April 2008: Olympic Voices from China

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Fiction by Juan José Saer

Shadows across Frosted Glass

For Biby Castellaro Time is so complicated, yet so simple! Now I'm in the living room sitting in the rocking chair, and I can see Leopoldo's shadow in the bathroom while he begins to undress. It…

Translated from Spanish by Matthew Lansburgh

Fiction by Nicolás Casariego

Travels with My Aunt

If I had to choose a few words to sum up the trip it wouldn't be one phrase, but several, shouted loudly in my aunt Adelina's dry, shrill voice: "Stop! Stop! Will you stop once and for all! What's…

Translated from Spanish by Samantha Schnee

Poetry by Max Blecher

Pastoral

An expansion of plants with water fingers Drink this and look The laced skirts of raw milk The subterranean giants drowned in the azure And lakes open mouths have remained frozen Four oxen under a tree,…

Translated from Romanian by Victor Pambuccian

Book Reviews

Mahmoud Dowlatabadi’s “Missing Soluch”

Reviewed by Elham Gheytanchi

Published during revolutionary times in Iran in 1979, Missing Soluch is a 500-page tribute to the socialist ideas that so enthused the Iranian intellectuals and writers of that period. Mahmoud Dowlatabadi,…...

S. Y. Agnon’s “To This Day”

Reviewed by Tsipi Keller

"During the Great War, I lived in the west of Berlin, in a room with a balcony in a small boarding house on Fasanenstrasse." So begins To This Day, Agnon's shortest novel, first published in Hebrew…...

Nonfiction by Hu Ying

Footnotes Like Skyscrapers

"I want translations with copious footnotes, footnotes reaching up like skyscrapers to the top of this or that page so as to leave only the gleam of one textual line between commentary and eternity." So…

Fiction by Zhao Ying

Red Bean Sticky Cakes and Running

I am a countrywoman. This year, I'm thirty-six years old. My name is Chen Wumi. This name isn't very pleasing to hear, but the Beijing reporter Guo Wangjing was charmed by my name. He said that…

Translated from Chinese by Victoria Hsieh

Fiction by Huang Yongmei

Level A

A-Gump had already been called A-Gump.1 At that time, the American movie Forrest Gump wasn't around yet. However, nobody knew about this. If A-Gump didn't mention it, nobody would know. Among all…

Translated from Chinese by Erin Yu-Tien Huang

Fiction by Sheng Keyi

Little Girl Lost

Dong Putao hadn't been at work long when a shadow passed over the door. It was a man with a broad, slightly open mouth who, with a single movement, glided into the store like a shark. Ripples spread…

Translated from Chinese by John Barthelette

Fiction by Ye Mi

Love’s Labor

Wang Longguan repaired bicycles on the street, and Fan Qiumian supported a large family on her meager income. They met on the street and fell in love. Could it last, a love that came about between these…

Translated from Chinese by Hu Ying

Fiction by Wang Anyi

Wang Hanfang

At the time, young wives in our village didn't have regular names. Add the word "xiao"–young–in front of their maiden names, that's how they'd be called: "Xiao Qian," "Xiao Sun,"…

Translated from Chinese by Hu Ying

Nonfiction by Liu Sola

Feminine Spirit, Unreconstructed

I first got to know Wang Jianan and Cai Xiaoli when I was in England. Wang Jianan can't stop talking, life in his mouth becomes a joke. Cai Xiaoli, on the other hand, hardly speaks at all, and doesn't…

Translated from Chinese by Hu Ying

Nonfiction by Wang Ping

Morning Cloud, Evening Rain

A dream is not a dream A butterfly not a butterfly In the cloud, a pining spirit A myth in the dream's red chamber It's dawn. Our cruise ship has passed the roaring Qutang Gorge and entered Wushan…

Translated from Chinese

Nonfiction by Liu Sola

Random Notes on Beijing

Beijing's cab drivers are the best in the world. They don't accept tips, and if the drive is at all less than direct, they always eat the loss themselves. They start the meter only after the cab…

Translated from Chinese by Hu Ying

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