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Brothers
by Yu Hua
Reviewed by Todd Shimoda
Yu Hua's over-the-top, ribald farce Brothers compresses the last fifty years of Chinese history through the lives of two stepbrothers. Baldy Li is rough, sex-obsessed, gnomish, and an inveterate opportunist. Song Gang is tall, good-looking, and loyal and selfless to a fault. They live in a village, Liu Town, only a day's bus ride from Shanghai, but in sophistication, a light-year away.
Baldy Li and Song Gang become stepbrothers when they are young boys in pre-Cultural Revolution times. Song's handsome and respected father shyly courts Baldy Li's widowed-mother, while the boys are up to the shenanigans that all boys get into around the world. They vow to stick up for each other, allying against bullies and pretentious artists like Author Liu and Poet Zhao. Together they work scams on the sympathetic villagers, like Popsicle Wang and Blacksmith Tong. Everyone (at least the men) is known by ever-changing nicknames and titles.
Even in their poverty, the newly-formed family gets along well and survives almost idyllically until the Cultural Revolution arrives. Baldy's mother gets cancer and goes away to Shanghai for healing. Song's father's lofty status in the community is now his downfall. The cultural police brand him a landlord, an enemy of the people. He is forced to wear a demeaning sign and while walking in the street he is cursed, spat upon, and beaten. Eventually he is thrown into prison to be re-educated.
Baldy Li and Song Gang are forced to survive on their own, often going days with nothing to swallow but their own saliva. When Song's father sneaks away from prison to meet Baldy's mother in Shanghai and bring her home. He never makes it as he is caught and beaten to death. Baldy's mother eventually makes it home only to find she is widowed for a second time. Her heart broken she soon dies of her illness.
And that's only the beginning of the story. The bulk of the action, and the more interesting narrative, takes place when the two brothers, now orphans, go separate ways. The split is mainly because of a woman who drives them apart, making them rivals for the first time. Song becomes the dutiful husband, while Baldy finds success as an entrepreneur in the post-Cultural Revolution reforms of Deng Xiaoping. Eventually, toward the end of the novel, their lives collide again in an explosion of rivalry and brotherhood.
As with many other novels capturing the effects of historical events, the action doesn't stop with a single episode -- action is piled on top of action. Violence doesn't end with a punch or drawing of blood, a hundred punches and gallons of blood must be shed. If a small fortune is made and lost, a huge fortune must be made and lost. Not content with having one virgin, hundreds must be deflowered. If one virgin is faking their purity, all must be faking it.
The book at over six-hundred pages reads quickly. Hua is a master of writing an engaging tale, delivering constantly and entertaining readers lavishly. But he also presents a sociological critique of China's cultural experiments. If a measure of a society's maturity is the way its artists poke at its belly, then Hua has demonstrated how far China has come, at least artistically.
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Todd Shimoda is the author of The Fourth Treasure and 365 Views of Mt. Fuji.
by Yu Hua
Reviewed by Todd Shimoda
Yu Hua's over-the-top, ribald farce Brothers compresses the last fifty years of Chinese history through the lives of two stepbrothers. Baldy Li is rough, sex-obsessed, gnomish, and an inveterate opportunist. Song Gang is tall, good-looking, and loyal and selfless to a fault. They live in a village, Liu Town, only a day's bus ride from Shanghai, but in sophistication, a light-year away.
Baldy Li and Song Gang become stepbrothers when they are young boys in pre-Cultural Revolution times. Song's handsome and respected father shyly courts Baldy Li's widowed-mother, while the boys are up to the shenanigans that all boys get into around the world. They vow to stick up for each other, allying against bullies and pretentious artists like Author Liu and Poet Zhao. Together they work scams on the sympathetic villagers, like Popsicle Wang and Blacksmith Tong. Everyone (at least the men) is known by ever-changing nicknames and titles.
Even in their poverty, the newly-formed family gets along well and survives almost idyllically until the Cultural Revolution arrives. Baldy's mother gets cancer and goes away to Shanghai for healing. Song's father's lofty status in the community is now his downfall. The cultural police brand him a landlord, an enemy of the people. He is forced to wear a demeaning sign and while walking in the street he is cursed, spat upon, and beaten. Eventually he is thrown into prison to be re-educated.
Baldy Li and Song Gang are forced to survive on their own, often going days with nothing to swallow but their own saliva. When Song's father sneaks away from prison to meet Baldy's mother in Shanghai and bring her home. He never makes it as he is caught and beaten to death. Baldy's mother eventually makes it home only to find she is widowed for a second time. Her heart broken she soon dies of her illness.
And that's only the beginning of the story. The bulk of the action, and the more interesting narrative, takes place when the two brothers, now orphans, go separate ways. The split is mainly because of a woman who drives them apart, making them rivals for the first time. Song becomes the dutiful husband, while Baldy finds success as an entrepreneur in the post-Cultural Revolution reforms of Deng Xiaoping. Eventually, toward the end of the novel, their lives collide again in an explosion of rivalry and brotherhood.
As with many other novels capturing the effects of historical events, the action doesn't stop with a single episode -- action is piled on top of action. Violence doesn't end with a punch or drawing of blood, a hundred punches and gallons of blood must be shed. If a small fortune is made and lost, a huge fortune must be made and lost. Not content with having one virgin, hundreds must be deflowered. If one virgin is faking their purity, all must be faking it.
The book at over six-hundred pages reads quickly. Hua is a master of writing an engaging tale, delivering constantly and entertaining readers lavishly. But he also presents a sociological critique of China's cultural experiments. If a measure of a society's maturity is the way its artists poke at its belly, then Hua has demonstrated how far China has come, at least artistically.
- Editor's note: 'Brothers' was short-listed for the 2008 Man Asian Literary Prize
--
Todd Shimoda is the author of The Fourth Treasure and 365 Views of Mt. Fuji.
Available in Asia from Paddyfield.com
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