Short story available to read in English translation at the website of Paper Republic. Yan Ge grew up in a small town in Sichuan, and her stories focus on small-town life. But there is much more to them than that. Her writing is full of acute comments on human relationships, and she has a wonderful ear for the things that remain unsaid, as well as the way people actually talk to each other. Sissy Zhong is one of series of vignettes she wrote, she tells me, in preparation for her major novel about small-town life The Chilli Bean Paste Clan. Yan Ge sent me three of these vignettes, and I chose this one because it works well as a short story. In just a few pages, it manages to be touching and funny, and to shock you with its denouement. In terms of her language, Yan Ge is very interesting (and has aroused a lot of interest among Chinese critics) in her use of dialect. All her writing contains plenty of colourful rudeness. As an example, just the title of this piece had me scratching my head: 钟腻哥 - surname 'Zhong', nickname, 'Greasy [soft/unctuous] elder brother'. I came up with 'Softie Zhong' and 'Sissy Zhong', both of which Yan Ge liked (the great advantage in having an author whose English is good is that you can brainstorm such problems), but eventually plumped for the latter.—Nicky Harman (translator)
Authors
Yan Ge (Chinese: 颜歌; born 1984) is the pen name of Chinese writer Dai Yuexing (戴月行). Yan Ge was born Dai Yuexing in 1984 in Sichuan, China. She began publishing in 1994. She completed a PhD in comparative literature at Sichuan University and is the Chair of the China Young Writers Association. Her writing uses a lot of Sichuanese, rather than Standard Chinese (Mandarin).[1] People’s Literature (Renmin Wenxue 人民文学) magazine recently chose her – in a list reminiscent of The New Yorker's ‘20 under 40’ – as one of China's twenty future literary masters. In 2012 she was chosen as Best New Writer by the prestigious Chinese Literature Media Prize (华语文学传媒大奖 最佳新人奖).
