Capturing Chinese — Learn Chinese Through Stories

In this week's reading sample, we are changing gears a little bit. While our first three selections were essays by Zhu Ziqing, this week we are introducing our first piece of fiction. The piece is called "Sealed Off" and was written by Zhāng Ailíng. Zhāng Ailíng is one of the most famous authors in modern Chinese literature and is most famous for her story, Love in a Fallen City . She is more frequently referred to in English as Eileen Chang since she spent much of her life living in the US. She lived from September 30, 1920 to September 8, 1995. Learning Chinese through real stories is one of the best ways to improve your reading skills in Chinese so enjoy! 封锁 Fēngsuǒ Sealed Off Written by 张爱玲 Zhāng Ailíng Eileen Chang

We are going to continue with the pieces of work by Zhu Ziqing.  Here is a nice short work of his called Haste.  It was first published in 1922. Enjoy. Zhu Ziqing - 匆匆 Haste

Here is another piece by Zhu Ziqing and is one of his most famous pieces of work.  The work is called Moonlight in the Lily Pond and was first published in 1927. Enjoy. Zhu Ziqing - 荷塘月色Moonlight in the Lily Pond

Happy New Year! In 2011, Capturing Chinese will publish weekly Chinese stories to encourage our readers to tackle some of the best in Chinese literature.  We know it is hard to find the important Chinese authors and know which stories to read so each week we will post one story on our website.  These stories will be picked from a range of authors that have had a large influence over China.  We will pick out some short stories as well as some longer ones. Our first author is Zhu Ziqing (朱自清) who was a native of Shaoxing and was a contemporary with Lu Xun.  He studied a Beijing University between 1916 to 1920 during the New Culture Movement (the May Fourth Movement) and joined the literary revolution.  After graduation he became a professor at Qinghua University.  He wrote poetry in his early years and then moved on to writing mostly essays.  Zhu Ziqing died in 1948. The first essay we are introducing is known as My Father's Back in English and as 背影 in Chinese.  This essay is a very famous piece recounting the scene between a father and son at a railway station.  As the father sees his son off, he clumsily climbs up the train platform. Enjoy. Zhu Ziqing: My Father's Back - 背影