The Thumbnail Book Reviews
by John Q McDonald --- 27 June 2001
by Ha Jin
Lin Kong is a doctor in the Peoples Liberation Army, living many miles away from his village home, where his wife remains in a little cottage and on a communal farm. She is a compliant little woman, seemingly years older than he, and with rare bound feet, which bring ridicule from the more modern members of her community. Lin feels trapped in this loveless arranged marriage. He comes home for a week or two every year, and feels embarrassed by his wife. When he meets an energetic young woman at the army hospital where he works, he sees a shining opportunity to enliven his life. Ha Jin permeates this book with the cultural environment in which these characters live. It is the time of the Cultural Revolution, and Chinese society is tightly controlled. Fraternization between staff members at the hospital is closely monitored. Gossip and prying eyes are everywhere. Both Lin and Manna feel compelled to toe the party line. They obey the rules and tread very softly as he attempts to end his loveless marriage with Shuyu. But he also feels a great deal of familial obligation to his wife. She nursed both his parents in their dying years, and has faithfully obeyed his every wish. All but for the divorce. Years drag by as Lin lives in a haze of responsibility, respectability, and inaction. Eventually, he may doubt he has ever felt real love. Manna presses him, but not too hard. Terrible things happen along the way. And yet there is beauty in this stark everyday world. With a wonderful attention to detail, Jin manages to convey the cultural realities of China from the 60s through the 80s, without belaboring the point. The characters are steeped in the culture. It is vivid, endlessly thought-provoking and bleak.
(For this book Ha Jin was awarded the 1999 National Book Award for fiction and the 2000 PEN/Faulkner Award.)