Taiwan Fiction and
Postwar Urban Experience
Week 14:
Thematic Explorations:
The City and Labor
[Dec 12th, 2013]
Instructor:
Richard Rong-bin Chen, PhD.
Adjunct Assistant Professor,
Graduate Institute of Taiwan Literature, NTU
Unless noted, the course materials are licensed under Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Taiwan (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0)
Yang Ch’ing-ch’u
Hsiao Sa
歷史文化學習網 楊青矗先生 提供
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(http://ent.appledaily.com.tw/enews/ar
ticle/entertainment/20030723/210025/)
and used subject to the fair use
doctrine of the Taiwan Copyright Act
Article 52 and 65 by GET and 蘋果日
報使用條款
Yang Ch’ing-ch’u [楊青矗]
• The Penname of Yang Ho-hsiung [楊和雄].
• 1940: born in Tainan, relocated to Kaohsiung with his
family when he was 12.
• His father, a firefighter, died when he was 21, so he had
to become the main supporter of the family.
• Used to be a worker in various trades before
becoming a writer. (For example, he used to be a
tailor apprentice, like the protagonist Dimples in
“Crossing Love River.”)
• 1979: became a political prisoner due to his
involvement with The Formosa Incident [美麗島事件],
released in 1983.
• Education: Yang graduated from Kaohsiung
Senior High School’s night division when he was
31 years, so unlike most of the writers we have
introduced so far, he’s a self-taught writer.
• Yang’s writing has concentrated on the lives of
ordinary men and women in the society of Taiwan,
and his stock characters are male and female
factory workers, janitors, pallbearers, and taxi
drivers.
• “Crossing Love River” [ 〈 在 室 男 〉 ] (1968),
which has been made into a movie in 1984, is one
of his representative works.
Stock Characters in Yang’s Writing
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
“Twilight in the Fields” [綠園的黃昏]
Farmer
“Crossing Love River” [在室男]
Tailor, tailor apprentice, bar girl, and prostitute
“Promotion” [升]
Carpenter
“Dance Party” [工廠的舞會]
Female workers in industrial parks
Yang’s Works in English Translation.
• For the English
translations of Yang’s
works, please check
Selected Stories of
Yang Ch’ing-ch’u.
Trans. Thomas B.
Gold. Kaohsiung:
First Publishing Co.,
1983.
This work is licensed by 第一出版社 for the
use of “Course Database of General
Education TW” ONLY. The copyright
belongs to the above mentioned creator and
we do not have the authorization right.
“Crossing Love River” (1968)
Wikipedia Wdshu
Wikipedia Benjiho
This work is from “Google
map”(https://maps.google.com.tw/)
and used subject to the fair use
doctrine of the Taiwan Copyright
Act Article 52 and 65 by GET
Key Points
 Characters are primarily named after their
physical features.
 Places in Kaohsiung City:
 Love River
 River banks
 Theaters
 Gymnasium
 Mutton shop
 Red light district
 Bars
 Tailoring shop
 The problem
environments.
of
bully
in
working
 The love in working environments.
 The river is more than a river.
 The story title is both geographical and
symbolic.
 A rite-of-passage story depicting the process
from a virgin boy to a man, after his visit to a
brothel.
• The problem of money.
The Living Standard of the Last 60s
• 2200 dollars needed for the appendicitis
operation.
• Salary (allowance) of a tailor apprentice: 100
dollars.
• Dimples spent 50 dollars on daily expenses.
• Then he spent the rest of it in the brothel.
• Big-eyes was paid 10000 dollars for being a
mistress.
• She got extra payment of 300000 thousand
dollars for being a surrogate mother.
Characters
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
The proprietress (owner of Chi-mei Tailoring Shop)
Big Eyes (21, a bar girl for 5 years) [有酒窩的]
Dimples (18, the apprentice) [大目仔]
Yuan-yuan (18, in the trade one year earlier) [媛
媛]
Lion Nose [獅子鼻的師傅]
Canyon Mouth [闊嘴的師傅]
The reason for this kind of naming?
Correspond with the informal and bantering
tone; only acquaintances
About the River
• The Love River is a household name in
Kaohsiung City. Originally known as the
Takao River [打狗], the Kaohsiung River, or
the Kaohsiung Canal.
• The 12-kilometer-long Love River originates
from the Renwu District, passing through
Zuoying, Sanmin, Gushan, Yancheng, Qianjin,
and Lingya, and emptying into Kaohsiung
Harbor.
• During the US Aid period, Yancheng [鹽埕]
District became the center for bar business.
Story and Spatial Structure
• Tailoring Shop—
• Big Eyes and Dimples ridiculed by Lion Nose
and Canyon Mouth
• Discrimination against the bar girl
• Hospital—
• Big Eyes cared for Dimples and paid for his
appendicitis surgery
• 2200 NT dollars
• Big Eyes’ Home, the River Bank, then the
Theater —
• Tailoring Shop, the Mutton Shop, and then the
lawn beside the gymnasium—
• Dimples stopped seeing Big Eyes, so she went to see
him and explained about her being seen with another
man in the theater.
• Big Eyes’ Home—
• Dimples compared Big Eyes with Yuan-yuan
• First Kiss
• Big Eyes’ Home, then the River Bank—
• Dimples went to see Big Eyes one month later
• Big Eyes had left, so he felt betrayed.
• Crossed Love River, took a trip to the brothel
• Red Light District behind the theaters—
• Dimples patronize a brothel named Peach Blossom
River [桃花江]
• Lost his virginity
• Tailoring Shop—
• Big Eyes pregnant with child for a manager of a
lumber company in Taichung.
• The choice of Dimples
• Crossing Love River is meaningful on two
levels:
• Traveling eastward for first love experience;
traveling westward for first sexual exploration.
【Hsiao Sa】
• In 1953, she was born in Taiwan, but her
family had been from Nanking. She was
originally named Hsiao Ching-yu [蕭慶餘].
• She graduated from Girls’ Normal College
of Taipei [台北女師專] in the early 70s.
• She published her first collection of short
stories, Long Dyke [《長堤》] in 1972, and
stopped writing for five years.
• In 1978, she published “My Son,
Hansheng” [〈我兒漢生〉] in the
supplement to the United Daily News.
• It also procured for her a literary
award set up by United Daily News,
one of the major newspapers in
Taiwan.
• Made into a movie in 1986, her
husband is the director.
• Features of Her Works
• Many of her works focus on social issues
and family problems, especially the troubles
young people usually run into in Taiwan.
• For example, besides “My Son, Han-sheng,”
“The Aftermath of the Death of a Junior
High Co-ed” [ 死 了一個 國中女 生之後 ]
(1982) also shows how young people’s lives
could be more and more difficult in a rapidly
transforming Taiwan.
• Hsiao Sa wrote many works concerning
marital problems. Her own marriage failed in
the period between 1985 and 1986, during
which his husband’s extramarital affair with
Yang Hui-shang [楊惠姍], a famous film
star, was known.
• In 1986, Hsiao Sa published an open letter to
her ex-husband in China Times, and the affair
became a scandal, driving her husband, a
renowned director named Chang Yi [張毅],
and his lover out of their artistic career.
About “My Son, Hansheng” (1978)
Social Transformation
How could he say that we don’t understand life’s
difficulties? Soon after Hansheng was born, Yude was
sent to the south for half a year. In order to afford
powdered milk for the baby, we ate pickled cabbage,
dried shredded fish, and steamed bread, and congee
for almost every meal. When I was pregnant with
Hanlin, Yude was again in the United States for
training. Pregnant woman are always hungry, but
since I couldn’t afford anything special, I would
spend one NT dollar on peanuts . . . (236).
Source: Hsiao Sa. (1991)Michael S. Duke(Eds.),
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's
Republic, Taiwan & Hong Kong. Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
Hansheng’s Jobs
• First Type
• Social education association
• Service center for the wounded and disabled
miners’ welfare organization
• Second Type
• Advertising agency
• Third Type
• Insurance company
• Cab driver,
Hansheng’s Perspective on the Society
• As Taiwan became more and more
commercialized, the workplace ethics became
more complex than ever.
• For example, Han-sheng thought that the
insurance company was exploitative in
nature, and the people in the advertising
agency were even worse.
• It shows us the fact that how young people with
unpractical ideas might be chewed up by the
society.
It turned out that the company not only
required a certain percentage of his sales,
but also since he had already reached his
maximum, they placed other salesmen under
his supervision. This time he was to go out
and exploit other people . Eventually
Hansheng pounded the table, accused the
insurance company of cheating, and walked
out. But Yude had to continue paying
insurance fees every month! (p.238-9)
Source: Hsiao Sa. (1991)Michael S. Duke(Eds.),
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's
Republic, Taiwan & Hong Kong. Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
Later, Hansheng once again passed a test into an
advertising agency as a market research analyst.
The pay was decent and the work was simple. At
first he was satisfied with the new environment and
the new colleagues were interesting, but soon after,
he again began to feel that the work was dry and
meaningless. When he came home he would
complain that the manager was unfair to his
subordinates and flattering to his superiors. The
section chief was sly, taking the credit for other
people’s work; every one of his colleagues were
crooks and devils, eagerly in pursuit of money and
fame, always ready to squeeze their way into any
favorable position. (p.239)
Source: Hsiao Sa. (1991)Michael S. Duke(Eds.),
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's
Republic, Taiwan & Hong Kong. Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
The Parents-Children Relationship
• The perspective from which the story is
presented is also significant.
• In this way, we see how worried a mother
might be about her son. In the process of
receiving his education, Hansheng,
whose parents were both intellectuals,
caused trouble incessantly.
• Father
• Mother
• Father (Pan Yude): The son’s father and the
editor-in-chief of a newspaper. He had arrived
Taiwan alone, worked all the way up through
college, doing whatever job which had come
along. His way to educate his son was to let
him do what he wanted. When his son was in
trouble, he always said something like “leave
him (Hansheng) alone” or “children at his
age are all like this.”
• He finally got angry when his son moved to
live with women who worked at a dancehall.
• The mother: The narrator of the whole story.
She has been worried about her son throughout
the story. She tried to be an open-minded
parent, but didn’t know what to do every time
her son was in trouble. She couldn’t
understand her son’s behavior and gradually
became unfamiliar with her son. Although she
was very worried about him and wanted to
help him, she didn’t know how.
• The ironic thing was that she was an expert
on teenage problem, but she couldn’t even
deal with her own son.
Mother’s Contradictory Perspectives
• Hanlin vs. Hansheng
• Hanlin was always a well-behaved, intelligent child.
A good student at school, a good daughter at
home, and among friends and relatives she was
considered a sweet little princess. Every
movement, every expression was perfectly
charming . . . It seemed that she didn’t have the
trace of a flaw.
But with a child like this, can one ever be sure
that there is nothing to worry about? (232)
Source: Hsiao Sa. (1991)Michael S. Duke(Eds.),
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's
Republic, Taiwan & Hong Kong. Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
• “I was truly worried about his future. Long ago he
had transgressed what was normal. Could this kind
of child ever become a successful man? . . . It was
perhaps the greatest defeat in our lives.” (233)
• “In truth, I didn’t worry about Hansheng’s stubborn
pride. It takes guts to not to rely on other people,
not to ask for help.” (239)
• “And in our hearts, both Yude and I had contradictory
feelings. We desperately hoped that he would want
to work at building up his own business smoothly,
but we were also afraid that he would agree with
us!” (245) [The mother considered using mortgage
money to help Hansheng.]
Source: Hsiao Sa. (1991)Michael S. Duke(Eds.),
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's
Republic, Taiwan & Hong Kong. Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
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2
This work is from “蘋果日報”
(http://ent.appledaily.com.tw/enews/article/entertainment/20030723/210025
/) and used subject to the fair use doctrine of the Taiwan Copyright Act
Article 52 and 65 by GET and 蘋果日報使用條款
6
This work is licensed by 第一出版社 for the use of “Course Database of
General Education TW” ONLY. The copyright belongs to the above
mentioned creator and we do not have the authorization right.
7
Wikipedai Henry Trotter
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Kaohsiung-Love-River.jpg
2013/12/10 visited
8
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http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ddm_2004_017_Love_River.jpg
2013/12/10 visited
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2013/12/10 visited
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use doctrine of the Taiwan Copyright Act Article 52 and 65 by GET
10
23
How could he say that we
don’t …spend one NT
dollar on peanuts . .
Hsiao Sa. (1991) . My Son, Hansheng
Michael S. Duke(Eds.)
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's Republic,
Taiwan & Hong Kong. (p.236).
Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
26
It turned out that the
company … insurance
fees every month!
Hsiao Sa. (1991) . My Son, Hansheng
Michael S. Duke(Eds.)
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's Republic,
Taiwan & Hong Kong. (pp.238-9).
Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
27
Later, Hansheng once
again … into any
favorable position.
Hsiao Sa. (1991) . My Son, Hansheng
Michael S. Duke(Eds.)
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's Republic,
Taiwan & Hong Kong. (p.239).
Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
31
Hanlin was always
a …there is nothing to
worry about?
Hsiao Sa. (1991) . My Son, Hansheng
Michael S. Duke(Eds.)
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's Republic,
Taiwan & Hong Kong. (p.232).
Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
32
. I was truly worried
about his … greatest
defeat in our lives.”
Hsiao Sa. (1991) . My Son, Hansheng
Michael S. Duke(Eds.)
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's Republic,
Taiwan & Hong Kong. (p.233).
Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
Copyright Declaration
Licensing
Author/Source
Page
Work
32
In truth, I didn’t worry
about …other people, not
to ask for help.
Hsiao Sa. (1991) . My Son, Hansheng
Michael S. Duke(Eds.)
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's Republic,
Taiwan & Hong Kong. (p.239).
Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe
32
And in our hearts, both
Yude and I …that he
would agree with us!”
Hsiao Sa. (1991) . My Son, Hansheng
Michael S. Duke(Eds.)
Worlds of modern Chinese fiction : short stories & novellas from the People's Republic,
Taiwan & Hong Kong. (p.245).
Armonk, N.Y. : Sharpe