Matter-of-Face Writing

"Woman from Shanghai" is a collection of biographical stories from several people in Chinese labor camps in the late '50s and early '60s. The author spent years tracking down former inmates, most wrongfully accused of having "ill" political thoughts, and interviewing them about their experiences in the desert prison.

Very little judgment is passed. The biographies speak for themselves about the terrible system of repression and torture in China. The narratives focus on the harsh conditions. There is very little about the major political figures of the time, but plenty on local politics and relationships. Some of the stories are very emotional because of the tragic toll the labor camps and prisons took on people's lives.

"Woman from Shanghai" is well-written. I'm sure much of the credit should go to the translator. The whole book reads well and is great for a lay person such as myself. ( )

History is replete with examples of the human capacity for evil. Over the decades, Nazi concentration camps, Soviet gulags, and American internment camps have plumbed the depths of depravity. But in each of these sad places of wickedness and cruelty, there have always been stories of nobility and courage and survival.

Xianhui Yang has collected thirteen such stories, all based on true accounts from survivors of the Chinese forced labor camp at Jiabiangou. Between 1957 and 19060, thousands of Chinese citizens labeled as Rightists were re-educated through forced labor. They were forced to live in one-room shacks or caves in large numbers and little food was available. After three years in the harsh desert, just five hundred survivors were relocated from the camps.

Yang is spare and plain, straightforward to a fault. The style is both an asset and a liability. While the lives of these survivors are described in detail, the stories seem dulled. Yang’s account lacks the raw, volatile emotion of Elie Wiesel’s “Night” or Victor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning,” stories told by holocaust survivors. Though some moments in Yang’s tales carry an inherent shocking affect, the remainder of the story usually remains flat. Whether because of a cultural gap in narrative forms or because the stories are based on interviews with real survivors whose emotions were blunted in the experience, these stories seem to cry out for a more evocative style.

Yang’s stories are important in a historical and anthropological sense. Even if they don’t make an immediate emotional connection, they still deserve attention, as they bear witness to the capacity of the human spirit for both good and evil.

Bottom line: An important collection of stories for which the emotional content seems somewhat dulled for the subject matter.

4 bones!!!! ( )