Shanghai Express: A Thirties Novel

by Zhang Henshui

Book Overview

In this suspenseful tale of seduction and deception, a wealthy banker is smitten by an alluring young woman while traveling aboard the express train from Beijing to Shanghai. A consummate storyteller and one of the most popular novelists of his day, Zhang Henshui sweeps us on board with them and takes us through train stations and back and forth between first, second, and third class cars, evoking the smells of this microcosm of the urban world...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 082481830X
• ISBN13: 9780824818302
• Release Date: April 1997
• Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.6" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

A fine novel

I would disagree strongly with the notion that this is a "trashy" novel. As William Lyell says in his afterward, just because this was a "popular" novel i.e. one intended for a mass audience, does not automatically mean it is trash. The story is told in simple and vivid prose, aided by the masterful translation of Dr. Lyell. The author obviously was a gifted story teller. He shows in this novel an ability for evoking the reality of his characters as he simply describes their actions. The story does not exactly evoke the profoundest human emotions but it does do so with considerable skill nonetheless, particularly at the end. In addition, the author's eye for details is quite profound; life on the trains are described with great precision, particularly life in and the denizens of, the train's third class car. About eighty five or ninety percent of the story takes place on the "Shanghai Express", a train going from Beijing to Shanghai. The novel takes place in the mid 30's, when it was first published. The story takes place over the several days of the trip and involves the eventually successful intrigue by passenger Hu Ziyun to get into bed, a young female fellow passanger, Liu Xichun. Ziyun is a very successful banker and Xichun claims to have married into the family of one of his friends. The novel is quite drawn out and, perhaps consciously intended for its popular audience, well into the book springs upon the reader, a major twist, relating to the character of Liu Xichun. After this twist is fully exposed, we jump forward about ten years and look at the very profound tragedy of what has become of Hu Ziyun. That evocation of that tragedy by the author is probably the most impressive part of the book. I was most bothered in the novel by some of the lengthy dialogues about their relationship between Xichun and Ziyun which sometimes seem a little unnatural and slightly abstrusely over-intellectualized. Overall, however, the novel is pretty impressive.