The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

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The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast

Angus Stewart

Arts

Frequency: 1 episode/19d. Total Eps: 94

A podcast about English translations of Chinese literature, hosted by Angus Stewart. All eras, all genres, all ideologies. Shanghai villas, Beijing alleys. Frozen Manchuria, Sichuan furnaces. Sanmao's Sahara, Liu Cixin's apocalypse. That's where this podcast lives!

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Apple Podcasts

🇬🇧 Great Britain - books
01/06/2025
#78

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https://trchfic.wordpress.com/all-episode-transcripts/
65 shares
https://trchfic.podbean.com/p/support-1604403295/
55 shares
https://trchfic.wordpress.com/help-support-trchfic/
10 shares

https://twitter.com/AngusLikesWords
59 shares
https://twitter.com/londonchinesesf
2 shares
https://twitter.com/chenqiufan
1 share

https://www.instagram.com/trchfic
67 shares
https://www.instagram.com/amanghung
1 share
https://www.instagram.com/sinoksiazki
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Score global : 32%

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The 100th Episode Party

Saturday, February 10, 2024 • Duration 02:02:08

In the one hundredth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we are throwing a goodbye party! Friends, listeners, and past guests joined me for a little reminiscing and musing. I drank precisely one beer. The show is going on hiatus, exactly as I’ve been warning you for the past ten episodes or so.

The feed will stay up indefinitely, and it’s likely that I will be migrating the hosting to a free service to make that permanent online presence economical.

I expect I will return to the show, though it will probably be years from now.

再见！It has been a pleasure, pengyous.

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Ep 85 - Mo Yan and Sandalwood Death with Stefan Rusinov

Sunday, February 12, 2023 • Duration 01:35:17

‘The final cut – the coup de grace – entered Qian’s heart, from which black blood the colour and consistency of melted malt sugar slid down the knife blade'

In the eighty fifth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we are experiencing the lacerating pains of Sandalwood Death, as dealt to us by Nobel literature prizewinner Mo Yan. It’s time to rip Shandong Province apart in a rebellion for the songbooks. Weapon in hand, the Sun Wukong to my Yue Fei is translator Stefan Rusinov. We laugh, we brood, we hallucinate, and we shake our fists at the craven villain Yuan Shikai, all the while pondering: is torture an artform?

// NEWS ITEMS //

A Record of My Battle with the Virus by Han Song, translated by Michael Berry
Xi Xi: Can We Say // a special issue on the recently late writer
Gu Long’s Blood Parrot, translated by Deathblade
SCMP takes a look at the new prequel to The Wandering Earth

// WORD OF THE DAY //

(喵 – miāo – meow)

// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

Ep 84 - Han Song and Hospital with Michael Berry and Mingwei Song

Friday, January 27, 2023 • Duration 01:53:25

‘Generation after generation, people have lived in this massive sick ward we call the universe ’

In the eighty fourth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we are lost deep inside Hospital, the first entry in an abyssal trilogy by show favourite Han Song. Old-time wardmates Michael Berry and Mingwei Song are here too, groaning in the darkness.

// NEWS ITEMS //

Tencent’s Three Body Problem series arrives… on Youtube!
A podcast interview w/ Yan Ge & Jeremy Tiang on Strange Beasts of China
Bookshop.org puts out a Lunar New Year reading list 🐇🐇🐇
New book: New Medieval Books: A History of Chinese Literature by Zhang Longxi

// WORDS OF THE DAY //

(生存 – shēngcún – survival)

(痛苦 – tòngkǔ – pain)

// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

Ep 82 - Wang Anyi and The Sanctimonious Cobbler with Lehyla Heward

Sunday, December 18, 2022 • Duration 02:20:55

‘If you lived in one of the lanes of Puxi, the moment you stepped out your door, you would find yourself in the thick of urban life in all its boisterous variety.'

In the eighty second episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, we are paying a visit to The Sanctimonious Cobbler (骄傲的皮匠 / Jiāo'ào de Píjiàng), a novella by Wang Anyi which can be read in By the River: Seven Contemporary Chinese Novellas. Wandering with me down the longtang to cast an eye across the little affairs and petites affaires of shopkeeper Shanghai is friend of the pod and Malta-based scholar Lehyla Heward.

// NEWS ITEMS //

Louise Law’s Ark E Newsletter for updates on Hong Kong lit
Durham University’s Centre for Contemporary Chinese Studies joins Twitter (at this late hour)
Uchiyama Bookstore reopens (Sources: Ting Guo, China Plus, Shine)
Two Lines Press announces translation of Xu Zechen’s Beijing Sprawl + a reissue of his Running Through Beijing

// WORD OF THE DAY //

(中篇小说 - zhōngpiān xiǎoshuō - novella/novelette)

Ep 81 - Xiu Xinyu and The Stars We Raised with Yen Ooi

Sunday, November 20, 2022 • Duration 02:02:52

A star’s coming of age was the process of slowly getting uglier.

In the eighty first episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, writer/researcher Yen Ooi and I are gazing up at The Stars We Raised (逃跑星辰 / táopǎo xīngchén), a short story by Xiu Xinyu featured in the all-women + nonbinary anthology The Way Spring Arrives. Once more, a Chinese science fiction story is taking us down to the countryside for melancholy reflections on the pains of growing up. Yen and I dig into the pains of publishing too, from gender to generation and from style to synthesis.

// NEWS ITEMS //

I will be hosting Sinoist Books’ November 2022 Book Club on Li Peifu’s Graft
Yan Ge’s next book Elsewhere is incoming – and it’s not a translation
New academic anthology Readings in Chinese Women’s Philosophical and Feminist Thought could make for a decent Christmas present, if you’ve got a spare £90

// WORD OF THE DAY //

(仁 - rén - human kind(ness))

// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

Yen’s musical pairing: Debussy - Suite bergamasque, L. 75 - I. Prélude
Angus’ musical pairing:

Ep 80 - Chiou Charng-Ting and Raining Zebra Finches with May Huang

Monday, October 24, 2022 • Duration 01:16:36

‘In the same spot where Father died, the dead body of a deer lay prostrate in the rain.’

In the eightieth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast, it’s Raining Zebra Finches (斑胸草雀 / bān xiōng cǎo què). Blame for this troubling meteorological occurrence falls upon Taiwanese author Chiou Charng-Ting; it’s her story. Under the weather with me is her translator, May Huang. In our discussion we’ll be testing the limits of our earthly knowledge and dreaming of other philosophies. When nature stops hiding and springs the inexplicable upon us, where else is there to turn?

// NEWS ITEMS //

Balestier Press publishes The Pidgin Warrior, David Hull’s translation of a kung fu satire written in the 1930s by Zhang Tianyi
A horror followup to Sinopticon, titled Sinophagia, is on the way
Can Xue’s Mystery Train published by Sublunary Editions on Oct 18th

// WORD OF THE DAY //

(梅雨季 - méiyǔ jì - plum rain season)

// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

Angus’ musical pairing: The Alien from the Annihilation OST
May’s musical pairings: Ivy by Taylor Swift & by Miley Cyrus

Ep 79 - Mu Ming and Express to Beijing West Railway Station

Saturday, October 8, 2022 • Duration 02:10:14

‘History is nothing more than a complex construction of records and observations’

In the seventy ninth episode of the Translated Chinese Fiction podcast, we’re riding the Express to Beijing West Railway Station (开往西站的特别列车 / kāiwǎng xī zhàn de tèbié lièchē), and I’ll be buying my ticket from none other than the author herself, Mu Ming. En route we’ll be passing by the scenic works of William Blake and Christopher Nolan, and pondering whether Shakespeare and Lu Xun would make good Netflix writers (see Patreon feed). Long-time TrChFic listeners will also already know all-too-well: you’re going to hear me enthuse about trains. Sorry.

// NEWS ITEMS //

WATCH: Qiufan Chen on How Chinese Science Fiction Imagines Our Future
WATCH: Gloria S Tseng on Biblical Imagery in Early Twentieth-Century Chinese Literature
READ: a new issue of Chinese Literature and Thought Today with a newly translated Han Song story & an essay on Little Smarty Travels to the Future

// WORD OF THE DAY //

(想象力 - xiǎngxiànglì - imagination)

// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

Mu Ming’s musial pairing: The Grandmaster OST
Angus’ musical pairing: The End Where We Start by The Black Queen

Ep 78 - Gu Hongming and Bonnie Prince Tuan with Lee Moore

Sunday, September 25, 2022 • Duration 01:42:40

‘Then each Boxer lad who loves fighting and fun, let him follow the bonnets of bonnie Prince Tuan’

In the seventy eighth episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are riding to war behind Bonnie Prince Tuan, a poem by a Chinese Scotiaphile that draws a parallel between two sets of rebels: the Jacobites of the Scottish highlands and the Boxers of northern China. Here to lend some Boxer brawn to my Jacobean jesting is Lee Moore of the Chinese Literature Podcast – a show that has already devoted an episode to this madness.

// NEWS ITEMS //

Bad Kids by Chen Zijin, a new Michelle Deeter translation, is out!
Shaanxi Opera by Jia Pingawa, a new Nicky Harman + Dylan Levi King translation, is out!
Found in Translation - Nicky Harman considers the state of translated Chinese lit
Why do China books all look the same? - an article from The China Project (formerly SupChina)
A third translation of Lu Xun’s Wild Grass enters the world

// WORDS OF THE DAY //

(廣記不如淡墨 - guǎng jì bùrú dàn mò - the best memory is not as good as the palest ink)

(雅各布派 - yǎ gè bù pài - Jacobite)

Ep 77 - Yan Lianke and Lenin’s Kisses with Piotr Machajek

Sunday, August 21, 2022 • Duration 02:03:49

“You can give me your empty words if you like; I’ve come to fill out the forms permitting us to withdraw from society.”

In the seventy seventh episode of The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast we are turning our cheek to Lenin's Kisses (受活 / shòu huó) by Yan Lianke. Yes, I’m finally dealing with him – and not alone. Piotr Machajek is here to show me how to Liven, as we look into the pros and cons of entering and retreating from a society that just cannot leave things be.

// NEWS ITEMS //

Wang Xiaobo’s Golden Age gets a retranslation & a spot in the NYT
Mildly interesting: a 2005 poll comparing expert & popular rankings of Chinese authors
Wang Shuo appears to enter Twitter and announce a new book
Paper Republic profiles Fujianese poet Wu Ang

// WORDS OF THE DAY //

(狗带 - gǒu dài - go die)

(入世，出世 - rùshì, chūshì - enter society, withdraw from society)

// MENTIONED IN THE EPISODE //

Angus’ musical pairing - by Emancipator

The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

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Shared links between episodes and podcasts

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Apple Podcasts

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The Translated Chinese Fiction Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

Other99+

Twitter40

Instagram4

RSS feed quality and score

Publication history

Latest published episodes

Similar podcasts and content

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Other99+

Twitter40

Instagram4