Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress in MHSHS Reading Group

Apr 15, 2009 Sarah rated it really liked it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Apr 15, 2009 Pgao rated it really liked it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. The power of literature is immeasurable, it is way beyond Luo and Ma’s imagination. After Luo and Ma burned all of their books, the infamous Cultural Revolution might seem to be rational for them.
Luo had successfully transformed the Little Seamstress, but he underestimated the Little Seamstress. The Little Seamstress had her own understanding of Balzac’s works, “A woman’s beauty is a treasure beyond price”, it is Balzac who defined the Little Seamstress. The Little Seamstress before Balzac was ...more

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Apr 16, 2009 Jacob rated it it was amazing

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. DEJ's on Part I:

In Balzac and the little Chinese Seamstress, on page 30, 3rd paragraph, one may come across the quote "Waking up in the morning, I would hear the rain dripping from the rock onto the cabin roof, which was covered with bits of tree bark, and would console my self with the thought that at least I was still alive." Now although when u may see this quote it doesn't seem that powerful but if you read it a second you will see it is. One may come to find that the situation of this pers DEJ's on Part I:

In Balzac and the little Chinese Seamstress, on page 30, 3rd paragraph, one may come across the quote "Waking up in the morning, I would hear the rain dripping from the rock onto the cabin roof, which was covered with bits of tree bark, and would console my self with the thought that at least I was still alive." Now although when u may see this quote it doesn't seem that powerful but if you read it a second you will see it is. One may come to find that the situation of this person is quite hard and lonesome. What this quote means to me is that even though this person faces much hardships or already is he is still happy that he has a cabin to wake up in and the fact that he is still alive.

Another quote I found on 35 was " A sincere hear can even make a stone blossom." I really liked this quote. I think it means that even if someone who had a hard time and has not yet experienced the joys of life, someone who has can make that persons heart more alive by experiencing the joys of life with that person. What that means that if there are two individuals one's heart filled with life and vigor and the others filled with pain and misery that blossomed heart can make that stone into a beautiful flower by showing him the joys of life.

DEJ's on Part II:

In Part II of the novel a quote on page 54 we find the quote "The physical odds were against him. Very soon he was in a sort of masochistic ordeal." In order to understand this quote you have to know what masochistic means, the enjoyment of what appears to be painful or tiresome. Now what i think this quote means is that the person who is enjoying the pain of this ordeal, doesn't want to give up something. It says that "The physical odds were against him" that means he wouldn't be able to have resistance in this hardship of this ordeal. He basically faced physical disabilities which he tried to overcome instead of doing it the easier way.

On page 94, 2nd paragraph one may come across the quote "To gain courage, you must swallow it when it's still lukewarm and frothy." In order to understand this quote one may need to find the definition of lukewarm, moderately warm. What this quote means is, that in order to gain courage is when your in the heat of the moment and take that lukewarm moment and pursue your courageous act. Even if sometimes your not 100 percent about something and situation looks unwilling you have to swallow that fear and just do it.

DEJ's on Part III:

A quote one may find in the last paragraph of page 113 is "The buzzing noise in my ears grew louder, and as I tossed my head to get rid of it I felt the stirrings of vertigo." This quote means that the buzzing noise was increasing inside his ears and that made him in the state of vertigo. Vertigo is when you have a loss of balance so the buzzing in his ear must have caused that.

Review:

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress was a really good book. It took time to understand what was going on but it all comes together in the end. The book took place in the time of the Chinese Revolution and talked about the hardships of the children in that time. The two main characters were Luo and Ma who were both intellectual Chinese boys, sent to re-education camps which were farms that Mao Zedong( a communist leader of China) created which were farms for young boys and girls to work on. The book talks about the life of these two boys and there struggles. In the book it talked about how badly these two boys wanted to get their hands on a book and read. I remember how my english teacher, Mr Carson was telling my class how important and lucky we are to receive free books, now I understand what he was talking about. Books are vital to a proper education and to children who are less fortunate like Ma and Luo books are so important to them.

I recommend this book to someone who is looking for a good read. It will teach you a lot about the Chinese Revolution and give you a perspective of the children's lives in the camps.

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Apr 05, 2009 Sanum rated it liked it

Luo, Ma and the Little Seamstress never imagined in their wildest dreams that they would be able to read a book in the mountains of "the phoenix of the sky". Luo and Ma lived in Mao’s revolution in which they had to get re-educated by peasants in China. Their mom and dad were enemies of the people so they had only a three in a thousand chance to go back home.
I hated the ending of this book, I wish the ending could have been something like Ma and Luo getting out of being re-educated and going b ...more

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Apr 16, 2009 Sabrina rated it it was amazing

This book was incredible. It was everything I didn't expect it to be. Ma and Luo recently relocated from the city life to the Phoenix of the Sky mountain life. Struggling to adjust to the re-education camps by Chairman Mao Zedong, they found interest in the mountain. Their interest became the tailor's daughter, the beautiful little seamstress. All the boys in her village adored her, but she only found interest in the two city youths. Luo and Ma each had two talents. Ma was violinist and Luo was ...more

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Apr 04, 2009 Xing rated it liked it

This book gives me an idea of how a Culture Revolution is like. As being a Chinese, I know very little about the Culture Revolution, I have never learn about any of it in China. I always believe that Culture Revolution is a good movement even thought I didn’t really know about it. What I know is that it is very important in Chinese history, a big change for the Chinese. When I asked my father about the Culture Revolution, he told me that there are both good and bad side, it depends on how you lo ...more

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Apr 13, 2009 Svitlana rated it really liked it

Great book!!!! I liked this book because it contains a lot of irony and ambiguity. At first, I thought I pretty much know the ending of the book based on the plot, but then all of a sudden all the twists and drama made me wonder and change my opinion like million times. This novel uncovers the meaning of treasure for a girl, yet it contains many interpretations. Some may think such treasure is a curse or a blessing. This novel uncovers the twisted story of a girl who manages to sacrifice the liv ...more

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Apr 15, 2009 Muyiwa rated it liked it

This book is set during the time of Cultural Revolution in China led by Communist leader Mao Zedong. In this story, two teenage boys lived in a village where everyone was being reeducated because of their new leader. These two boys’ names were Ma and Luo. They struggle through the times of vigorous labor daily without the wonderful things they used to have - their families. They did this reeducation so that the children can live like peasants rather than living like the class enemies: doctors, d ...more

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Apr 06, 2009 Sutapa rated it really liked it

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Apr 03, 2009 Kyle rated it really liked it

When I first started this book I was too quick to judge. I thought it was going to be a book like "The Heart of Darkness." But later in the story the boys seem to get into the western literature Four-Eyes provides them with. Soon so crazy stuff start happening in their mountain village especially when they learn the book provider is leaving. Overall I decided to give this book four stars because of the way you can so easily get into the book after the rough beginning its pages have. ...more

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Apr 03, 2009 Jamie rated it really liked it

This book wasn't what i thought it was going to be. Like I said before i usually don't enjoy books that are historical fiction, but this book was different. It was based off of the Cultural Revolution. This book shows how even people who were deprived of their educational rights could end up being very smart. This book does get boring at times and i might not have finished it if it wasn't assigned for me. ...more

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Apr 07, 2009 Kayla rated it really liked it

I liked this book because it was a different setting than most of the other books I've read. Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress is also very interesting because there are so many literary elements used like foreshadowing, stories within the story, visualization, and irony. All of these elements come together to form a very captivating and fascinating novel. ...more

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Dec 01, 2008 Ashley rated it it was amazing

This book the little Chinese seamstress is about two boys who live in the Communist time of china. They work in a camp of people who were put in there for re education. These boys find a girl who they both like. One of them has sex with her and after that, she runs away. She moves from the countryside of china into one of the big cities. She leaves one of the boys heartbroken and he tries to follow her to find her but does not make it.

This book is alright. In this book you might see lots of reli ...more

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Apr 09, 2009 Shenshen rated it liked it

I finished this book a long time ago, but still, I really don't feel like doing this review. This book was kind of hard for me to understand. I mean, not the local color part but the whole book. It mixed up many things together, which made it hard to read for me. However, I liked the movie though. I only saw the opening of it and I love it. I guess it's because I knew the actors in the movie. ...more

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