Thursday, August 15, 2013

Review: The Dark Road

The Dark Road
By Ma Jian
Translated by Flora Drew
Penguin June 2013
375 pages
From the library

The Dark Road

Meili is pregnant with her second child. What should be a time of celebration is overshadowed by danger. Meili and her husband Kongzi live in China and they don't have a permit to have a second child. Kongzi is determined to have a son and continue the proud line of Confucius. When family planning officials start to close in on their village, the couple flee with their daughter Nannan. They travel down the Yangtze River, living in deplorable circumstances and always looking over their shoulders for the authorities who will rip their family apart. 

This is the first book in a long time that I actually had to convince myself to keep reading. This book is incredibly graphic and dark. The knowledge while that Meili may be fictional, her plight is not makes it even more difficult to stomach. Family planning officials have the ability to take you off the street to sterilize you, insert an IUD, or perform a late term abortion. They will then send you on your way...with the bill, of course. 

Meili is caught between two forces - her husband's determination to have a son and the government's determination to control their family. While the government may be cruel, her husband is equally so as he puts his desire to have a son over the safety of the family he already has. "When she met him at seventeen, she believed marriage was for ever, that the government protects and cares for the people, and that husbands protect and care for their wives. But as soon as she got married, these naive beliefs were shattered. She discovered that women don't own their bodies: their wombs and genitals are battle zones over which their husband and the state fight for control - territories their husbands invade for sexual gratification and to produce male heirs, and which the state probes, monitors, guards and scrapes so as to assert its power and spread fear. These continual intrusions into her body's most intimate parts have made her lose her sense of who she is. All she is certain of is that she is a legal wife and an illegal mother."

Throughout the book, Jian changes the point of view from Meili to the spirit of her unborn child. This gives him the opportunity to have some omniscient narration alongside Meili's version of events. This technique is jarring and I was often tempted to skip over it in order to get back to the main narrative. However, I can see how Jian thought using the infant spirit would both give a voice to the fetus whose fate is the focus of this book and illustrate the reverence that many Chinese people (such as Kongzi) have for the spirits and their ancestors.

The Dark River truly exhibits the dissonance of life in rural China. While Meili talks about becoming a businesswoman and longs for certain high-end purses and shoes, she also makes dinner by scraping the skins of potatoes with a shard of glass. The contrast between what she sees and the little that she has makes her story all the more heartbreaking. In some instances, modern China looks just like the modern US. But in the darkest moments of this book, readers are reminded of the horrors that are feared daily by Chinese women. The Dark Road is not a book you will soon forget. "If a panda gets pregnant, the entire nation celebrates, but if a woman gets pregnant she's treated like a criminal. What kind of country is this?" 

11 comments:

  1. Oh wow. This sounds incredibly powerful. Whew.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, powerful is a good word for this book.

      Delete
  2. What an interesting, if bleak, storyline! I just finished The Storyteller, about Nazi Germany, and that was a bit bleak for me also. Yes, when fiction is based on horrible things that actually took place, it makes the reading intense. Wonder what the husband would do if this second pregnancy produced another girl. Would he want to keep trying and endanger his wife? Good review, thanks.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. If you read the book, you just might find the answer to your question!
      I think reading books like The Dark Road and The Storyteller is so important. It teaches us about different times and places and makes us so grateful for our lives.

      Delete
  3. Wonderful review, Lindsey. I didn't know that Ma Jian has come out with a new book. I read his travelogue / memoir 'Red Dust' a few years back and liked it very much. This book looks quite powerful and bleak. The last sentence that you have quoted is very powerful and thought-provoking and sad. Thanks for this review.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's such a simple statement, but it has so much power.

      I saw Jian's memoir mentioned on the book jacket. I will have to keep an eye out for it.

      Delete
    2. Jian's memoir is wonderful. It is about China in the '80s and so some of the things that it talks about have changed now, but it is still wonderful to read. Hope you get to read it and like it. Will look forward to hearing your thoughts on it.

      Delete
  4. I've had an ARC of this sitting on my shelf for quite some time and, even though I totally DIG dark fiction, I haven't been able to get myself to pick it up. I know I'll like it, I just feel like I need to be in the right place to enjoy. Your review really makes me want to start reading now, though!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think it's all about balance when reading something really dark. You need something afterwards that isn't too tough on your head or your heart!

      Delete
  5. I will never read this. Not because it doesn't sound really good, but I don't think I'd ever make it through it. My delicate heart can't take books like this. They make me WAY too upset.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I can understand that. It was an extremely difficult book for me to read, especially with a new baby sitting next to me.

      Delete