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Title: Beijing Coma: A Novel
ISBN: 0374110174
Author:
Ma Jian
Publicate Date: 2008-05-27
Publish: 2008-05-27
List Price: $27.50
Average Customer Rating: 4.0
Format: Hardcover
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $16.05
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $16.99
Amazon Merchant Price: $18.15
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Bejing Coma
Too many characters, too many stories to follow. But it is historically acurate just too many details. Way beyond the point.
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2: Beijing Coma and Rabbit in the Moon
Anyone who has enjoyed and appreciated "Beijing Coma" should read "Rabbit in the Moon" by Deborah and Joel Shlian. Both are incredible insights into Chinese culture and so relevant to how China is positioning itself in the world today.
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3: China from Cultural Revolution onward
Ma Jian's Beijing Coma is very well written, albeit with a bit of the stilted sound you get when Chinese is translated to English. (Readers of this book might also want to read Life and Death in Shanghai by Nien Cheng, a fascinating, brutal, nonfiction work describing the author's incarceration during the Cultural Revolution. I learned a lot about the Cultural Revolution from that book.)
Beijing Coma is narrated by the character of Dai Wei, a molecular biology doctoral student in Beijing. Caught up in the pro-democracy student-led protests leading up to the massacre at Tiananmen Square in 1989, Dai Wei is shot in the head and lapses into a coma. Despite his appearance as a "vegetable," he is sentient, his sense of hearing and smell intensified greatly in compensation for his loss of sight and speech.
I was a child during the Cultural Revolution and never knew anything about it; it was amazing to me, upon reading Cheng's book mentioned above, that this could have happened in my lifetime. I was an adult during the protests in Tiananmen Square and followed the news coverage of that time. Despite this, I was astounded, in reading Beijing Coma, at descriptions of life under the Chinese government, at the bravery of the students and others who participated in the protests, and, especially, at the long-term ramifications that participation in the protests had on the students and citizens. For example, no doctor will treat or even examine Dai Wei once they learn he received his wound at Tiananmen Square. Everyone is terrified of the government.
The book alternates between Dai Wei's memories of his life before being shot and his (internal) observations of his life in the coma, where he lives at home and is cared for by his increasingly unstable and resentful mother.
In my opinion the book could have been improved by a little editing; there are long sections of Dai Wei's internal molecular damage that seemed a little excessive. But that's a minor quibble: I found the book a worthwhile read, very informative about China as it has evolved from the Cultural Revolution to a modern society, wrestling with its desire to enter the modern capitalist world and still control its citizens. It's heartbreaking.
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4: I want to read it again!
Ma Jian's Beijing Coma was a really enlightening novel. I learned so much about China- the good and the bad. This novel exposed me for the first time to the horrifying Cultural Revolution and the Tiananmen Square massacre- really important events that no one bothered to teach in high school history. What you find in this book will alternatively inspire and infuriate you, and at no time will Ma Jian leave you feeling apathetic.
The writing in this novel is unique. The narration is delivered with a certain sparsity and emotionless quality, but is occasionally punctuated with incredibly poignant and striking images and revelations that take you aback and force you to pause and reflect. The novel reminds me a bit of the fiction of Sartre and Camus, but with distinguishing elements that are Ma Jian's own.
In any case, the novel is brilliant. Read it. It is an accessible opportunity to experience the richness of another culture's literature.
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5: China same old same old
Bejing Coma is a delightfully written book telling one man's story of his childhood and upbringing in Mao's China and the immediate aftermath . What struck me was the amazingly law abiding behaviour of the Chinese and their stoical acceptance of authority .
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