Eileen Chang's story is literary and precise; the film has more raw devastating power in some scenes, and fleshes out Mr. Yee's character better, but bloats itself to 2 1/2 hours on less important fare.---- SPOILER ALERT: ----If you haven't seen the movie or read the story, you probably don't want to read my review.The short story better captures the materialistic mood of high society in occupied territories, and gives interesting insights into the characters' thoughts, but the story does not fully convey the emotional tragedy of Wang Jiazhi's 'carnal' sacrifice. It's a very good translation and non-Chinese readers shouldn't feel any FOMO, but if I had to complain about something it would be that the awful circumstances under which Jiazhi lost her virginity were glossed over in the story, especially in the English translation.English (Julia Lovell):"Apparently, Liang Jun-sheng is the only one who has any experience, " Lai Hsiu-chin, the only other girl in the group, told her.Liang Jun-sheng.Of course. He was the only one who had been inside a brothel.But given that she was already determined to make a sacrifice of herself, she couldn't very well resent him for being the only candidate for the job.Chinese (roughly translated by me):“听他们说，这些人里好像只有梁闰生一个人有性经验，”赖秀金告诉她。除她之外只有赖秀金一个女生。 偏偏是梁闰生！ 当然是他。只有他嫖过。 既然有牺牲的决心，就不能说不甘心便宜了他。"The guys say that Liang Jun-sheng is the only one who has any sexual experience," Lai Hsiu-jin, the only other girl in the group, told her.Why did it have to be Liang Jun-sheng!Of course. He was the only one who had been to a brothel.If she was determined to sacrifice herself for the cause, then she had to shake off her resentment that he would gain this advantage from her.As for the story's powerful denouement, both the story and the film don't let us down. Lovell describes it perfectly in her Foreword: "Mr. Yee's return to the mahjong table brusquely exposes the true scale of Chia-chih's miscalculation: his ruthless, remorseless response, his warped sense of triumph." "Now that he had enjoyed the love of a beautiful woman, he could die happy––without regret. He could feel her shadow forever near him, comforting him. Even though she had hated him at the end, she had at least felt something. And now he possessed her utterly, primitively––as a hunter does his quarry, a tiger his kill. Alive, her body belonged to him; dead, she was his ghost."“得一知己，死而无憾。他觉得她的影子会永远依傍他，安慰他。虽然她恨他，她最后对他的感情强烈到是什么感情都不相干了，只是有感情。他们是原始的猎人与猎物的关系，虎与伥*的关系，最终极的占有。她这才生是他的人，死是他的鬼。”"Having had her as a confidante, he could die without regrets. Her shadow would always stay beside him, comforting him. Although she had hated him at the end, she had felt so strongly about him that it didn't matter what emotion it was, only that she had felt it. With the primeval connection of hunter to game, of tiger to accomplice*, he possessed her utterly. Now she really was his woman in this life; his ghost in death."* As Ang Lee points out in the Afterword, the "chang" is in folklore the ghost of someone who is killed by a tiger or by drowning. After death, this spirit serves to lure other humans to the tiger or to the water, to become its next victims. You can see why this spirit is so despised, a traitor to its own kind like both Mr. Yee and Jiazhi are, and why the concept of "chang" is difficult to translate succinctly.Linguistic cavils aside, my final word is that it's a beautiful story and I look forward to reading more of Chang's work.全文: http://news.xinhuanet.com/book/2007-0...
It’s been my wish to read something by Eileen Chang for a long time and the impetus to read Lust, Caution was heightened by the prize winning movie directed by Ang Lee. I read the book, then watched the movie.Eileen Chang’s novels write about the tensions set between men and women in love. Although set in a period where Shanghai is occupied by Japanese, I like that many of the short stories collection do not have a heavy political agenda about China. It was a welcome stray off the beaten path of stories about oppressed Communist China regime, defection and tribulations; which in recent years depict a one-dimensional picture of Chinese translated literature.It is 1940’s Shanghai. Young, naïve and beautiful Jiazhi (in the movie spelt Chia Chi) spends her days playing mah-jong and drinking tea with high society ladies in Shanghai. While war is raging outside, the ladies talked about the carats of their diamond rings and who should do the rounds of banquet invitation next.Jiazhi’s life is a front. A patriotic student radical posing as Mrs Mai, married to a businessman. Her mission is to seduce a powerful employee of the occupying government (a Chinese collaborator to the Japanese government, Mr. Yee) and lead him to the assassin’s bullet. The process took 2 years (in the book) and 3 years (in the movie) for Jiazhi to get acquainted and then earned Mr. Yee’s trust. Mr. Yee’s masochism shines through more in the movie, as heavy handling interrogation and torture is his speciality and he trusts no one. Not even his past mistresses.Yet as Jiazhi waits for him to arrive to meet at their liaison, Jiazhi begins to wonder if she is cut out to be a femme fatale and coldly take Mr Yee to his death. Or is she beginning to fall in love with him?The short story has managed to build the climax leading to Jiazhi’s trap, framing Mr. Yee for her colleagues’ ambush. I read the book, watched the movie and felt compelled to read the book again just to notice the details from the movie. I must say the movie brilliantly provides a better context and inner turmoil of Jiazhi. From the innocent young Jiazhi to the loss of her innocence and became a powdered-face, heavy make-up of Jiazhi’s double persona as Mrs. Mai, the transition is heart wrenching.The book portrays a sad case of a gender ruled mostly by heart and another by power.Although the first Lust, Caution short story took a better part of my review, I thought Chang’s other short stories in the same book are just as good. I like the story Great Felicity, as a girl from a lower class prepare for her marriage to the upper echelon and invited critics from her in-laws. In Steamed Osmanthus Flower: Ah Xiao’s Unhappy Autumn is about the life of a live-in servant and her flamboyant western expatriate employer, how she has to be the conspirator to cover her employer’s back from a persistent admirer called Miss Li as she raises her son Baishun at the same time. Traces of Love is about a second wife Dunfeng who has to endure her husband’s loyalty to his first wife, who is ailing. While accepting that she married for money, all relationships are frayed and patched up, the women in Eileen Chang’s world, make the best of what they have got.I thought the entire soundtrack of Lust, Caution was haunting and sublimed brilliant.Read the book. The book is only 159 pages including Editor’s afterword. Most rewarding of all, watch the movie.For full review see: http://bibliojunkie.wordpress.com/201...
What do You think about Lust, Caution: The Story (2007)?
Just one word. Uttered almost in whisper, by a woman. She told her lover: "Run." I paused, staggered, heartbeat quickening as I raced towards the ending. Then I went back to the page where this word was, eleven pages earlier.""Run,' she said softly."They are inside a jewelry store. A rich, married, powerful politician working for the Japanese occupying Hongkong during the war and his young, beautiful mistress secretly working for the resistance. They are choosing a diamond ring, his gift to her. Her colleagues at the resistance are outside waiting to ambush him. She was their willing bait, they had set him up for an assassination.You will wait for an explosive finish. A shootout, guns ablaze, a violent dramatic end. Instead, you'll get one word, almost imperceptible, like a light feather that silently drops to the ground on a windless day. And that word, "run," that solitary word, three letters, a plea, perhaps a cry, creates stories within the story, hidden sequels, questions needing to be asked, uncertainties over facts erstwhile laid plain.
—Joselito Honestly and Brilliantly
This is really a short story, packaged on it's own to cross-promote the movie. I'm not much of a short story reader, and this was no exception. The format doesn't give me enough time to invest myself in the characters. I don't believe the idea that Wang Chia-chih realizes she is in love with Mr. Yee, and that is why she tips him off. More likely she is disallusioned by the operation. Does she realize that she will die for it? Eh, maybe it's too deep for me...It is such a small story, I wonder how they were able to stretch it out into a movie. I suppose they created scenes for the back story.
—Melissa
The story is surprisingly short, which can be finished by a couple of hours. It supports the idea that everyone can write something interesting, not necessarily long to be named "Classic".I guess the flow of reading it was, in some way, influenced and preoccupied by the movie as I watched it first. Some descriptions of the interior of a building always get me out of joy in reading it. Not too sure if it's because English is not my first language. "The way to a woman's heart is through her vagina" is a theory that, from my understanding, the story is trying to prove. Overall, the story is good but can be expanded as the time frame is about two years. The movie is the best illustration than the words.
—Dave Yan
