There was whispered speculation about his off-and-on contact with Ling, with some saying this contributed to his ascension. The Missouri-based Qiu, by contrast — a native of and frequent return visitor to Shanghai, where most of his Inspector Chen novels are set — often takes things he has experienced, heard, or read about and reworks them into whodunits. In some cases, as with Chronicles of Narnia, disagreements about order necessitate the creation of more than one series. Like many concepts in the book world, "series" is a somewhat fluid and contested notion. He was concerned about his possible loss of independence in the event of such a family alliance. What propelled me into the book project was, ironically, a “private kitchen” dinner with friends about two or three weeks before the official announcement of Bo’s fall. Or did you only think of working him into a novel later? But Chen is more of an accidental poet. The narration unfolds through a variety of angles, involving the first, second, and third person perspectives, juxtaposing the characters as “no man is an island, entire of itself.” Here you may be reminded of Years of Red Dust, but the new book is different for being more thematically unified. Dean Barrett, another novelist writing about China, recently suggested that I write new Judge Dee books, but with van Gulick before me, how do I dare? Van Gulick must have been inspired by the real-life crime of passion committed by the gifted, ill-starred beauty, but the fiction seems to be too harsh on her. In the increasingly materialistic society, less and less readers have the time or interests for poetry. That adds a touch of “found poetry” to Chen’s work. Not like in the early eighties, instead of being fashionable or politically meaningful with the authoritarian government persecution for any independent voice, a poet like Chen becomes marginalized. For now, avoid forcing the issue with mere "lists" of works possessing an arbitrary shared characteristic, such as relating to a particular place. Billed Into Silence: Money and the Miseducation of Women. Chen has a poetry collection published, but he soon discovers that it is done through a large amount paid by a Big Buck (influential figure) associate in secret, something done to curry his favor in the omnipresent cobweb of connections in China. So it’s still a mystery — in a more general sense of the word — about things happening to Chen and others around him in his pre-inspector days. When Bo Xilai began riding high in China’s political landscape, it did not come into my mind to write a novel linked to him, in spite of us being schoolmates at the graduate school of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in the early ’80s. He compares the momentary break to the Song dynasty poet Su Shi’s metaphor about staying on the moon, much higher, but also much too cold to stay for long, though a necessary change for the moment. For the next book, consequently, it is tentatively titled Becoming Inspector Chen, or Constructing Inspector Chen (perhaps you may tell me which you like better). The same with The Poems of Inspector Chen, a collection of poems in the persona of Inspector Chen, which too is scheduled to come out in French and Italian first. Inspector Chen Novels. He jots down fragments in a small notebook, like the Tang dynasty poet Li He who rode around on a donkey, dashing off the lines whenever obtainable, and dropping them into a cloth bag for composition later. But then with his frantic attempt to grab for more power by launching the political movement of “singing the red and smashing the black” — the “red” referring to the revolutionary songs of the Cultural Revolution, in praise of the Party or Mao, and the “black,” to the people targeted by the Party authorities for whatever political reasons — I began to pay closer attention. All books feature Chief Inspector Chen Cao. His poems grew somber, leading him to be viewed as a “Chinese modernist,” a politically negative label. © 2019 Los Angeles Review of Books. There is no way of solving completely the conflict between a conscientious cop and a Party cadre, but poetry-writing comes to provide a temporary escape from the mounting frustrations involved in confronting this problem. During that suspenseful period, as you may remember, stories about the Bo’s scandal surfaced now and then online without being instantly blocked by the netcops. If you want to force a particular order, use the | character to divide the number and the descriptor. The battle Huxley waged against the loss of individuality and autonomy under the authoritarian government remains an uphill one in China today. Then, after college graduation, he was assigned by the state to work at the Shanghai Police Bureau, an arrangement which was taken for granted in the then government policy: people were all supposed to work in the Party’s interests regardless of personal preference. Shamima Vawda . The Inspector Chen mysteries have been translated into French, German, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Danish, Swediah, Finnish, Hebrew and Hungarian. He is a complex man living in a rapidly changing nation. You’re surely right about his taking “an extant Chinese literary text featuring Di Baoan as a starting point.” In Poets and Murder, for instance, I recognized the poet as none other than the famous Tang dynasty courtesan / poet Yu Xuanji (844?-871?). Now, thanks to Qiu Xiaolong, a poet and translator (as well as a writer of mysteries), a collection of Chen Cao’s poems has become available . To create a series or add a work to it, go to a "work" page. In his line of duty, Inspector Chen has to walk a lot, observing, canvassing, and thinking, around the city of Shanghai, particularly in the old sections of the shikumen houses and narrow lanes, coming upon not just clues that aid his investigations, but also sights that spur reflection in this man who is an independent-thinking intellectual as well as policeman. The Party’s new cadre promotion policy came with an unprecedented emphasis on a candidate’s educational credentials, thanks to which Chen was chosen to rise in the ranks. As we talked about it, an American friend challenged me, “No publisher would accept it if you wrote a book with those unbelievable details, which would beat the wildest fantasy for any mystery readers.” So I started researching and writing in earnest. Now it’s perceptive of you to note “the ties between the Chines crime solver and the Western poet as a more central element” of Shanghai Redemption than of the earlier books in the series. It is also the second Inspector Chen story to focus on an environmental theme, after 2012’s Don’t Cry, Tai Lake. He also altered the identity of some villains; in too many of the original stories the Buddhist monk was the culprit, which took some of the, well, mystery out of the original Chinese mysteries. © 2019 Los Angeles Review of Books. Inspector Harry Callahan – Harry Julian Fink and Rita M. Fink (played by Clint Eastwood in the Dirty Harry film series) Chief Inspector Chen Cao – Qiu Xiaolong; Detective 2nd Grade Stephen Louis ("Steve") Carella – Ed McBain; Detective Sergeant Ray Carling – Life on Mars/Ashes to Ashes (played by Dean Andrews) Some of his early poems turned out to be idealistic in spite of the modernist influence. Avoid series that cross authors, unless the authors were or became aware of the series identification (eg., avoid lumping Jane Austen with her continuators). But the word is not a Chinese invention, I recalled, for I had caught it much earlier in Aldous Huxley’s book. So I’m not taking it for granted that your next publication will be a mystery. His rise in the Party system brings about change in his experience as a poet. With Bian’s encouragement, Chen had them published in Poetry and other magazines. This site uses cookies to deliver our services, improve performance, for analytics, and (if not signed in) for advertising. People no longer take it seriously. Dramatisations of the mystery novels of Qiu Xiaolong, set in Shanghai and featuring poet and translator-turned-detective Chen Cao. 5.0 out of 5 stars My favorite detective. But with so much happening in the contemporary Chinese society, Inspector Chen has no choice but to continue investigating—and writing. In the dedication page, I quote, “Because I do not hope to turn again” by Guido Cavalcanti, a line which Eliot also quoted and used. Series was designed to cover groups of books generally understood as such (see Wikipedia: Book series). During the period, changes also occur in his personal life. In the meantime, he started translating T. S. Eliot and other Western poets, which added to his visibility in the circle. The Inspector Chen Collection 1-3: Death of a Red Heroine, A Loyal Character Dancer, When Red is Black (As heard on Radio 4), A Case of Two Cities: An Inspector Chen Novel (Inspector Chen Cao), Red Mandarin Dress: An Inspector Chen Novel (Inspector Chen Cao), Shanghai Redemption: An Inspector Chen Novel (Inspector Chen Cao), Publishers Weekly's Best Books of the Year. At the beginning of Shanghai Redemption, however, his illusion shattered, his position deprived, Chen comes to the realization that “the system has no place for a cop who puts justice above the interests of the Party.” So his is not just a personal crisis, nor was Eliot’s. Comment Report abuse. Read more. As for the present-day Chinese TV movies featuring Judge Dee, I have watched just an episode. Eliot in your novels, due to Inspector Chen being, like you, a translator of the poet. The Inspector Chen series is set in Shanghai in the 1990's at the point when the People's Republic of China is going through major social and economic changes. To keep his pledge to the dead, Chen edits the manuscript, adding in some of his own translations, and has this published.

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