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Executive Times |
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2008 Book Reviews |
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A Free
Life by Ha Jin |
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Rating: |
*** |
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(Recommended) |
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Click
on title or picture to buy from amazon.com |
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Home Ha Jin’s new novel, A Free
Life, presents the immigrant Chinese experience of life in America with a
steady progression of scenes of ordinary life. The protagonists are a family:
Nan Wu, his wife Pingping, and their son, Taotao. Nan Wu came to America at
the time of the Tiananmen Square protests, and as the title indicates, over
time he gained A Free
Life. Here’s an excerpt, all of Chapter 4, pp. 21-23: These days Pingping was so happy
that even her Jim felt lighten An internal plow expanded in her, and a
pinkish sheen frequently came over her face. She often hummed Chinese folk
songs when she was cooking or sewing. Whenever she went shopping or to the
post office, shed take Taotao along as if the boy might disappear the moment
she left him alone Even when Taotao played within the yard, shod accompany
him, Behind Heidi’s house, beyond the blueberry bushes, lay a Lamas court,
green and springy as if coated with rubber surrounded by a tall steel fence. But
the Wus didn't go there. Instead, they often kicked a volleyball under a
basketball hoop In the front yard. Taotao played only soccer. Pingping understood that the joyful
days were temporary, because the summer would end soon—the Masefields would
crone hack and she'd resume doing the housework. Furthermore, Taotao would
begin school in early September which might be hard for him. She had been
reading children's books in English together with him for five or six hours a
day. Since he watched a lot of TV, he had begun to pick up words, able to say
"Uh-oh,” “Okay-dokey,” and even “Get lost.” Having him with her, Pinping
felt more certain how she would live. In the past years she had prepared
herself mentally for returning to China, because Nan had planned to go back
and teach at his alma mater, a small college in Harbin City. Yet whenever she
dreamed of home, she'd have nightmares, in which she rushed around looking
for a clean toilet but couldn't find one. Nan told her that modern restrooms had
been put up in many Chinese cities lately; in fact, there had been a campaign
to modernize the public facilities, and to use some of them you'd have to
pay, like buying a cup of tea. Nan would joke, “Like no free lunch in America, there’ll be no free bathrooms in China anymore. Too many people." Pingping
couldn't stop searching for a toilet in her dreams. But since Taotao came,
her nightmares had mostly stopped and her head had grown clearer. Even if Nan
changed his mind and returned to China someday, she'd live in America raising
their child alone. She was sure of that. Nan had come to the United States alone in the
summer of 1985. A year and a half later Pingping had managed to leave China.
But the officials wouldn't allow her to bring Taotao along for fear she might
not return, so the boy stayed with her parents in Jinan City, a provincial
capital more than two hundred miles south of Beijing. Soon after her arrival
in Boston, Pingping told Nan that she wanted to save $20,000 before they went
back home. That astonished Nan, to whom the figure was unreasonable, though
he already had more than $3,600 in the bank. He had never cared about getting
rich and would tease her, saying she was a born capitalist. Yet Pingping
wanted financial independence, which meant a tidy sum in their bank account
so that they wouldn't worry about getting a raise that had to be approved by
officials at whose feet many people would grovel. So she resolved to make
money and save as much as possible while they lived here. Among his
compatriots at Brandeis, Nan was known as a rich man after his first year at
the school, mainly because he had worked constantly to earn the money needed
for his wife's visa—the U.S. embassy in Beijing required a bank statement
that showed at least $3,000. Unlike the graduate students in the science
departments, Nan didn't have a stipend and had to take care of his own living
expenses. To save time for his study, he'd cook himself huge meals, each of
which he'd eat for half a week. Sometimes he slept only three or four hours a
day. He lived such an industrious life that he had lost more than twenty
pounds by the time Pingping came to join him. Two and a half years later, after Pingping had worked
in a nursing home for a year and then for Heidi for a year and a half, and
after Nan had done various odd jobs, the Wus had saved $30,000. Yet this sum
didn't give them any sense of security, because now they were planning to
live here permanently. If Nan quit his Ph.D. candidacy, Pingping wasn't sure
what he was going to do. Though she knew he didn't love her, she loved him
deeply. Before she'd married him, her father had warned her that she might
not live a secure life with Nan, who, though a decent young man, was by
nature impractical, an incorrigible dreamer. Yet she had never regretted
being his wife, though she did feel hurt from time to time and was even
tempted to drink (though she disliked American wines and there was no way to
find the kind of fragrant Luzhou liquor here, of which she had used to pilfer
mouthfuls from her father's bottles when she was a child). She was certain
Nan wouldn't just walk out on her. For better or worse, he was trustworthy
and dependable. Now that Taotao was here, Nan was all the more willing to be
the head of the household. In his own words, "To be the draft horse
pulling the cart of this family." "I'll look for a full-time job soon,"
he told Pingping one afternoon. Their son was napping in the other room. "What kind of jobs do you have in
mind?" "Do I have a choice?" Again a caustic
edge sharpened his voice. "Don't be nasty. I always can work too." That mollified him some. He sighed, "I'll
keep my eyes open for jobs." Pingping remained silent, feeling guilty because
Heidi didn't pay her during the summer. They had spent thousands of dollars
recently and couldn't afford to stay home eating away their savings. Yet she
wanted to teach Taotao some basics before his school started, so it was Nan
who needed to look for a job. It was reported that the U.S. government was
going to issue green cards to the Chinese students who did not intend to
return to China. Professor Nicholson in Nan's department, a specialist in
American domestic policy, had assured him that the United States would
definitely keep the Chinese students here. This baggy-eyed scholar said to
Nan, "Believe me, any country will be willing to have the cream of
China's young generation." That was probably true. Indeed, both Canada
and Australia had just granted permanent residency to all the Chinese
students and scholars living there. Pingping and Nan felt relieved to know
they wouldn't have to spend thousands of dollars and wait years for green
cards like most immigrants. Still, they were unsettled. Mentally they were
not prepared for such a new life. Through the mundane description
of the Wus life over the course of over 670 pages, Jin assembles a
comprehensive view of life on the pages of A Free
Life. Readers who are in no rush can savor his description, dialogue, and
development of characters, and appreciate all that it takes to create a home.
Steve
Hopkins, May 15, 2008 |
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The recommendation rating for
this book appeared in the June 2008 issue of Executive Times URL for this review: http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/Books/A Free Life.htm For Reprint Permission, Contact: Hopkins & Company, LLC • E-mail: books@hopkinsandcompany.com |
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