Book of the Week: Ninth Building by Zou Jingzhi (translated by Jeremy Tiang) is a memorable, sparely written and often darkly funny set of vignettes based on the author’s experiences during China’s Cultural Revolution, first as a child in Beijing and then as a teenager sent to work in the countryside. The book captures the unseen and usually unrecalled aspects that actually comprise the majority of history, even in dramatic times; the tedium, the uncertainty, the strange acceptance, the perspective limited to the immediate time and place, the eruptions of humanity or brutality into otherwise unresolved and seemingly irresolvable circumstances.
>>”I wrote this book to let go of my childhood.”
>>Read an extract.
>>”Everyone should translate.”
>>Everything is taken for granted.
>>Your copy of Ninth Building.
>>Other books listed for the 2023 International Booker Prize.
>>Which book should you read first?