Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China


Jung Chang - 1991
    Chang was a Red Guard briefly at the age of fourteen, then worked as a peasant, a “barefoot doctor,” a steelworker, and an electrician. As the story of each generation unfolds, Chang captures in gripping, moving—and ultimately uplifting—detail the cycles of violent drama visited on her own family and millions of others caught in the whirlwind of history.

Ms Ice Sandwich


Mieko Kawakami - 2013
    He is in awe of her aloofness, her skill at slipping sandwiches into bags, and, most electric of all, her ice-blue eyelids. Every day he is drawn to the supermarket just to watch her in action. But life has a way of interfering – there is his mother, forever distracted, who can tell the fortunes of women; his grandmother, silently dying, who listens to his heart; and his classmate, Tutti, no stranger to pain, who shares her private thrilling world with him.Tender, warm, yet unsentimental, Ms Ice Sandwich is a story about new starts, parents who have departed, and the importance of saying goodbye.

The Face of Another


Kōbō Abe - 1964
    The narrator is a scientist hideously deformed in a laboratory accident–a man who has lost his face and, with it, his connection to other people. Even his wife is now repulsed by him. His only entry back into the world is to create a mask so perfect as to be undetectable. But soon he finds that such a mask is more than a disguise: it is an alternate self–a self that is capable of anything. A remorseless meditation on nature, identity and the social contract, The Face of Another is an intellectual horror story of the highest order.

C.P. Cavafy: Collected Poems


Constantinos P. Cavafy - 1972
    P. Cavafy (1863 - 1933) lived in relative obscurity in Alexandria, and a collected edition of his poems was not published until after his death. Now, however, he is regarded as the most important figure in twentieth-century Greek poetry, and his poems are considered among the most powerful in modern European literature.Here is an extensively revised edition of the acclaimed translations of Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard, which capture Cavafy's mixture of formal and idiomatic use of language and preserve the immediacy of his frank treatment of homosexual themes, his brilliant re-creation of history, and his astute political ironies. The resetting of the entire edition has permitted the translators to review each poem and to make alterations where appropriate. George Savidis has revised the notes according to his latest edition of the Greek text.About the first edition: The best [English version] we are likely to see for some time.--James Merrill, The New York Review of Books [Keeley and Sherrard] have managed the miracle of capturing this elusive, inimitable, unforgettable voice. It is the most haunting voice I know in modern poetry.--Walter Kaiser, The New Republic ?

I Have the Right to Destroy Myself


Young-Ha Kim - 1995
    I have no interest in one person killing another. I only want to draw out morbid desires, imprisoned deep in the unconscious. This lust, once freed, starts growing. Their imaginations run free, and they soon discover their potential... They are waiting for someone like me.A spectral, nameless narrator haunts the lost and wounded of big-city Seoul, suggesting solace in suicide. Wandering through the bright lights of their high-urban existence, C and K are brothers who fall in love with the same woman - Se-yeon. As their lives intersect, they tear at each other in a struggle to find connection in their fast-paced, atomized world.Dreamlike and cinematic, I Have the Right to Destroy Myself brilliantly affirms Young-ha Kim as Korea's leading young literary master.

Anthology of Japanese Literature: From the Earliest Era to the Mid-Nineteenth Century


Donald Keene十返舎 一九 - 1955
    Every genre and style, from the celebrated No plays to the poetry and novels of the seventeenth century, find a place in this book. An introduction by Donald Keene places the selections in their proper historical context, allowing the readers to enjoy the book both as literature and as a guide to the cultural history of Japan. Selections include “Man’yoshu” or “Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves” from the ancient period; “Kokinshu” or “Collection of Ancient and Modern Poetry,” “The Tosa Diary” of Ki No Tsurayuki, “Yugao” from “Tales of Genji” of Murasaki Shikibu, and “The Pillow Book” of Sei Shonagon from the Heian Period; “The Tale of the Heike” from the Kamakura Period; Plan of the No Stage, “Birds of Sorrow” of Seami Motokiyo, and “Three Poets at Minase” from the Muromachi Period; and Sections from Basho, including “The Narrow Road of Oku,” “The Love Suicides at Sonezaki” by Chikamatsu Monzaemon, and Waka and haiku of the Tokugawa Period.

The Hunting Gun


Yasushi Inoue - 1949
    Told from the viewpoints of three different women, this is a story of the psychological impact of illicit love. First viewed through the eyes of Shoko, who learns of the affair through reading her mother's diary, then through the eyes of Midori, who had long known about the affair of her husband with Saiko, and finally through the eyes of Saiko herself.

Revenge of the Mooncake Vixen


Marilyn Chin - 2009
    Raucous twin sisters Moonie and Mei Ling Wong are known as the “double happiness” Chinese food delivery girls. Each day they load up a “crappy donkey-van” and deliver Americanized (“bad”) Chinese food to homes throughout their southern California neighborhood. United in their desire to blossom into somebodies, the Wong girls fearlessly assert their intellect and sexuality, even as they come of age under the care of their dominating, cleaver-wielding grandmother from Hong Kong. They transform themselves from food delivery girls into accomplished women, but along the way they wrestle with the influence and continuity of their Chinese heritage. Marilyn Chin’s prose waxes and wanes between satire and metaphorical lyric, referencing classical Chinese tales and ghost stories that are at turns sensual, lurid, hilarious, shocking, and surreal. .

Journey to the West: The Monkey King's Amazing Adventures


Timothy Richard - 2008
    They face fantastic foes, demons and monsters during their amazing adventures traveling to the Western paradise. More than anything else, though, the Monkey King loved mischief and rule–breaking, and was sure he was the most powerful creature in the world.But after defeat and punishment for his tricks, the Monkey King found himself wanting some things he never expected: to be disciplined and good enough to help the monk Hsuan Zhang on his mission to bring Buddhist Scriptures—and enlightenment—to China.Readers of all ages will thrill to Timothy Richard's retelling of the Monkey King's exploits—whether in the Dragon King's underwater castle, the Halls of the Dead or the palace of Buddha himself—and find themselves captivated as the Monkey King joins Hsuan Zhang and their companions the Dragon Horse, the Monk Sand and the equally mischievous Pig on the dangerous trek West. Despite the tale's ancient origins, Journey to the West proves as fresh and engaging an adventure as anything written today.

The Selected Poems of Po Chü-i


Bai Juyi - 1999
    In spite of his preeminent stature, this is the first edition of Po Chü?-i's poetry to appear in the West. It encompasses the full range of his work, from the early poems of social protest to the later recluse poems, whose spiritual depths reflect both his life-long devotion to Taoist and Ch'an (Zen) Buddhist practice. David Hinton's translations of ancient Chinese poetry have earned wide acclaim for creating compelling English texts that have altered our conception of Chinese poetry. Among his books published by New Directions are The Selected Poems of Tu Fu, and The Selected Poems of Li Po. His work has been supported by fellowships from The National Endowment for the Arts and The National Endowment for the Humanities.

A Small Town Called Hibiscus


Gu Hua - 1981
    Its author Gu Hua was brought up in the Wuling Mountains of south Hunan. He presents the ups and downs of some families in a small mountain town there during the hard years in the early sixties, the "cultural revolution," and after the downfall of the "gang of four." He shows the horrifying impact on decent, hard-working people of the gang's ultra-Left line, and retains a sense of humor in describing the most harrowing incidents. In the end wrongs are righted, and readers are left with a deepened understanding of this abnormal period in Chinese history and the sterling qualities of the Chinese people.

Musashi


Eiji Yoshikawa - 1935
    Musashi is a novel in the best tradition of Japanese story telling. It is a living story, subtle and imaginative, teeming with memorable characters, many of them historical. Interweaving themes of unrequited love, misguided revenge, filial piety and absolute dedication to the Way of the Samurai, it depicts vividly a world Westerners know only vaguely.

Crystal Boys


Pai Hsien-yung - 1983
    A-qing, the adolescent hero, comes from an impoverished family. His father casts him out after learning that his son is gay. A-qing drifts into New Park, a gay hangout in Taipei, and begins his life as a hustler. He meets other boys living on the street, also forsaken by their families: Little Jade, who is constantly searching for his unknown father; Mousey, an orphan and petty thief; and Wu Min, a shy tender kid, who attempts suicide when discarded by a middle-aged man. These four boys become fast friends and are taken under the protection of Chief Yang, a fiftyish gay guru in the Park. The boys begin to build a family of their own. Meanwhile, A-qing meets Dragon Prince, whose passionate and faithful love for Phoenix Boy has become a legend of the Park...The second part of the novel deals with the Cozy Nest, a gay bar run by Chief Yang, where the boys and other homosexual exiles have found refuge. The bar is sponsored by Papa Fu, whose young soldier son had shot himself when his homosexuality was exposed.In Taiwan, the gay community is known as the buoliquan, literally "glass community," while the individuals are called "glass boys" or "Crystal Boys."Crystal Boys was first published in Taiwan and has since appeared in Hong Kong and in mainland China: two editions (Beijing and Harbin) were published in 1987. A film, Outcasts, based on the novel and directed by Yu Kan-Ping (1986) is currently available in the United States on video cassette (subtitled).

Vagabonds


Hao Jingfang - 2016
    The war results in two different and mutually incompatible worlds. In 2196, one hundred years later, Earth and Mars attempt to initiate a dialogue, hoping a reconciliation is on the horizon. Representing Mars, a group of young delegates are sent to Earth to study the history and culture of the rival planet, all while teaching others about life on Mars.Narrated from two perspectives: Luo Ying, an eighteen-year-old girl from Mars who has spent the past five years on Earth, and Ignacio, a filmmaker in his late twenties from Earth on a job to document the delegates from Mars. Both Luo and Ignacio are trapped between worlds, with critics all around, and always under suspicion, searching for where they truly belong.

Salomé


Oscar Wilde - 1891
    Symbolist poets and writers — Stéphane Mallarmé and Maurice Maeterlinck among them — defended the play's literary brilliance. Beyond its notoriety, the drama's haunting poetic imagery, biblical cadences, and febrile atmosphere have earned it a reputation as a masterpiece of the Aesthetic movement of fin de siècle England.Written originally in French in 1892, this sinister tale of a woman scorned and her vengeance was translated into English by Lord Alfred Douglas. The play inspired some of Aubrey Beardsley's finest illustrations, and an abridged version served as the text for Strauss' renowned opera of the same name. This volume reprints the complete text of the first English edition, published in 1894, and also includes "A Note on Salomé" by Robert Ross, Wilde's lifelong friend and literary executor. Students, lovers of literature and drama, and admirers of Oscar Wilde and his remarkable literary gifts will rejoice in this inexpensive edition.