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我就要看看,《雪花密扇》究竟能折腾出个什么名堂

本帖已经被作者加入个人空间
The Interior, Lisa See's gripping follow-up to her best-selling novel Flower Net, follows Liu Hulan and David Stark into China's remote countryside on a heart-pounding journey that begins as a favor to an old friend- and ends with a shocking revelation of murder, betrayal, and greed. After a hit and run accident that leaves a close friend dead, David accepts the job opportunity of a lifetime when he's asked to open a law office for Phillips, MacKenzie & Stout in Hulan's home city of Beijing. Meanwhile, Hulan has received an urgent message from an old friend imploring her to investigate the suspicious death of her daughter. The scent of trouble wafts up almost immediately as David and Hulan realize their separate cases have a surprising element in common: the dead girl worked for Knight International, the toy company about to be sold to David's new biggest client, Tartan Enterprises.
In spite of David's protests, Hulan goes undercover, transforming herself from Red Princess to peasant girl, to gain entry into the Knight factory compound. Once inside, rather than finding answers to the girl's death, Hulan unearths more questions, all of which point to possible crimes committed by David's client- ranging from corruption to child labor to unsafe manufacturing practices to far worse. Suddenly Hulan and David find themselves on opposite corners: One of them is trying to expose a company and unearth a killer, while the other is ethically bound to protect his client. Their independent activities collide when a female worker, who gets seriously wounded on the factory floor where Hulan is working, later winds up dead- her body discovered close to where David is finalizing the details of the merger with Knight and Tartan executives.
As the body count rises, the "accidents" and "suicides" begin to look more and more like cold-blooded murders, with the possible suspects ranging from an old peasant farmer to a popular government official to the genius inventor behind Knight International's wildly popular action figure toys. Hulan's trip into the countryside to help piece together clues about her friend's daughter's life brings her back to the past she's long been running from- and forces her to face some ugly truths about herself. At the same time, David sees that his deep desire to overlook the truth- about Hulan's feelings concerning his move to Beijing, about his colleague's death, about his new client's activities- could possibly cost him everything, both professionally and personally.
Deftly weaving her plot from the affluent streets of Los Angeles to the teeming city of Beijing to the primitive culture of China's country villages, Lisa See reveals the striking contrast between Eastern tradition and Western beliefs, the privilege and betrayal of the ruling class, the poverty and desperation of peasant life, and the pull of professional duty and the power of "true heart love." An enthralling story that keeps you guessing until the end, The Interior takes readers deep into the heart of China to reveal universal truths about good and evil, right and wrong- and the sometimes subtle lines that distinguish them.

Praise for The Interior

"Lisa See is one of the classier practitioners of that ready-for-Hollywood genre, the international thrillerÖ She draws her characters (especially her Chinese heroine, Liu Hulan) with convincing depth, and offers up documentary social detail that reeks of freshly raked muckÖ Seeís China is as vivid as Upton Sinclairís Chicago."
The New York Times
"[Seeís] true ambition is not simply to entertain (which she does) but to illuminate the exotic society that is contemporary China, and to explore the consequences ‚ present and future ‚ of its growing partnership with the United StatesÖ See paints a fascinating portrait of a complex and enigmatic society, in which nothing is ever quite as it appears, and of the people, peasant and aristocrat alike, who are bound by its subtle strictures."
The San Diego Union Tribune
"SophisticatedÖ.Seeís writing is more graceful than is common in the genre, and she still has China passionately observed."
The Los Angeles Times
"The Interior is packed with well-researched and nuanced reporting on todayís ChinaÖHulan is an insightful guide to both Chinese corruption and those who resist it."
Washington Post
"Immediate, haunting and exquisitely rendered, a fine line drawing of the sights and smells of the road overseas."
San Francisco Chronicle
"[An] unflinching portrait [of] modern-day China."
Booklist
"The novel eschews any cheap exoticism to plunge the reader into the puzzle that is China today as seen through the eyes of outsiders. A unique read, whose credible protagonists make this a thriller with a heart."
The Saturday Review
"A cracking good story."
The Good Book Guide
"The strength of Seeís work here is her detailed and intimate knowledge of contemporary China, its mores, its peculiar mixture of the traditional and the contemporary, and its often bedeviled relationships with the U.S."
Publishers Weekly
"A must-read for those looking for foreign intrigue."
Rocky Mountain News
"A well-written book with a complex plotÖShines a harsh and revealing light on the modern-day Chinese interior and on Beijing, the real China beneath the postcard imagesÖShe explores themes of Old China and new China, and how the more things change the more they remain the same. She illuminates tradition and change, Western and Eastern cultural differences, and the real politics behind the system. All this in the middle of her thriller which is also about greed, corruption, abuse of the disadvantaged, the desperation of those on the bottom of the food chain, and love."
Nashville Tennessean
"A unique readÖa thriller with a heart."
The Guardian

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As we look towards the 21st century, biracialism and biculturalism are becoming increasingly common. Skin color and place of birth are no longer reliable signifiers of one's identity or origin. Simple questions like "What are you?' and "Where are you from?" aren't answered- they are discussed.
Half & Half is a collection of personal essays by eighteen writers on the experience of being biracial and bicultural in America today. The essays are joined by a shared sense of duality and address the difficulties of not fitting in and the benefits of fitting into two worlds. In her essay, Lisa See uses her grandmother's funeral to discuss her memories of growing up in a Chinese-American family and what it means to feel Chinese when you have red hair and freckles. Other contributors include James McBride, Garrett Hongo, Indira Ganesan, Meri Nana-Ama Danquah and Julia Alvarez.
Praise for Half & Half
"These writers… are, by and large, trying to forge an identity that reconciles the basic human desire to fit in and yet remain separate, distinct, special."
New York Times Magazine
"The future is here in these fascinating looks at complicated identities. Insightful, hilarious, and often heartbreaking."
Cristina Garcia - The Aguero Sisters
"A wonderful and thought-provoking collection."
Caryl Phillips - The Nature of Blood
"Half & Half is more than the sum of its parts- it is at once somber and hilarious, irreverent and moving. These writers show us, in the alchemy of their art, how their experiences in identifying who they are make not only for cultural news but for riveting reading."
Chang-Rae Lee - Native Speaker
"Half & Half is brilliant… In the face of snowballing intolerance and social and family obstacles, the writers in Half & Half safeguard each feverish distinction in unforgettable voices."
Maria Flook - My Sister Life

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最后说的是铜钱吧。怎么翻译成cash

What is your educational background?
I went to Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. I started out as an art history major, but I graduated with a B.A. in the Humanities. I ended up creating my own major, which was Modern Greek Studies. On the surface it would seem like that wouldn’t have helped me much as a writer, but actually it did. I learned the pleasures and surprises of research, which are at the heart of all of my books.
Where do you live? Do you have a family?
I live in Brentwood, California. (Yep, that’s right, of O.J. Simpson fame.) I’m married. My husband is an attorney. I have two sons. Alexander is working in Boston. Christopher is a student at Stanford. These three men are the greatest joys of my life.
Did you have a favorite teacher?
I had two. The first was Mrs. Bruinslot, my fifth grade teacher at Topanga Canyon Elementary School. She was a wild and fiery old dame. She loved history and she made it come alive by talking about the quirkiness of each individual person instead of the usual recitation of dates, wars, presidents, and kings. She taught me that history is something that happens to individual people. I used that idea with On Gold Mountain, the mysteries, and now Snow Flower and the Secret Fan.

The other great teacher in my life is my mom, Carolyn See, who’s a wonderful and much beloved writer. She is the most incredible person, truly! She taught me to write a thousand words a day, stay focused, not get dragged down by the negativity in the publishing business, and to have fun. If you can’t have fun writing, then what’s the point?

How and when did you decide to become a writer?
I knew three things about myself when I was growing up. I never wanted to get married, I didn’t want to have children, and I always wanted to live out of a suitcase. I took two years off from college to travel in Europe. The whole time I was wondering how I was going to make my life work the way I envisioned it and how I would be able to afford it. One morning, when I was living in Greece, I woke up and it was like a cartoon light bulb had gone off in my head. I thought, Oh, I could be a writer! But clearly I didn’t know myself very well, because I got married and had children. I still spend an awful lot of time living out of a suitcase though!
Why do you write about China?
I’m part Chinese. My great-great-grandfather came here to work on the building of the transcontinental railroad. My great-grandfather was the godfather/patriarch of Los Angeles Chinatown. I don’t look at all Chinese, but I grew up in a very large Chinese-American family. I have hundreds of relatives in Los Angeles, of which there are only about a dozen that look like me.

All writers are told to write what they know. My family is what I know. And what I don’t know – nu shu, for example – I love to find out whatever I can and then bring my sensibility to the subject. I guess what I’m trying to say is that in many ways I straddle two cultures. I try to bring what I know from both cultures into my work. The American side of me tries to open a window into China and things Chinese for non-Chinese, while the Chinese side of me makes sure that what I’m writing is true to the Chinese culture without making it seem too “exotic” or “foreign.” What I want people to get from my books is that all people on the planet share common life experiences – falling in love, getting married, having children, dying – and share common emotions – love, hate, greed, jealousy. These are the universals; the differences are in the particulars of customs and culture.

What’s your writing process?
I get up early and work on my e-mail for an hour or two. Then I write 1,000 words a day. That’s only four pages. Some days I write more, but I try never to write less. I usually have an outline and I write from beginning to end without stopping to edit. Some writers won’t move forward until they get one page absolutely perfect, but I think you can spend a lot of time questioning yourself and making things perfect before going on. Also, if you write straight through, you allow magic to happen.

A good example of that was when I was working on The Interior. (If you’re about to read that book, don’t read the rest of this paragraph.) It’s a mystery, so a body was discovered up around page three and the identity of the killer and the conspiracy were going to be revealed around page 400. I was working one day—typing and minding my own business—when all of a sudden it turned out the killer was someone completely different than who I’d planned. But I loved the scene. I knew I’d have to go back and add some clues and bits and pieces so that readers wouldn’t be upset that the killer had just popped out of nowhere. So I went back to the beginning and there he was in the first scene! In fact, he’d done everything he’d needed to do. That, to me, is the magic of writing and it was something I never could have planned.

What advice would you give aspiring writers?
Write 1,000 words each day before you do anything else. That’s only four pages, but at the end of a week you’ll have twenty pages. If you do it first thing in the morning, then you won’t get distracted by all the things that tempt you not to write.

So much of writing happens, I think, in the editing process. I tell aspiring writers that they should listen to criticism – whether it’s from a teacher or an editor – and then look at it three ways. About a third of all editing suggestions are right, a third are absolutely wrong, and a third are things you have to look at, consider, and play around with.

What’s your favorite all-time book?
Ameliaranne and the Magic Ring, by Eleanor Farjeon. My grandmother picked up this children’s book at a thrift store many, many years ago, so it was old and very used when she gave it to me. It’s about a little girl who longs to own a special doll from the local toy store but can’t possibly afford it. Ameliaranne wins a toy ruby ring from a grab bag run by gypsies. Then she finds out that the old woman who runs the toyshop mistakenly gave her life savings to the gypsies, who also deal in rags. Ameliaranne finds the daughter of the gypsy grab bag/rag dealer and trades her ruby ring for the lost sock with the money. In the end, the old woman gives Ameliaranne the doll as a reward. I loved this story! Then my little sister lost the book. Spring forward about thirty-five years. My sister did an international search, found a copy on the Internet, and gave it to me for my birthday in 2005. It turns out that while there is an entire series of Ameliaranne books, only 2,000 copies were printed of Ameliaranne and the Magic Ring. It’s amazing how clearly I had remembered the story and even whole sections of text, but what really struck me was that in many ways I had modeled my life on Ameliaranne. Not only that, the title of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan bears a striking resemblance to Ameliaranne and the Magic Ring. The subconscious works in mysterious ways. What types of music do you like? Is there any particular kind you like to listen to when you’re writing? I listen to all types of music—hip hop, Indian tabla, South African township, soundtracks, Mexican jarocho, norteno, and mariachi, everything really. I love the Beach Boys, Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell, Bonnie Raitt, and the Stones—lots of stuff from the sixties; on the other side of the spectrum, I think 50 Cent, OutKast, and Eminem really know how to tell stories and they’re funny too. I also love opera. I’ve learned a lot about storytelling, specifically how to tell a story through the pure emotion of music, through opera. The language is gorgeous too. And I can’t help it, but I love Dylan. I realize his voice isn’t as melodious as it could be, but I still think the guy’s a genius. He can tell an entire story in just a few minutes. He uses beautiful and interesting words, and I love the cadence and rhythm of his writing.

Words are distracting when I’m writing, so my favorite CDs to work to are “Puccini without Words,” which has—obviously—Puccini’s opera scores minus the words, the soundtrack to “Monsoon Wedding,” and Midori playing Mozart’s sonatas.

Do you have any special writing rituals? For example, what do you have on your desk when you’re writing?

I don’t have any special rituals other than starting early so I don’t get distracted by the day and drinking lots and lots of decaffeinated tea. On my desk I have photos of my sons, Chinese wind-up toys, a pencil holder my youngest son made for me, a photo of a dim sum lunch I made that was really gorgeous (if I do say so myself), a dictionary of Chinese street language, and the research notebooks I’ve used for each book so I can refer back to them.What are you working on now? When I first heard about nu shu, I thought, how could this exist and I didn’t know about it? Then I thought, how could this exist and we all didn’t know about it? So often we hear that in the past there were no women writers, no women artists, no women historians. There were women, but supposedly they didn’t do anything. But of course they did things. It’s just so often what they did was lost, forgotten, or deliberately covered up. In all of my books, I’ve tried to find and bring back lost stories. More and more, I find I’m increasingly drawn to the lost stories of women.My new book is like a mirror image of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, which was about 19 th-century uneducated women who found solace and friendship through their secret writing. In the 17 th-century, in the Hangzhou area of China, the women were extremely well educated, came from wealthy families, but still had bound feet. There were more women writers in this area who were being published than altogether in the rest of the world at that time. My new novel focuses on a sub-category of these women called the lovesick maidens.

This story is based on fact and focuses on three young women. The first was a sixteen-year-old girl, Chen Tong, who was engaged to be married. She loved an opera called The Peony Pavilion, which is about a girl who catches a case of lovesickness, dies, comes back to earth as a ghost, and is eventually resurrected through true love. Chen Tong used to stay up late at night to read the opera, and then write her thoughts about the characters and the nature of love in the margins of the story. Unfortunately, like the main character in the opera, she became lovesick, wasted away, and died. The poet she was engaged to married another sixteen-year-old girl, who also loved The Peony Pavilion. She added her thoughts to the same volume as her predecessor. She lent the volume to a friend, who showed it around Hangzhou. Everyone kept asking, “Who could have written such wonderful thoughts about love?” To which the second wife responded, “My husband.” He became quite famous for this, but she caught a case of lovesickness, wasted away, and died. The poet married a third time to yet another sixteen-year-old girl. She added her thoughts in the margins, but she was made of different stuff than her two predecessors. She pawned her wedding jewelry, and used the money to have the volume published. “The Three Wives Commentary” became the first book of literary criticism written by women to be published in the world. I’m writing the novel as a ghost story within a ghost story. It’s about love, how women find their purpose in life, and those emotions which are so strong that they transcend time, place, and perhaps even death.   

Is there a specific talent you would most like to have?
I’d love to have ESP, an awesome serve for tennis, to be able to TIVO in real life, and to know where the commas go at all times.
If you weren't a writer what would you be?
A landscape architect.
How do you spend your time when you’re not writing?
I go for walks and play tennis. I love movies and see about 100 a year. But frankly, I don’t have much free time. I’m a L.A. City Commissioner. I also curate the occasional museum exhibition and do tons of speaking events each year. I’m also a freak when it comes to letter writing. I write lots of letters, and I think I’m pretty good at answering my e-mail in a timely way. (So write to me!) My days are extraordinarily full with all sorts of things and I have to say no more than I’d like so I can write.
In Snow Flower, you often refer to cash. What is that?
Cash was a type of money used in China. It was round and usually had a square cutout in the middle.

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这个论坛的人气实在是

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太长。看了半个小时。。。

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引用:
原帖由 沙野 于 2010-5-16 22:25 发表
太长。看了半个小时。。。
帖子质量高嘛,哈哈。。。。。。。

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我喜欢苏菲玛索

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引用:
原帖由 代启福 于 2010-5-17 19:34 发表
我喜欢苏菲玛索
me,too

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江永女书,老师说像女性做刺绣一样的文字...一定很美

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引用:
原帖由 amyyangamy 于 2010-5-22 16:39 发表
江永女书,老师说像女性做刺绣一样的文字...一定很美
内容也很凄美。。。。
干嘛要签名,又不是真名。。。。。

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看见电影觉得还是不要相信外国人编排创造的。一个法国女人能够了解公元1800年中期的湖南小镇吗。女主人公惺惺相惜。尼娜为了索菲娅甚至放弃考入清华的机会?相信她乱编都不会编。湖南小镇上面的良家梳女是画面女演员那个搞活样子吗。画面片中一面的所谓女书出现,则被定位成民俗艺术。也因了此,这一部胡编的影片也被定位成了什么“民俗史实大片”。用来恐吓我们人民观众。片中的所谓“老同”“女书”种类的文化元素一闪,只是能让西国观众天书一般了解误读所谓中国文化。

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东方民俗能让合拍片“里外通吃”吗

中国评论新闻网   2011-07-06 11:39:22   


  
  中评社香港7月6日电/《解放日报》报道,“十九世纪的中国,女人必须裹足,生活与外界几乎完全隔绝。在湖南省一个偏远地区的妇女,发展出她们独特的沟通密码:女书。有些少女结为‘老同’,如同精神上的婚配,情谊可延续一生……”电影《雪花秘扇》开宗明义,“女书”和“老同”这两个神秘且暧昧的民俗文化符号即是影片“题眼”。因传媒大亨默多克的华裔妻子邓文迪首次筹划电影项目,《雪花密扇》从开拍起就备受关注。公映后,《雪花密扇》票房尚可,但争议更大,制片方冀图以东方民俗的展示让影片“里外通吃”,但观众并不买账。

  花谁的钱?

  “拍《雪花密扇》没有用我丈夫或是我自己的钱”,让邓文迪骄傲的是,虽然是第一次拍电影,但在《雪花密扇》这一电影项目上,她扮演的并非“金主”角色,而是成功进行了一次资本运作。

  资本最擅长资源优化配置,考察《雪花秘扇》的每一项资源配置看得出都经过精打细算——要为西方观众展示东方奇趣观感,以《喜福会》大受好评的华裔导演王颖是最佳选择;亚洲市场主打韩国演员全智贤以及李冰冰的明星号召力,欧美市场则有“金刚狼”休.杰克曼出演的噱头(虽然他的戏份只能以“打酱油”形容);剧本脱胎于华裔女作家邝丽莎的欧美畅销小说(虽然写的是中国故事,却是英文小说);题材亘古及今,“女书”和“老同”这两项民俗的延展还有难以言说的禁断和暧昧感……无论从保存、传播民俗的文化意义,抑或从商业角度来看,《雪花密扇》都算得上一个好项目。  




  拍给谁看?

  好项目未必等于好电影。让中国观众很快“出戏”的是电影开头李冰冰饰演的尼娜接到医院电话,被告知全智贤饰演的索菲亚遭遇车祸入院。虽然电话那头说的是“上海徐汇某某医院”,但电话两头的对白却都是先说英文,再说普通话。此后,英文、中文乃至韩语在影片中交替出现,不少观众表示“听得头晕”。从语言使用管窥全豹,有观众评价,影片上下透着一种别扭感——你很难说清这是外国导演还是中国导演拍的中国故事,但有一点感觉很明显,它是拍给外国人看而不是给中国观众看的。

  中国观众“出戏”,国际观众是否“入戏”尚未可知,但有一点可以明确,瞄准国际观众窥探东方秘闻的心态,也许能让一部电影卖座,但离艺术成功还很远。国际化不是一件容易的事情,拍给外国人看的“中国故事”,回到中国观众面前冀图漂亮地来个 “里外通吃”,更不容易。

  如何表现?

  事实上,民俗题材电影算得上“第五代”导演的成名利器。无论是《大红灯笼高高挂》《红高粱》还是《黄土地》,“挂红灯笼”、“裹脚”、“颠轿”等等“民俗”,在电影中是美学符号,是仪式感,亦是东方奇观。经过数十年嬗变,以《雪花密扇》为代表的新“民俗电影”,背负了更多的商业目标。“民俗”在电影中更多地意味着话题性和商业元素。

  应该说,以电影这一流行文化的方式让古老民俗得到更好的被保留和传播的机会,值得称许。如《雪花秘扇》中的“女书”是世界上唯一供女性阅读和学习的文字,1982年被发现,2004年最后一位自然传人谢世,2006年被收录进第一批国家级非物质文化遗产名录,具有很高的文字学价值和社会学价值。但如何让民俗避开猎奇角度,真正展示魅力,则是电影语言需要思量的问题。有文化作底蕴、有观念作支撑、有明星当头面,民俗电影可为空间很大,“里外通吃”并非奢望,而电影人在资本的资源配置外,更需要动情感的脑筋。

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