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selenicseasThis is a collection of stories by Pu Songling, written from the 1640s to the 1710s. The version I have is abridged, with 103 out of the original 497 stories translated by John Minford. Some of the previous translations into English were heavily censored, with the one by Herbert Giles called out in particular for catering heavily to Victorian Era sensibilities. So, if you're going to pick up a copy of this book, pay close attention which translation of it you're getting.
Some of these stories are ghost stories, and some aren't. Some read like moral fables, with the narrator giving his own comments at the end. My initial instinct is to broadly categorize these stories under the "weird fiction" label – though, to be honest, I think they may only be "weird" when compared to Western fairy stories and folk tales.
One of the stories, "Nie Xiaoqian", felt really similar to a movie, A Chinese Ghost Story, that I'd watched years ago. As it turns out, A Chinese Ghost Story is based on "Nie Xiaoqian", and the only reason I didn't make the connection immediately is because the movie is in Cantonese and the character's name in Cantonese is Nip Siusin.
Some of these stories are ghost stories, and some aren't. Some read like moral fables, with the narrator giving his own comments at the end. My initial instinct is to broadly categorize these stories under the "weird fiction" label – though, to be honest, I think they may only be "weird" when compared to Western fairy stories and folk tales.
One of the stories, "Nie Xiaoqian", felt really similar to a movie, A Chinese Ghost Story, that I'd watched years ago. As it turns out, A Chinese Ghost Story is based on "Nie Xiaoqian", and the only reason I didn't make the connection immediately is because the movie is in Cantonese and the character's name in Cantonese is Nip Siusin.
