Oracle Bones: A Journey Through Time in China (P.S.) Review
Oracle Bones Book Review
(05-15-2010)
Have just finished reading Oracle Bones after reading River Town in succession I decided to record my impression before Peter Hesslerfs third book of his trilogy of China Journey, and I must congratulate him for a task very well done. Having been a Chinese immigrant for almost 60 years, Peter Hessler would not be surprised that I still consider myself a Chinese and, like so many other first generation Chinese immigrants, I too, would frequently identify him as wai guo ren iŠO`lj, a foreigner in my conversation with other Chinese immigrants. My comments in this article will be marked, however, a review of the Oracle Bones only.
My copy of Oracle Bones was a 2006 paperback edition, and Hessler, already becoming an excellent China observer in his few years in China since 1996 when he arrived at Fuling, Sichuan province, to teach as a Peace Corp volunteer. His view point expressed in River Town was quite clearly that of a foreigner but he is a China expert in this later book.
It is through several people discussed in this book one gets a good idea about China from his visits and friendship with them, including couple of his former students, several Chinese and American scholars and Polat, an Uighure ethnic minority from Xinjiang province, we get some aspects of a very complex country not to forget a movie actor, Jiang Wen, and one excellent movie of his.
One former student of his, Emily, who had gone to the Overnight City Shenzhen to work after her graduation from college had experienced such dark mental picture of that city few of us can imagine but when she, after a few years, finally got accepted by a university in Chongqing doing graduate work to teach handicapped or perhaps retarded students, her life outlook seemed to have totally reversed from hopelessness to a brighter and meaningful future. This reader was caught by surprise not so much by the switch of Emilyfs life, but rather, by the fact that there are concerns for people of that sort of misfortune in China. It was not the China I had lived before 1951. The young people, most of them are young women, going to find work in Shenzhen are facing a life few of us in America can imagine. The Shenzhen I had been to in 1951 was a village of few thousand aboriginals; it is now a megacity of more than 13 million as of 2006.
Chen Mengjia, the archeological scholar whose monumental research on oracle bones was so severely damaged mentally by political persecution, during the late 50s and early 60s, and committed suicide is the backbone of this book. What Hessler had gone through in order to get as much truth to the life of Chen Mengjia is nothing unique in trying to find out any reliable history of just about any event in anywhere around the world but particularly in China where so much deliberate efforts are placed in blocks trying to obscure the real picture. Hesslerfs effort in this regard is simply commendable. He had gone to Seattle, Princeton, Stanford and Berkeley to interview various scholars for their expertise on ancient writing and language, but I respect his own analysis on the significance of Chinese writing, calligraphy in particular, to the Chinese culture and mostly their mind. This reader had to endure the education system during his early schools in China trying to carry out the rigid school regulation practicing the intricacy of calligraphy with both large and small brush pens. The irony is the art form did not become meaningful until after arriving as an immigrant to the U.S. as a college student. I realized the great abstract quality of calligraphy but never thought that calligraphy is taken by Chinese in China actually as ART in the purest sense. And this very nature of Chinese calligraphy plays an important role in the Chinese mind not only in Chinese education but social and civilization aspects. I had so opposed to Dr. Hu Shihfs suggestion and urge to Chinese-American parents not to send their kids to Chinese school in Chinatowns to study Chinese but spending more time on English and mathematics during the late 1950s. I came to understand and appreciate Dr. Hufs idea only in 1998 when I was struggling to learn the Chinese pinyin system in order to use the computer Chinese writing software. And, of course, this leads to Hesslerfs discussion on the highly controversial issue of Chinese writing reform. Again, Hessler brought numerous issues in this regard into this book and I sincerely hope that is will once again ignite a lively discussion among more Chinese scholars. I myself now firmly think that language is principally a communication tool, and as art, only a secondary consideration.
It is also a key point in the book when Hessler presents a very good anthropological discussion on the ancient evolving process of Chinese written language, the words, that it did not develop into an alphabetical system over thousands of years. This is a topic of immense difficulty beyond mere speculation. His effort commands respect.
The young ethnic Uighure Polat hates the Han Chinese and from what I have read about him I wish I can someday meet with him in Washington, D.C. and I think we can establish friendly dialogue and letting him realize that meaningful understanding with the Han Chinese is possible.
At the end of the book Hessler brought in Mr. Wu who had attended Manchester College in 1948 and I too went there in 1951.
Thank you, Mr. Hessler, for Jiang Wenfs movie, Devils on the Doorstep, a rare, far reaching film of Shakespearian drama.
Oracle Bones: A Journey Through Time in China (P.S.) Feature
- ISBN13: 9780060826598
- Condition: New
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Oracle Bones: A Journey Through Time in China (P.S.) Overview
A century ago, outsiders saw China as a place where nothing ever changes. Today the country has become one of the most dynamic regions on earth. In Oracle Bones, Peter Hessler explores the human side of China's transformation, viewing modern-day China and its growing links to the Western world through the lives of a handful of ordinary people. In a narrative that gracefully moves between the ancient and the present, the East and the West, Hessler captures the soul of a country that is undergoing a momentous change before our eyes.
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Customer Reviews
Sharp and insightful - Marcus Schuetz - Hong Kong SARm China
I found Peter Hessler's narrative and insight brilliant. The book is a collection of impressions the author describes thoughtfully and sharply from a perspective of a reflecting insider. What he writes resonates a lot with what I have seen, living in China since 2003. And it opens interesting new views, triggers interest on further research and last but not least, I learned a lot of new things which I did not know before. If you are looking for a book on the contemporary China and its making on the level of individual plots and stories, do not miss reading Oracle Bones.
Nice and interesting - Lina Ma -
Really good book to know China. The author gave us a true China he saw, not imagination.
Hessler knows China better than most of the Chinese - C. Zhu - Vienna, VA
Not only every American or people who are interested in China should read this book, but also, in my humble opinions, all the Chinese leaders should read this book. Hessler was a great story teller, his thoughts were well organized and he had a pair of eyes that could see things with all sorts of analogies. As he had said in this book, he had the influence from his parents who is a social worker and a history teacher. He approached this book from the views as a sociologist and a historian would have done. Not just the characters interested me, but the people who he interviewed that truly added his characters' stories another layer of spectrum. Reading this book was like watching a spider weaving its web, across the time from Shang dynasty to modern China, from the west Xingjiang to Beijing and Shenzen. I think Hessler knows China much better than most of the Chinese people. This book should be a required reading material in any high school or college history classes, and any journalism classes. Thank you for writing such an amazing book!
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