Reviews and Comments

the book shows its age: the guy is your prototype orientalist white scholar-cum-adventurer and no surprise some claims float around that Indiana Jones is based on this character. Thrill seeking, entitled, opinionated and racist AF yet the whole way through he manages to write well enough for me to feel I don’t want to put the book down. I keep thinking that if he gets himself killed when his disguise falls through, he’d bloody well deserved it for lack of respect to other cultures he claims to study, and yet I feel the tension each time he gets into a sticky situation. No indication at the end he paid his servants (enough) for what they had to put up with, or what happened to them when he returned to India!

Good overview of chances open for improving education, but also remaining in the final analysis a bit to hopeful or presenting things as easy to achieve in the final part, when you need a totally different culture outside schools to make this work. Ambitious, yes. Achievable? Only with time and effort, but worth a shot

Great story- classic procedural but satisfying to read

Improving my French by reading on my commute

Ongelooflijk mooie zinnen, waarmee de auteur een heel specifieke sfeer in het naoorlogse Vlaanderen weet op te roepen, en ook spanning opbouwt. Ik had constant mijn grootouders voor ogen (die een andere ervaring hadden van WWII), en hoe het dorpsleven er aantoe ging gebaseerd op de verhalen die ik hoorde.

Heel veel blijft open voor de fantasie van de lezer, net zoals ik het graag heb, en toch is er een afgerond einde.

(Read the first chapter a long time ago, now settling in to read through the entire thing, slowly)

If you're not crying when you're reading at the climax of this volume are you even human? Hm... Considering our two protagonists, maybe not!

Yes, Gao E finishes things in a way that not everybody may be happy with. Did Cao Xueqin set the book up to end in this way or did Gao E egg on the allegory too much? I dunno, but darn it, I still like this 120 chapter edition and how Bao-yu gets to where he supposedly needs to be.

I read this when I started my Chinese Studies degree many years ago, used a few chapters in teaching, re-read the whole first volume (this one) a few years back and just keep being floored by the quality of the writing and translation. Best novel ever? Happy to give it this accolade if it gets you reading the thing. Four more volumes of thickening plot after this one!

Due to various circumstances not to do with the book, it took me ages to read. It’s a classic in the field, and well worth the time, great research and a great first book from a great author/scholar.

Interesting ideas to engage with but still thinking there is something more to why leftist ideas are more prevalent at unis and probably has something to do with class/background as the professorate is shifting. Older colleagues often were less left (even outspoken right wing) but they also were of the male pale and stale variety so have more to lose by giving up the status quo. I need to think a bit more through this.

sounds like a fun book - adding to my list!

(Appr. start date) Contains some wonderful sentences, lush prose. There is a lot of detail but I do enjoy this for my current read