<![CDATA[The Vagrants: A Novel]]>

false <![CDATA[The Vagrants: A Novel]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255572795m/3575636.jpg 3575636 4 Brilliant and illuminating, this astonishing debut novel by the award-winning writer Yiyun Li is set in China in the late 1970s, when Beijing was rocked by the Democratic Wall Movement, an anti-Communist groundswell designed to move China beyond the dark shadow of the Cultural Revolution toward a more enlightened and open society. In this powerful and beautiful story, we follow a group of people in a small town during this dramatic and harrowing time, the era that was a forebear of the Tiananmen Square uprising. Morning dawns on the provincial city of Muddy River. A young woman, Gu Shan, a bold spirit and a follower of Chairman Mao, has renounced her faith in Communism. Now a political prisoner, she is to be executed for her dissent. Her distraught mother, determined to follow the custom of burning her only child’s clothing to ease her journey into the next world, is about to make another bold decision. Shan’s father, Teacher Gu, who has already, in his heart and mind, buried his rebellious daughter, begins to retreat into memories. Neither of them imagines that their daughter’s death will have profound and far-reaching effects, in Muddy River and beyond. In luminous prose, Yiyun Li weaves together the lives of these and other unforgettable characters, including a serious seven-year-old boy, Tong; a crippled girl named Nini; the sinister idler Bashi; and Kai, a beautiful radio news announcer who is married to a man from a powerful family. Life in a world of oppression and pain is portrayed through stories of resilience, sacrifice, perversion, courage, and belief. We read of delicate moments and acts of violence by mothers, sons, husbands, neighbors, wives, lovers, and more, as Gu Shan’s execution spurs a brutal government reaction. Writing with profound emotion, and in the superb tradition of fiction by such writers as Orhan Pamuk and J. M. Coetzee, Yiyun Li gives us a stunning novel that is at once a picture of life in a special part of the world during a historic period, a universal portrait of human frailty and courage, and a mesmerizing work of art. 3617882 2008 The Vagrants: A Novel total:223|5:59|4:104|3:47|2:10|1:3| 223 875 733 91 3 4 false false Thu Apr 02 06:35:29 -0700 2009 Thu Apr 02 06:49:37 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 1 false false Wed Feb 25 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Feb 10 17:27:46 -0800 2009 Wed Feb 25 19:24:26 -0800 2009
The Gu family was like any other family. They lived good quiet lives in the town of Muddy River. That all changed ten years ago. The Gu’s daughter, Gu Shan, a free spirit was...more...]]> 4 1 false false Wed Mar 04 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Fri Feb 27 16:05:27 -0800 2009 Wed Mar 04 08:36:55 -0800 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Tue Apr 21 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu May 14 17:36:26 -0700 2009 Thu May 14 17:40:39 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 1 false false Tue Apr 28 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Tue May 12 20:49:36 -0700 2009 Tue May 12 20:55:57 -0700 2009
The writer is literally a translator of one culture into another: He is fully aware of the unique quirks of his birth culture that are alien, even incomprehen...more...]]> 4 1 false false Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sat May 02 07:36:25 -0700 2009 Sat May 02 07:37:43 -0700 2009 http://therumpus.net/2009/03/no-one-is-i...)

When I think of Beijing in 1998, I think of a worn-out train bound for a town fifty miles from the capital. Across from me sat a Chinese man in his late twenties who, for a while, would not m...more...]]> 0 0 false false Wed Apr 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Tue Apr 07 14:39:58 -0700 2009 Thu Apr 09 11:58:11 -0700 2009 A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT
Nisi Shawl

A Review of The Vagrants
By Yiyun Li
Random House

In the wake of China’s Cultural Revolution, wrecked lives did not simply right themselves and continue on as before. The Vagrants, the first novel by award-winning short-...more...]]> 3 1 false false Wed Apr 22 18:55:51 -0700 2009 Sun Apr 19 16:29:43 -0700 2009 Wed Apr 22 18:55:51 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon Oct 05 17:19:08 -0700 2009 Mon Oct 05 17:19:46 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 1 false false Wed Mar 11 14:16:03 -0700 2009 Wed Mar 11 14:16:49 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Wed Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Jul 24 12:04:00 -0700 2009 Fri Jul 24 12:13:47 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Wed Apr 15 12:43:58 -0700 2009 Wed Apr 15 12:43:58 -0700 2009 Reviewers were clearly impressed by The Vagrants, especially noteworthy because it is Li's first novel. They valued its memorable and nuanced characters, its simultaneous severity and humor, and the way Li creates moral ambiguity without diminishing the bravery and sacrifice of Chinese dissidents. T...

more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Jul 21 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Sun Aug 16 13:48:43 -0700 2009 Sun Aug 16 13:52:15 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Mar 16 05:51:47 -0700 2009 Mon Mar 16 05:58:09 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 1 false false Wed Jan 28 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sat Jan 24 11:58:44 -0800 2009 Sun Feb 01 01:19:34 -0800 2009 5 0 false false Fri May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Sun Aug 30 07:09:29 -0700 2009 Sun Aug 30 07:14:18 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Tue Mar 24 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Tue Mar 24 14:07:42 -0700 2009 Tue Mar 24 14:13:58 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Sun Mar 29 10:45:45 -0700 2009 Sun Mar 29 10:47:10 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Thu Aug 20 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Jul 20 08:26:20 -0700 2009 Thu Aug 20 07:34:44 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Mon Apr 20 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Apr 20 09:24:48 -0700 2009 Mon Apr 20 09:31:26 -0700 2009 more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=3575636