Ballad of the Himalayas: Stories of Tibet, by Ma Yuan. Translated by Herbert J. Batt. Introduction by Yang Xiaobin. Portland, ME: MerwinAsia, 2011. Review by Steven J. Venturino, first published in China Review International 18.4 (dated 2011, published 2013): 535-41. University of Hawai’i Press.
This long overdue collection of stories by a major writer should be read by anyone, China specialist or not, who appreciates good literature. Ma Yuan’s work offers the simple yet detailed observations of Hemingway, the humor and poignancy of Salinger, the stylistic coherence of Woolf, and the playfully serious formal irony of Borges or Cortázar.
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Venturino Ma Yuan review CRI.
Related Links
List of Ma Yuan’s fiction available in English translation.
Essay: “Apostrophizing the Catastrophe.”