Summer reading and reflecting (Day Thirty)

For various reasons, I felt kind of down today--I'm getting frustrated with my writing project, and I was also sad to find out that a colleague was resigning. So I mostly did some reading today (except for when I was having a meeting with another colleague about how we are going to revise a course--that went well). I read four stories in A Son of Taiwan, one of the books I mentioned yesterday. Some of them deal with men who have come back after getting out of prison for political "crimes," and others appear to be more metaphorical takes on the White Terror period. One thing that I got from reading these stories (like Li Ang's "Auntie Tiger") was the feeling of fear and conspiracy in the air during that time. As Li Ang writes in one place,

"It was an era of mad people and beggars. We did not witness the massacre, we did not see piled bodies or bloodstains, and even Third Uncle seldom passed on his tales. Our fear came from having been taught that one could not believe even what one witnessed, for there had to be a conspiracy by enemy spies." (130)

Li uses this idea to describe various rumors that spread about the Taiwanese Communist Xie Xuehong, who tried to lead a rebellion against the KMT in the wake of the 228 Massacres. The rumors (and Li's story) tie her strength and leadership--and mysteriousness--to her sexuality, which is also depicted as strong yet mysterious. As this is a work of fiction, however, I feel I have to read a biography to find out what is true about Xie. I have a biography written by Chen Fangming, but I haven't had time to read it yet. In the meantime, I can read the article by Ya-chen Chen about her that was listed in the Wikipedia references. It's about Li Ang's portrayal of Xie. 

One thing I wish the editors would have done with the book (besides proofreading it a bit better) was expand the introduction. I noticed that that they didn't include any publication dates for the stories, for instance. I'd like more information about the stories, particularly Ye Shitao's, which appears to be extracts from a longer work and is a little hard to follow. 

Two more stories to finish. Maybe tomorrow I'll work on my paper, too.

[Update, 6/12/21: I finished the book last night. A correction: The publication year for one of the stories, Lee Yu's "Nocturnal Strings," was given (1986).]