The woman in the story will display exoticism of some sort. The other tales in the book are similarly built around the relationship of the narrator (always male) with a woman who is in some way unique, unusual and supernaturally connected.
It is a story of relationship, of human love, puzzled determination and morality.
The narrative of the story carries the reader along-no high-speed chases, shoot-outs, steamy sex scenes, or any of the devices modern writers depend on today to hold a reader’s interest. The heart-broken narrator wonders, “Where in the world will I ever see her again?” (p. She admits she loves him but tells him this love cannot be and finally vanishes entirely from his life. She assassinated people, broke out of jails, escaped being shot, crossed deserts, fled danger by boarding steamships she is also Jewish, born to a Jewish mother and a Chinese father. She tells him she was a revolutionary when she lived. “Why can’t you just let me be? Why do you have to drag me out of the grave and into this world?” (p. The narrator eventually sees her again in a public place. The owners tell him a woman rented a room from him but died two years ago of tuberculosis. He finds the house to which she had once taken him. She will not return his love for a simple reason: she is a ghost, he is a human. He hopes to make her see her delusion by asking her questions: if she is a ghost, how is it that she smokes? Why does she want him to escort her through dangerous areas of town to where she lives? Where does she live? Doesn’t she know that there is no such thing as a ghost? She addresses him as “Human” and insists he address her as “Ghost.” Despite his disbelief, he humours her. The exotic features that are often part of them intrigue and mystify the reader, deepening the allure of each fictional endeavour with this unusual and paranormal dimension.Īn example of this can be found in his most well-known and widely read tale, “Ghost Love.” In this story, a man meets a woman who insists she is a ghost. The basic elements of story that we all learn in literature classes-plot, character, setting, narration-all work together to propel his writing from the opening lines to the climax and the denouement. His stories fizz with energy from the beginning to end. What struck me as a reader is the skill of Xu as a storyteller-or maybe I should say, his velocity as a storyteller. His stories are populated with ghosts, spices, characters who speak with birds, quirky female figures who seem to have magical powers and who see visions or who are telepaths. Xu Xu’s tales have been termed “exotic” by critics (Green uses the term in his own assessment of Xu’s writings). This excellent and highly readable translation opens the works of a fascinating writer to the Anglophone readers for the first time, making his longer tales and short stories available and also providing an enlightening biography of the author, a sketch of the literary and political world from which he wrote and a critical assessment of the stories included in the book-though the bulk of the volume consists of the stories themselves. Green, a professor of Chinese at San Francisco University. Bird Talk and Other Stories is translated by Frederik H. But, until now, they have not been translated and made available to English-speaking readers. Some of his stories are iconic, all are popular his works have been made into films and adapted for the stage. His status in the Chinese-speaking world is considerable. Xu Xu (1908-1980) was a Chinese novelist, poet, literary critic, and journalist. Bird Talk and Other Stories by Xu Xu: Modern Tales of a Chinese Romantic, Stone Bridge Press, 2020. Translated and with commentary by Frederik H.