chinese journalist; there is the lovely and controversial writer Zhang Jie suiting abrupt mood changes to a variety of actions; and there is the fiercely spirited Jiange Zilong singing in a Connecticut dining room, eyes closed. These are real stories told with a warm and lively humor, with a keen eye for paradox, and with fresh insight into the human drama.
Autorentext
ANNIE DILLARD's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek won a Pulitzer Prize in 1974. Her other books are Tickets for a Prayer Wheel, Holy the Firm, Living by Fiction, and Teaching a Stone to Talk. She was born in Pittsburgh and received a B.A. (1967) and an M.A. (1968) from Hollins College. She is now adjunct professor of English at Wesleyan University. A chapter of this book was the Phi Beta Kappa lecture at Harvard/Radcliffe n 1983. She lives in Middletown, Connecticut with her husband, Gary Clevidence, and their daughter, Rosie.
Zusammenfassung
Chinese and U.S. writers try to bridge the culture gap in this "e;splendid little book"e; from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (The Washington Post Book World). Winner of the New England Book Show Award It's been a pilgrimage for Annie Dillard: from Tinker Creek to the Galapagos Islands, the high Arctic, the Pacific Northwest, the Amazon Jungle and now, China. This informative narrative is full of fascinating people: Chinese people, mostly writers, who encounter American writers in various bizarre circumstances in both China and the U.S. There is a toasting scene at a Chinese banquet; a portrait of a bitter, flirtatious diplomat at a dance hall; a formal meeting with Chinese writers; a conversation with an American businessman in a hotel lobby; an evening with long-suffering Chinese intellectuals in their house; a scene in the Beijing foreigners' compound with an excited European journalist; and a scene of unwarranted hilarity at the Beijing Library. In the U.S., there is Allen Ginsberg having a bewildering conversation in Disneyland with a Chinese journalist; there is the lovely and controversial writer Zhang Jie suiting abrupt mood changes to a variety of actions; and there is the fiercely spirited Jiange Zilong singing in a Connecticut dining room, eyes closed. These are real stories told with a warm and lively humor, with a keen eye for paradox, and with fresh insight into the human drama. "e;Engrossing and thought-provoking."e; Irving Yucheng Lo, author of Sunflower Splendor 'Keenly observed, often comic encounters."e; The New York Times Book Review "e;Dillard distills her encounters in lively anecdotes, sketches and vignettes. Her charm lies in the simplicity of her storytelling."e; Publishers Weekly
Inhalt
Author's Note
Introduction
A Man of the World
The Meeting
At the Dance
Sunning a Jinx
The Shanghai Worker
Some Notes On Reading
Saving Face
The Journalist
Zhang Jie
Disneyland
What Must They Think
Not Too Easy
Singing the Blues