I finished 逃走的人 “The Ones That Got Away”. A book about young Chinese that go to live in low-cost cities to escape a high-pressure life. Before reading I’d (naïvely) imagined them to be a bit like hippies or punks but the ones portrayed here just seem exhausted and alienated. 📚

A new volume of the De Gruyter Library of Chinese Humanities!

The Finest Souls of Our Rivers and Alps

A parallel text translation of the only extant contemporaneous poetry anthology from the High Tang (completed ca 753 CE).

I finished Why on Earth Do We Have Libraries. An academic is seconded to start a public library, despite bureaucracy and corruption. Reads part like an officialdom novel 体制内文学, part like cultural essays through the lens of selecting books for the library and the people serving as subject experts.

History: A Very Short Introduction (Arnold, 2000) is a delightful little book. It contains a brief “history of history” and beautifully written essays on doing history e.g. “Is the past fundamentally different or similar to the present?” and “What is truth in history”. 📚

I’m reading 世上为什么要有图书馆 “Why on earth do we need libraries?”, first on Douban’s favourite books of 2024 list. It’s not great literature nor is it investigative journalism, but China Books Review is correct: it is entertaining and gives an interesting glimpse into the Chinese bureaucracy.

I just finished 我们家 (The Chili Bean Paste Clan) by 严歌 (Yan Ge) and I am pleased to inform you that it contains 71 instances of the word 屁股 (bottom), that’s more than 7 bottoms per chapter.

Here’s an article where the author talks with translator Nicky Harman.

I’ve gone down a rabbit hole on the Five Star Armband “五星出东方利中国”护膊 and wonder how the last part of the associated text (四夷服單于降與天無極) was reconstructed. According to this rather handwavy article by collating other textile fragments but does anyone have a ref to a more detailed account?

🀄️📚

TFW you discover that you’ve added the same item to your todo-list three times the last month.

If I had the self-discipline to follow a productivity method I wouldn’t need a productivity method. I’d just do the things and be done with them.

Dear #chinese #cooking #lazyweb,

can anyone recommend a good recipe for gluten-free dumpling skins?

I’m reading Lao She 老舍 short stories, and, man, I think i’m gonna need trigger warnings, so far I’ve got an execution, a crushed skull, a mother and new-born dying from dereliction of duty, implied non-consensual sex. The contrast with the breezy language and the grim events is a bit jarring.