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The Cave Man
The Cave Man is an extraordinary and moving portrait of a man brutalized in Mao’s China.
Ja Feng is contained within a three-foot by four-and-one-half foot solitary confinement cell in a prison camp. He has survived this punishment for nine months, a period of time that has forced him to question his most basic human faculties.
The Cave Man follows Ja Feng once he is released from solitary confinement, as he tries to integrate with fellow prisoners who view his skeletal figure and erratic screaming fits as freakish. It follows him through his heartbreaking attempts to assimilate into Chinese culture, to reestablish familial bonds and to seek out an ordinary human experience.
Ja Feng is contained within a three-foot by four-and-one-half foot solitary confinement cell in a prison camp. He has survived this punishment for nine months, a period of time that has forced him to question his most basic human faculties.
The Cave Man follows Ja Feng once he is released from solitary confinement, as he tries to integrate with fellow prisoners who view his skeletal figure and erratic screaming fits as freakish. It follows him through his heartbreaking attempts to assimilate into Chinese culture, to reestablish familial bonds and to seek out an ordinary human experience.
174 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2009
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
August 5, 2010
(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com:]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)
Xiaoda Xiao's The Cave Man is the third book this year I've now reviewed by the increasingly impressive Ohio small press Two Dollar Radio, and I have to say that it establishes a pretty consistent track record for the publisher -- like the others (Joshua Mohr's Some Things That Meant the World to Me and Scott Bradfield's The People Who Watched Her Pass By), it is ultimately an action-based tale but more psychological than you would expect from such a story, featuring a highly unique writing style that is simply going to naturally appeal to some and naturally repel others. Based on the author's real life, its autobiographical shocks are in fact its main hook; it's the story of a Chinese nerd sent to a labor camp for accidentally ripping a poster of Mao during that country's "Cultural Revolution" of the 1970s, who is then imprisoned for nine months in a three-by-four-foot cell carved literally into the side of a hill in retribution for attempting to report a corrupt superior. It's this confinement that actually opens our story; but soon he is out and back among the civilian population, where Xiao then uses his experience in being pent-up as a nice metaphor for his slow, problem-filled attempts at ingratiating himself back into society, including his suddenly strange love life and his persistent problems with trying to sleep in a normal-sized room. Spanning all the way to the Tianammen Square protests of 1989 and beyond, the book ends up being as well a nice survey of the major events to happen to China over the last thirty years, told through a unique filter and an engaging voice; and in fact just about the only complaint I have at all is that the novel rushes through an entire second book's worth of material in just its last few pages, as our hero finally emigrates to America and eventually finds artistic success. Other than that, though, it comes highly recommended.
Out of 10: 9.2
Xiaoda Xiao's The Cave Man is the third book this year I've now reviewed by the increasingly impressive Ohio small press Two Dollar Radio, and I have to say that it establishes a pretty consistent track record for the publisher -- like the others (Joshua Mohr's Some Things That Meant the World to Me and Scott Bradfield's The People Who Watched Her Pass By), it is ultimately an action-based tale but more psychological than you would expect from such a story, featuring a highly unique writing style that is simply going to naturally appeal to some and naturally repel others. Based on the author's real life, its autobiographical shocks are in fact its main hook; it's the story of a Chinese nerd sent to a labor camp for accidentally ripping a poster of Mao during that country's "Cultural Revolution" of the 1970s, who is then imprisoned for nine months in a three-by-four-foot cell carved literally into the side of a hill in retribution for attempting to report a corrupt superior. It's this confinement that actually opens our story; but soon he is out and back among the civilian population, where Xiao then uses his experience in being pent-up as a nice metaphor for his slow, problem-filled attempts at ingratiating himself back into society, including his suddenly strange love life and his persistent problems with trying to sleep in a normal-sized room. Spanning all the way to the Tianammen Square protests of 1989 and beyond, the book ends up being as well a nice survey of the major events to happen to China over the last thirty years, told through a unique filter and an engaging voice; and in fact just about the only complaint I have at all is that the novel rushes through an entire second book's worth of material in just its last few pages, as our hero finally emigrates to America and eventually finds artistic success. Other than that, though, it comes highly recommended.
Out of 10: 9.2
August 3, 2010
This semi-autobiographical novel is powerful but succinct and accomplishes much in its 180 pages. I've read my share of Solzhenitsyn and was expecting a similar treatment of the dehumanizing prison camp experience. This book, however, is more about what happens to the main character, Ja Feng, after he is released back into society. He faces pity, discrimination, accusations of madness, and a multitude of personal torments. I love the "to-the-point" style and third-person narrative that proves you don't have to fill thousands of pages with detailed inner monologue to convey human agony and redemption.
December 22, 2017
Cave Man begins like one of Beckett's closed-space narratives (save for its being socio-political fact rather than fictive philosophy) and slowly loses steam as the formerly confined protagonist aimlessly traverses the open-spaces of post-Mao China, trying to establish a life in the face of past-prejudice, night terrors, and erectile dysfunction.
The aimlessness is the point, yes, but Xiao's prose renders it less and less compelling as the novel wears on.
Redeemed somewhat by the final few pages of full circle thirst intimating an actual or metaphysical failure to have ever really emerged from his cave.
The aimlessness is the point, yes, but Xiao's prose renders it less and less compelling as the novel wears on.
Redeemed somewhat by the final few pages of full circle thirst intimating an actual or metaphysical failure to have ever really emerged from his cave.
January 26, 2013
This is a wonderful, it is beautifully written. It tells a sad story of life in China from the Cultural Revolution to the mid 80's ( my guess), but will it is sad and depressing it is at the same time warm and uplifting. The main character is wonderfully drawn and I feel as if I have known him as a friend for many years...and only wish really knew hom and could have helped him......
June 5, 2011
Although the language isn't at all times exactly an exiting read, I really like the story and the trademark Chinese way of presenting the characters as first and foremost products of their conflicts with a top-down system trying to make them fit in to roles they cannot accept.
October 25, 2014
The thought of 9 months in a solitary 4 foot cell is horrifying. That is how this book starts out. Ja Feng survives this wrongful imprisonment and is released into society. But how does one reenter normal society after an ordeal like this?
I highly recommend The Cave Man.
I highly recommend The Cave Man.
March 20, 2010
Perseverance is a kind of madness.
July 29, 2011
. . . .. . . . ^ ^ | ^ ^'| _____ '
January 25, 2020
I definitely enjoyed this novel, but it was a little this happens and then that happened and then something else happened. It was definitely an emotional rollercoaster but I wanted something more. Would still recommend
April 5, 2025
2.5 rounded down against global.
First Two Dollar Radio I’ve put down and felt, “okay.”
Nothing really grabbed me prose-wise and made me want to chew on it.
Not bad by any means but pretty straight-forward and more of a romantic melodrama than I was expecting.
First Two Dollar Radio I’ve put down and felt, “okay.”
Nothing really grabbed me prose-wise and made me want to chew on it.
Not bad by any means but pretty straight-forward and more of a romantic melodrama than I was expecting.
December 3, 2017
A wonderful book! Just when you think life is gonna embrace him, it SHITS on him! I love the way slight non-sequiturs make sense in sequence.
December 9, 2016
A rather bleak glimpse of the life of a man labeled a political dissident by the Chinese government and the damage done to him by his stay in a small solitary confinement cell.
Interesting enough to keep me reading, but a bit of a downer.
Interesting enough to keep me reading, but a bit of a downer.
February 11, 2011
This is an extremely difficult book to read. The suffering, the loss of family, friends, country is overwhelming..... is this what life is life in oppressive countries???
February 26, 2014
gotta stay hydrated
July 23, 2014
Tough read. Bleak. Kafkaesque
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews