The Red Chamber by Pauline Chen
In this lyrical reimagining of a Chinese classic and set against the breathtaking backdrop of eighteenth-century Beijing, the lives of three unforgettable women collide in the inner chambers of the Jia mansion. When orphaned Daiyu leaves her home in the provinces to take shelter with her cousins in the capital, she is drawn into a world of opulent splendor, presided over by the ruthless, scheming Xifeng and the prim, repressed Baochai. As she learns the secrets behind their glittering facades, she finds herself entangled in a web of intrigue and hidden passions, reaching from the petty gossip of the servants' quarters all the way to the Imperial Palace. When a political coup overthrows the Emperor and plunges the once-mighty family into grinding poverty, each woman must choose between love and duty, friendship and survival. In this dazzling debut, Pauline Chen draws the reader deep into the secret, exquisite world of the women's quarters of an aristocratic household, where the burnish of wealth and refinement mask a harsher truth: marriageable girls are traded like chattel for the family's advancement, and to choose to love is to risk everything.
Rarely does a cast of beloved literary figures from another culture and time come alive on the pages of a modern writer's workPauline Chen has reimagined the characters from my very favorite novel to make a compelling new version of China's great literary masterpiece. I highly recommend The Red Chamber. It will transport you into an altogether new world -- Arthur Golden, Author Of Memoirs Of A Geisha
Pauline Chen earned her B.A. in Classics from Harvard, her J.D. from Yale Law School, and her Ph.D. in East Asian Studies from Princeton. She has taught Chinese language, literature, and film at the University of Minnesota and Oberlin College. She is also the author of a novel for young readers, Peiling and the Chicken-Fried Christmas, and lives in Ohio with her two children.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781844087969 |
| ISBN 10 | 1844087964 |
| Title | The Red Chamber |
| Author | Pauline Chen |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Little, Brown Book Group |
| Year published | 2012-07-05 |
| Number of pages | 496 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |