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Rating: 
Summary: "What did I do in previous life to deserve it?"
Review: (****1/2) It was 1950s, the time China under the throes of Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward, decades of traumatic history that provides the architectural background to the intimate details of Yu Hua's characters' lives. The novel explores an aspect of poverty that very few Chinese readers would miss the way in which the story engages the social and economics havoc of contemporary Chinese life under the red flag. Everyone, especially men, who were strong enough went to sell a bowl of blood for 35 yuans (roughly US$5). In the countryside men who had not sold blood could not even get themselves a wife, for blood selling was more than a gesture of showcasing one's masculinity and health. Xu Sanguan was the blood merchant. His meager salary as a cart-pusher at a silk mill was not enough to sustain his family, which included his wife Xu Yulan and three sons. The impregnable Xu Sanguan had got himself on the good side of a local Blood Chief and gave blood in a frequent interval that was otherwise forbidden by hospital. In over 40 years, the impregnable Xu Sanguan had overcome every family calamity by selling his blood that he might as well had sold his life along with it. Each and every time he sold blood was for his sons. For example, he sold blood to pay hospital bills of the blacksmith's son whose skull was cut open by his eldest son Yile, whom he had cuckolded for 9 years. As Mao directed all youths to be exiled to the countryside for reeducation by the farmers, Xu Sanguan again sold blood for money that would ease the austerity of lives of his sons. At the height of the three-year famine that claimed lives of 5 million Chinese, Xu Sanguan sold blood in exchange for food more nutritious than plain corn gruel, as the Xu family would lay in bed all day to conserve energy. In a series of heartrending drama and reversals, Xu Sanguan reconciled with his cuckolded son and decided to risk his life to save Yile, who had contracted hepatitis. Chronicle of a Blood Merchant follows faithfully Xu's life during the early 1950s when socialism burgeoned in China, then the disastrously ambitious economic collectivization of the Great Leap Forward in 1958 and its aftermath of a 3-year famine (as recalled by my grandfather and father, whose herb house converted into a steel smelting ground by order of local bureau), to the factional violence of Cultural Revolution in 1966 to 1976. Yet the novel is not necessarily, or exclusively, historical in focus. It does not present itself as a rebutting critique of the political upheaval but rather a tapestry of human life and sufferings in the grave particulars of a very ordinary man's days. Yu Hua's realistic style bears much resemblance and affinity to that of Lu Xun (Diary of a Madman), another contemporary Chinese literary master whose work had induced the May 4th Movement in 1919. Like Lu Xun, and the more recent Su Tong, Mo Yan, Ha Jin, and Gao Xinjian, Yu Hua returns obsessively to the violent, excruciating spectacles of China's tumultuous modern history without reservation and in a very detached voice. Also recommended:
One Man's Bible, Gao Xinjian
The Crazed, Ha Jin
To Live, Yu Hua
Red Sorghum: A Novel of China, Mo Yan 2004 (24) © MY
Rating: 
Summary: Lost in Translation
Review: I really wanted to like this book, as I had liked Yu Hua's "To Live" so well, but something about this book is uncomfortable. The language is choppy and void of emotion. As this book is popular in China, and Yu Hua is revered as one of China's finest modern, popular writers, I am guessing that the translation is just not that good. If you can read Chinese, I would recommend reading this book in its original language, "Xu Sanguan Mai Xie Ji" This is the story of Xu Sanguan, and his struggles to make ends meet when life deals him a blow. Whenever he is in a need of money, he sells his blood. There is something to say here about the dire poverty and desperation of Chinese peasants under Mao; about the HIV crisis that is threatening to develop in China; and about the selling of one's soul to make a buck. Of these three themes, only the third is alluded to. And in the context of 1950s-1970s China, that theme doesn't even seem to make much sense. Instead, "Chronicle of a Blood Merchant" is just THERE...that's about the only way I can put it. As for the translation, the language is so active and choppy that it is hard to relate to the characters. Here is a typical passage..."Each and every time he sold his blood was for you. Every ren he made selling blood he spent on you. You were raised on his blood...You three seem to have forgotten all about that. Then there was the time Erle was sent to work in the countryside. Your dad sold blood not once but twice." etc. For such a rant, it's a tremendously unexciting, repetitive speech. And with so much punctuation (read: period, never an exclamation point), it's hard to feel the character's emotions. Also, while it may be a verbatim translation, the English is awkward...using slang (i.e. "snot-nosed brats", "kids")where proper terms would be much more appropriate makes the English just completely unnatural and stilted. There are times where i can see a glimmer of the real Yu Hua...passages where repitition is not boring, but touching, where simplicity is not unemotional, but jarring...in other words, the Yu Hua that wrote "To Live." I am pretty sure the translator has done a disservice to Yu Hua here. One merit...the book is FAST, mainly because the language is absurdly simple. You can probably read all 250 plus pages in a few hours. And it's an okay story, even if it does read like something I could probably write myself. I'd skip this one. Read "To Live" instead.
Rating:
Summary: Lost in Translation
Review: I really wanted to like this book, as I had liked Yu Hua's "To Live" so well, but something about this book is uncomfortable. The language is choppy and void of emotion. As this book is popular in China, and Yu Hua is revered as one of China's finest modern, popular writers, I am guessing that the translation is just not that good. If you can read Chinese, I would recommend reading this book in its original language, "Xu Sanguan Mai Xie Ji" This is the story of Xu Sanguan, and his struggles to make ends meet when life deals him a blow. Whenever he is in a need of money, he sells his blood. There is something to say here about the dire poverty and desperation of Chinese peasants under Mao; about the HIV crisis that is threatening to develop in China; and about the selling of one's soul to make a buck. Of these three themes, only the third is alluded to. And in the context of 1950s-1970s China, that theme doesn't even seem to make much sense. Instead, "Chronicle of a Blood Merchant" is just THERE...that's about the only way I can put it. As for the translation, the language is so active and choppy that it is hard to relate to the characters. Here is a typical passage..."Each and every time he sold his blood was for you. Every ren he made selling blood he spent on you. You were raised on his blood...You three seem to have forgotten all about that. Then there was the time Erle was sent to work in the countryside. Your dad sold blood not once but twice." etc. For such a rant, it's a tremendously unexciting, repetitive speech. And with so much punctuation (read: period, never an exclamation point), it's hard to feel the character's emotions. Also, while it may be a verbatim translation, the English is awkward...using slang (i.e. "snot-nosed brats", "kids")where proper terms would be much more appropriate makes the English just completely unnatural and stilted. There are times where i can see a glimmer of the real Yu Hua...passages where repitition is not boring, but touching, where simplicity is not unemotional, but jarring...in other words, the Yu Hua that wrote "To Live." I am pretty sure the translator has done a disservice to Yu Hua here. One merit...the book is FAST, mainly because the language is absurdly simple. You can probably read all 250 plus pages in a few hours. And it's an okay story, even if it does read like something I could probably write myself. I'd skip this one. Read "To Live" instead.
Rating: 
Summary: Uncomfortable read
Review: I tried to like this book; however, it was too heartbreaking. Could not finish.
Rating: 
Summary: great read
Review: I'm surprised at the negative reviews here. This book was not depressing at all. It was a quick enjoyable read with the subtle humor I find only in Chinese works.
Rating:
Summary: Cruelty and Kindness
Review: Yu Hua is a Beijing-based writer of very sharp-edged fiction. CHRONICLE OF A BLOOD MERCHANT was, at times, a little shocking for me, a person who's lived most of her life in western Europe and her entire life someplace in the west, despite visiting several Asian countries. CHRONICLE OF A BLOOD MERCHANT is set against the backdrop of China's Cultural Revolution and contains scenes of extreme cruelty as well as scenes of genuine kindness. Yu Hua is an author who isn't afraid to "tell it like it is." His writing verges on the melodramatic, but he has such wonderful control you know he's giving you the facts rather than simply inventing melodrama for its shock value (though it is shocking). CHRONICLE OF A BLOOD MERCHANT centers around Xu Sanguan, a worker in a silk factory who refuses to resign himself to his life of hardship. Xu Sanguan has a family to feed and care for and he can't really do that on what he makes delivering cocoons. The real blow comes when Xu Sanguan's eldest son, Yile, becomes involved in an argument with the son of the local blacksmith and ends up crushing his skull with a rock. Now, Xu Sanguan has medical bills to pay as well, despite the fact that he has never considered Yile his "real" son. Xu Sanguan increases his visits to Chief Li and convinces him to buy his blood, always gorging on fried pig livers and rice wine after a "donation," hoping to keep up his strength and encourage his body to make yet more blood for him to sell as fast as he can. Xu Sanguan doesn't have things easy in his personal life, either, and here is where Yu Hua shows us his character's rich complexity. Yile probably isn't even Xu Sanguan's own son. Although his wife swears she was raped, Xu Sanguan believes she simply took a lover instead and he beats her unmercifully and ignores Yile, even to the extent of refusing to share the family's food with him. The incident with the blacksmith's son, however, changes things. The Red Guards seem to share Xu Sanguan's opinion of his wife and eventually jail her as a prostitute. This gives Yu Hua a chance to show us Xu Sanguan's humanity and kindness as well as his cruelty. Allowed to bring his wife a bowl of plain steamed rice, Xu Sanguan hides pork underneath the rice for extra nourishment. CHRONICLE OF A BLOOD MERCHANT can be a shocking and cruel book. Yu Hua shows us how cruel one human being can be to another, especially when pushed to his limits in an effort to simply survive. But, to his enormous credit, he also shows us moments of great kindness as well. Modern life in Europe has been a lot more quiet than life in modern China, so I'm sure CHRONICLE OF A BLOOD MERCHANT will be less shocking to the Chinese than it was to me, a western European. As dramatic as this book is, the most shocking thing is that life in modern China is even worse than Yu Hua has painted it. CHRONICLE OF A BLOOD MERCHANT doesn't begin to portray the horrors of HIV and hepatitis that plague China's blood sellers (a practice which is illegal). I think CHRONICLE OF A BLOOD MERCHANT is a complex and well-written book and there can be no doubt that it's an important book as well, especially to those who want to understand the barbarism and violence that exists in China today, a country whose people are, by nature, quite kind and gentle. At its heart, CHRONICLE OF A BLOOD MERCHANT is quite sad, but, considering its importance, I would recommend it to anyone and everyone.
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