Why writing in English makes me freer - Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

Author Zhang Lijia of the recently published Lotus: A Novel is a native from Nanjing, but writes in English. Writing in her chosen language makes her feel more free, she explains in an interview with Mengfei Chen of the LA Review of Books.

The LA Review of Books:

Interestingly, writing in English frees me literally as well. It frees me from any inhibition I may have: if I had written the novel in Chinese, I am sure the sex scene would be less explicit. Without the constraints, I can also be bold as I experiment with the language. Because English is not my native tongue, I use different words and I structure my sentences differently, consciously and unconsciously. Of course, my experiment doesn’t always work. But I enjoy the adventure. 

The challenges are obvious. After diligently studying English for 30 years, I have yet to command the language completely. I write slowly, too slowly, in fact; I don’t understand the subtle meanings of certain words; and I am still confused by the use of the definite and indefinite article! 

I find the relationship between the writer and the chosen language fascinating. I speak Chinese with a slight Nanjing accent. [NB: In many parts of China, this accent is viewed as a fairly déclassé one, definitely inferior to that of Beijing, where Zhang has long been based.] When speaking English, I’ve tried to cultivate a refined accent. [NB: She speaks English with what Americans might describe as a BBC accent.] Maybe there’s another reason that I went for English — it makes me feel more sophisticated than I actually am. I probably have not gotten rid of a sense of inferiority because of my worker’s background! 

In addition to a romance and coming-of-age story, readers will be given insights to a full range of Chinese social issues, including corruption, taxation, educational inequities, rural to urban migration among others.  How did you balance the desire and need to include explanatory information about China for readers who might not necessarily know very much about the country with the narrative and characters? 

From the very beginning, I intended to use prostitution as an interesting window to observe the social tensions brought by the reforms and opening up. So I had to provide context to western readers who probably don’t know a great deal about China. In the earlier drafts, I often dumped too much information to a degree that it slowed the narrative drive. Also in earlier drafts, my writing in such parts tended to be journalistic. I cut back some background information – if a reader really wants to know more about certain aspect, he/she can easily Google it. I then sprinkled the necessary information and delivered it in a less journalistic way.

More in the LA Review of Books.

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you interested in more stories by Zhang Lijia? Do check out this list.

NPR: The underbelly of contemporary China, review Lotus by Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

More reviews are coming in of author Zhang Lijia´s Lotus: A Novel, about prostitution in China, this time from the NPR. The reviewer is rightfully impressed. "We can count ourselves lucky to get this glimpse into the fascinating world of Lotus."

NPR:

The author has a light touch, even when delineating the underbelly of contemporary Chinese culture. She conducted research in the red light districts of Shenzhen, Dongguan, Beihai, Tianjin and Beijing, so there is a documentary verity to the telling, giving starch to fiction that might otherwise be flabby. Zhang also brings a personal stake to the book, dedicating it to her grandmother, who was sold to a brothel as a euphemistically-termed "flower girl," or courtesan. 

Some first novels, especially those birthed in creative writing classes (Zhang, a former rocket factory worker in China, studied at the University of Iowa), go heavy on self-consciously poetic language. The author tries too hard and the reader suffers. The images Zhang gives us, in contrast, are uncomplicated, concise and touching. Young Lotus's "pencil was homemade, simply the broken end of a pencil's lead discarded by her classmates, stabbed into a piece of soft wood." Concerning Bing's emotions, Zhang writes, "He had been like an ant on a hot pan ever since the girls' visit." 

Book groups be advised: Readers will learn quite specific tricks of the trade. Lotus is undeniably earthy but thankfully spare, letting its characters, and its proverbs, do the talking. When Bing wants to get serious with Lotus, we hear about the development a proverbial way: "What luck, this offer. A pancake fallen from the sky, as her grandma would say." We can count ourselves lucky to get this glimpse into the fascinating world of Lotus.

More at NPR. 

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

She will be at a book presentation in New York at February 1, Barnes & Noble on 82nd Street and Broadway, at 7 PM.

Are you looking for more experts on cultural change in China? Do check out this list.

Exploring the sex trade for my novel Lotus - Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

The story of her grandmother, first a prostitute, then a concubine, triggered author Zhang Lijia´s into writing her latest book Lotus: A Novel. With meticulous research she explored the life of today´s sex workers, and tells in Refinery29, how a middle-class lady explored a secret world.

Zhang Lijia:

I chatted with the salon girls and learned that they were migrants from the impoverished countryside. All three were poorly educated and unskilled: The youngest was in her early teens — the same age as my grandma when she began work at a brothel in 1928. How did these women end up here? I wondered. And how did they reconcile their trade with their conservative upbringing in the village? 

It was at that moment the seed for my novel, Lotus, was planted. Through the lives of these women, I could explore China’s growing gap between men and women, urban and rural — as well as the tug of war between modernity and tradition. 

Because my last book was a memoir, people often wonder if I’ve penned another autobiography: I am always quick to point out that Lotus is purely a work of fiction, not based on personal experience. Keenly aware that my middle-class urban existence is so removed from that of a migrant-worker, I knew I needed serious research. And so I interviewed sex workers in Shenzhen, Dongguang, a neighboring city, Beijing, and other cities. I tried to make friends with these sources, but it proved to be a very challenging task: Their lives are so transient, as they change from one massage parlor to another, from one city to another. They change their mobile numbers — or they simply vanish. 

My breakthrough came after I managed to gain work as a volunteer for a non-governmental organization NGO that is dedicated to helping female sex workers in a northern city in China. The main task of these volunteers is to distribute condoms to sex workers operating at massage parlors and hair salons — all fronts for brothels — in an outskirt of Tianjin. 

They are mostly low-class establishments, and I usually went out with a staff member from the organization, Little Y — a former sex worker herself, who is very skilled in her NGO role. She would sit down and chat over a cup of weak jasmine tea; she would always find something flattering to say. 

“Wow, what a pair of heavy melons!” Little Y would say, pointing at one woman’s robust chest. “Are they real?” She would volunteer that she had had implants herself; on several occasions, she lifted up her top and compared herself to other women who also had breasts enlargement. Little Y’s augmentation was done in a back-alley clinic, and resulted in one of her nipples pointing westward.

More in Refinery29.

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you looking for more stories by Zhang Lijia? Check out this list.

Prostitution, a free choice - Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

One remarkable conclusion by author Zhang Lijia of Lotus: A Novel  on sex work in China is her conclusion that prostitution in China is largely a free choice, where women are free to enter, and free to leave. Yes, there is economic pressure, but no organized crime or human trafficking on a major scale, she says.

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you looking for more stories by Zhang Lijia? Do check this list.

Unsung heroes - review of Lotus, by Zhang Lijia

First reviews of journalist Zhang Lijia´s touching Lotus: A Novel, are coming in, like here from the Star Tribune, focusing on the Chinese migrants, the unsung heroes who made the country´s economic development possible. "Lotus and Bing, as well as the secondary characters, feel like real, rounded human beings. Zhang portrays them compassionately."

The Star Tribune:

Still, it is a novel, not a sociological treatise. Lotus and Bing, as well as the secondary characters, feel like real, rounded human beings. Zhang portrays them compassionately: At one point Bing remarks that the uneducated migrants from the provinces are “China’s unsung heroes,” whose cheap labor has made the country’s economic miracle possible, and the novel does indeed find heroism in their struggles and conflicts while telling a darn good story at the same time. 

Although the narrative of a young girl from the provinces struggling to make it in the big city is a familiar one, the novel’s texture, setting and thought patterns seem specifically Chinese. While “Lotus” sometimes reads as if it were translated from Chinese (it is not), that is part of its charm, anchoring us in a world outside American experience.

More at the Star Tribune.

Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you looking for more books by our speakers? Do check out this page.

How I explored prostitution in China - Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

Author Zhang Lijia explored the life of more than ten million women in the sex trade in China for her book Lotus: A Novel. How is the trade organized? How does their life look like, and how voluntary is a choice to go into prostitution? Zhang Lijia spent years on the ground, and comes with a few remarkable conclusions. Organized crime has only little grip on prostitution, and most is organized by women themselves.

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you looking for more speakers on cultural change in China? Do check out this list.

Related articles

• About time to deal with Mao´s legacy - Zhang Lijia

New books on cultural change by Ian Johnson and Zhang Lijia

Ian Johnson

2017 is going to be a productive year for both Zhang Lijia and Ian Johnson as they are going to publish their long-awaited books. Both are very well versed in documenting cultural change in China, a development that often remain undetected for the outside world.

Zhang Lijia will publish in January Lotus: A Novel, based on the stories she noted from her grandmother, who was a concubine. Zhang Lijia has done extensive research into prostitution in China and although the book is a novel, there is a strong overlap with reality.

Ian Johnson will have his book The Souls of China: The Return of Religion After Mao on the shelves in April. Emerging Christianity pops up in the headlines now and then, but Pulitzer-price winner Ian Johnson promises to go beyond those superficial media hypes.

Are you interested in having Zhang Lijia or Ian Johnson as a speaker? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you looking for more speakers on cultural change in at the China Speakers Bureau? Do check out this list.

Earlier we discussed with Ian Johnson about the spiritual values among the Chinese.

Unseen China in Zhang Lijia´s Lotus - Review

Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia´s upcoming novel Lotus: A Novel will only appear early 2017, but the first raving reviews are already coming in. Renowned Indian author Amitav Ghosh praises the story the main figure migrant Lotus and the way she ends up in prostitution.

 Amitav Gosh:

Every year, across Asia, millions of city-bound journeys are launched in exactly this way – and as happens only too often, Lotus’s move does not turn out as she had hoped. She finds out the hard way that “the city is a place where dragons and fish jumble together. Not a safe place for a young girl.” She ends up having to earn her living by selling her body. 

The descriptions of Lotus’s life as a ji (‘chicken’ or prostitute) are remarkably persuasive – so much so that I wrote to Lijia to ask how she came by the details. I did an enormous amount of research, she wrote back. I tried to make friends with working girls. But they moved away, changed their numbers or simply vanished. Luckily I met Lanlan, a former prostitute who now runs a NGO dedicated to help female sex workers. She generously shared her experience with me and allowed me to work for her NGO, distributing condoms to the girls and hanging out with them. All the working girls are made-up characters, but many details are real. 

One of the novel’s major characters is a photographer (Bing) who has made a specialty of photographing prostitutes. At one point he says to Lotus: ‘Migrant workers are China’s unsung heroes. Without their cheap labour…. there would not be China’s economic miracle.‘ 

This is indeed one of the principal  themes of the novel, and it reflects Lijia’s own life experience: ‘Coming from a poor family myself I am interested in those ‘xiao ren wu’, ‘little people’, and their struggles. You may say I am a self-appointed spokesperson for China’s under-privileged. I want to explore the emotional costs of China’s rural-urban migration. By the way, a lot of sex workers in Shenzhen areas were former factory workers.’... 

Lotus is a wonderfully readable and perceptive novel about an aspect of contemporary China that remains largely invisible to the outsider. Although it pulls no punches it is saturated with the spirit of stoic optimism that sustains millions of rural migrants around the world.

More at Amitav Gosh´s website.

Amitav Gosh and Zhang Lijia in Beijing in 2010

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you looking for more speakers on cultural change at the China Speakers Bureau? Do check out this list.

Exploring the life of Chinese sex workers - Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

In her upcoming book Lotus author Zhang Lijia explores the life of Chinese sex workers, taking the life of her grandmother, a concubine, as a starting point. On the weblog Zhen de Gender, she explains what it took to do her research. "Prostitution is just a device, a window to show the tensions and the changes."

Zhen de Gender:

I discovered that many people have the same fantasy. People ask me: are these prostitutes beautiful? They’re just normal women – some are ugly, some wear more makeup, they wear more revealing clothes, but they are just normal women. 

Their lives are very complicated. All the prostitutes I have met help their family. It is out of obligation but it also makes them feel good. They know prostitution is wrong so they argue, ‘look I’m helping my family, you cannot say I’m a bad person.’ Also, because they have money, they improve their position in the family, who are proud of them, which gives them a lot of pleasure. 

I stayed with them, those prostitutes. I was really interesting. I asked one woman, ‘what’s your favourite [food]?’ and she said, ‘toast on jam.’ She had begun to experiment with things; in the village you would never have heard of such things. I went to see her mother. I asked her what to buy for her mother, she said, ‘buy something my mother hasn’t tried.’ So this was all part of her trying new things. I bought her mother a durian. 

Why does the world need to know about China’s sex workers? 

Prostitution is just a device, a window to show the tensions and the changes. You can pack in so many important issues: migration, women’s position, the gap between city and rural. 

What challenges did you face when researching Lotus? 

Part of the biggest challenge is their life is so far removed from mine. One of my friends said: ‘try and work as a prostitute, you can satisfy your sexual needs, and you can make some money, and do your research.’ Imagine, if I had to work as a prostitute! I know I have lots of choices in life, so it’s difficult to identify with their life. 

They’re just humans, they’re very complicated. I really had lots of fun. They talk a lot about breasts and some of them have implants. One woman’s implants go sideways! You know, just awful. Before they are successful [with a client] they often go to the back room – they really compare their breasts! 

I went to another of the prostitutes’ home to visit her family. She had become quite successful, she had bought her family a flat and she no longer lived in the village. She went back because she was supposed to be sweeping the tomb for her stepfather and when she arrived she put on high heels. High heels! When we were walking to the mountain she was wearing high heels. To show [her change in status]. 

Sounds like you quite enjoyed that process. 

Of course, yes. But it took me so long! I worked as a volunteer, distributing condoms. If we hadn’t met, how could we have language, what would we talk about? If they’re not in my life, it would be difficult to imagine. So many small details in the book are real.

More in Zhen de Gender.

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you looking for more experts on cultural change at the China Speakers Bureau? Do check out list here.  

Sex in a country without sex education - Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

Next year author Zhang Lijia will publish her novel Lotus, on sex workers in southern China, inspired by her grandmother. Caijing interviews her about this inspiration and about how sex changed in China.

Caijing:

Your first novel, Lotus, which will be published by Henry Holt and Co. next year, revolves around the story of a sex worker in southern China. Where did you find the inspiration for it? 

Before she died, I discovered that my grandmother was a sex worker. She was an orphan and was sold into a brothel. She met my grandfather, a married small-time grain dealer, on the job, and then became his concubine. I was curious about how she coped, what her life was like. 

Then, when I was in Shenzhen for work, I went to a small saloon to get a haircut. The women there just giggled and said the only person who knew how to cut hair was not around. When I looked at the saloon floor there were no hair shavings. I just stared at those girls in their low-cut dresses for a few minutes before I realized the shop was just a front for a brothel. 

My grandma's story had planted the initial seed of curiosity in my mind. I interviewed several sex workers while in Shenzhen. I also worked as a volunteer for a non-governmental organization distributing condoms among sex workers in northern China. 

Many small details in the book are real. Prostitution is just a window to see the tensions and the changes happening now. You can pack in so many important issues like migration, women's position in society, the gap between cities and rural areas, etc. It's just a literary device. 

What were the challenges you faced when researching your novel? 

The biggest challenge was that the lives of sex workers were so far removed from mine. One of my friends said, "Try and work as a prostitute, you can satisfy your sexual needs, and you can make some money, and do your research." All the sex workers I have met sent money to their families. They knew what they were doing is wrong so they argue, "Look I'm helping my family, you cannot say I'm a bad person." I really had lots of fun researching the book. They talk a lot about breasts. One woman's implants had gone sideways, they really compare their breasts! 

Have attitudes toward sex and sex education changed? 

It has changed dramatically. I spoke with Li Yinhe, a famous sexologist, recently. She conducted a survey in 1989 and 85 percent of the respondents said they had no sexual experience before marriage. Now, by the time people get married, very few will have had no sexual experience. 

While sex before marriage has become commonplace, there's not enough sex education, especially among the rural population. When a couple gets married, they'll be given condoms. Village officials will demonstrate how to use them by putting the condom on the thumb. But, the woman still gets pregnant and they say, "Oh, how did that happen?" 

Sex education is supposed to be part of the curriculum but it is not taught in many schools. There's this explosion – the divorce rate is increasing, the number of abortions and cases of STDs have gone up rapidly – but sex education is lacking.

More in Caijing.

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your conference or meeting? Do get in in touch or fill in our speakers´request form.

Are you looking for more experts on cultural change at the China Speakers Bureau? Check out our list here.

Journalist Ian Johnson discusses spiritual values: what are Chinese looking for?

Tackling misconceptions about China: Mission Impossible? - Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

Between China and the rest of the world, an abyss of misunderstandings has to be bridged, and that is one of author Zhang Lijia´s missions, she tells in Prestige Hong Kong. She tells about the research into prostitution in China, the theme of her upcoming book, and inspired by her grandmother.

Prestige Hong Kong:

Public speaking, at home and overseas, broadens her audience farther. “I spend a lot of time travelling for business and pleasure – it’s one of my passions,” she says. “I used to live in such a small, confined world. Now that I’m out of it, I try to make the best of this freedom.” On a recent trip to the US, Zhang “gave a breakfast talk at the Four Seasons Hotel to HSBC New York and some of its clients”, she says. “I talked about my life and recent social and cultural changes – stuff you don’t read in newspapers.” Then it was on to Chicago and “a discussion at the Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, where my focus was Xi Jinping”. Yet Zhang has required still more avenues for the dissipation of a restless energy that perhaps built up during her decade in the depths of the well: witness the writing of her forthcoming debut novel. 

Titled Lotus and set in Shenzhen, it stars a photojournalist and a young sex worker who, like much of China itself, is torn between ineradicable tradition and the temptations of a mutating modern world. 

“I’m interested in prostitution because my grandma was a working girl in her youth,” reveals Zhang. “She was sold into prostitution after becoming an orphan. Since I discovered her secret, by her deathbed in 1998, it has fascinated me and I’ve wondered how the girls cope with life.” 

Zhang’s research was empirical. “I made a huge effort to befriend prostitutes, especially a lady who’s a former sex worker and who now runs an NGO helping girls on the street,” she says. “I worked for her organisation, distributing condoms, chatting with the girls and gaining invaluable insights. 

“But leaping into fiction writing has been an extremely difficult transition,” she admits. “Coming from a journalistic background, I find the freedom to create a believable world exciting but utterly intimidating. It’s taken me 16 major rewrites and more than 10 years to complete the book.” 

The girl whose international success is a direct descendant of The Carpenters’ hits turns 51 this month and is “feeling young and much happier with myself than in my earlier days,” she says. “I have a clearer idea of who I am and what I want from life.” 

Nor has she forgotten her musical inspiration. “When I hear The Carpenters I sing along happily,” says Zhang. “I sing their songs in the bathroom – the only place I’m allowed to. My children have banned me from singing in public.”

More in Prestige Hong Kong.

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers´ request form.

Are you looking for more political experts at the China Speakers Bureau? Do check out this list.  

Related articles

• The advantage of being a non-native English speaker - Zhang Lijia

Prostitution in China - Zhang Lijia

Zhang Lijia

Author Zhang Lijia reviews the novel Paying for It by Canadian comic artist Chester Brown about prostitution on her weblog, but gets nicely sidetracked into her own upcoming novel on prostitution in China.

Zhang Lijia

Who are the prostitutes? The majority of them are country girls from the poor hinterland, unskilled, poorly educated and ill-prepared for life in the city. Many of them work in karaoke bars, sing and dance halls, hair saloons and massage parlors. 

My beloved grandma worked as a prostitute for years after she became an orphan and then she was sold into prostitution. I’ve become fascinated by the subject ever since my mother disclosed this secret to me, shortly before grandma’s death. 

I am working on this novel about prostitution and also considering a non-fiction on the subject. For me, prostitution serves as an interesting window to see China and the tensions brought by the reforms. It deals with gender issues, economic issues (it contributes a lot to the GDP), the changing values and the sexual norms and of course corruption. 

Pan Suiming, China’s top sexologist, contends that China has a specific type of prostitution that entails a bargain between those who use their power and authority in government to obtain sex and those who use sex to obtain privileges. All exposed corrupt officials have mistress, often more than one. 

... I think in a civilized and democratic country like Canada, the clients are more likely respect the working girls. In China, men often think they can do whatever they like to the girls, for example, refusing to use a condom. The prostitutes are often the victim of robbery and violence. There are quite a few cases of them being murdered. 

Like Brown, I agree that women should have that choice. It’s her body. She should be allowed to do whatever she likes with it. I only hope that there should be more NGOs that can offer the working girls some support. I am very pleased to see that slowly such NGO’s are emerging. I know one former prostitute-turned lady (as robust as her chest) who runs such an organization in Tianjin, offering prostitutes free condoms, knowledge how to protect themselves and how to save money but she doesn’t try to pursue them to quit the profession.

More on Zhang Lijia's weblog.

Zhang Lijia interviewing prostitute

  

Zhang Lijia is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need her at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers' request form.

Related articles

• Democracy does suit the Chinese - Zhang Lijia (chinaspeakersbureau.info)
• Receiving hate-mail after my Yueyue story - Zhang Lijia (chinaspeakersbureau.info)
• Locusts and running dogs in Hong Kong - Zhang Lijia (chinaspeakersbureau.info)