Dear chrysanthemums : a novel in stories
Call Number
- FICTION SZEL (CEN)
Edition
First Scribner trade paperback edition.
Publication Information
New York, NY : Scribner, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc., 2023.
Physical Description
164 pages ; 22 cm
Summary
"A startling and vivid debut novel in stories from acclaimed poet and translator Fiona Sze-Lorrain featuring deeply compelling Asian women who reckon with the past, violence, and exile-set in Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore, Paris, and New York. 'Cooking for Madame Chiang,' 1946: Two cooks work for Madame Chiang Kai-shek and prepare a foreign dish craved by their mistress, which becomes a political weapon and leads to their tragic end. 'Death at the Wukang Mansion,' 1966: Punished for her extramarital affair, a dancer is transferred to Shanghai during the Cultural Revolution and assigned to an ominous apartment in a building whose other residents often depart in coffins. 'The White Piano,' 1996: A budding pianist from New York City settles down in Paris and is assaulted when a mysterious piano arrives from Singapore. 'The Invisible Window,' 2016: After their exile following the Tiananmen Square massacre, three women gather in a French cathedral to renew their friendship and reunite in their grief and faith. Evocative, vivid, disturbing, and written with a masterly ear for language, Dear Chrysanthemums renders a devastating portrait of diasporic life and inhumanity, as well as a tender web of shared memory, artistic expression, and love"--
Contents
- Yi--means one
- Death at the Wukang Mansion (1966)
- Cooking for Madame Chiang (1946)
- Green (1966)
- A Change of wind (1976)
- The Invisible window (2016)
- The White piano (1996)
- Reading a table (1976/1996)
- Neither an elegy nor a dream (1996)
- Back to Beijing (2016)
- News from Saigon (1995-1996)
- Dear chrysanthemums (1946/1966-1976/1996-2006).