Friend: Selected Essays on Writing People by Jia Pingwa

Author: Jia Pingwa
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-01-01
Features: Jia Pingwa's essay collection "Friends" (published by Chongqing Publishing House) is just one of his numerous works, but the selected over 240 essays focus on portraits of people from various periods of his life since the 1980s. The quality is self-evident. Among them: "Mourning My Father," "Drinking," "Lamenting My Aunt," "A Letter to My Younger Sister on Her Eighteenth Birthday," "I Am Not a Good Son," and "Speech at My Daughter's Wedding," etc., are essays about family members, while many others, such as "Preface to My Rural Life," "A Brief Note on Xiao Lei," and "Postscript to 'Qingqiang'," are recent works. Whether they are long essays spanning thousands of words or short ones of just a few hundred, the author's reflections on life and friendship are profound, thought-provoking, vivid, and distinct, all revealing the depth of his emotions. His writings range from remembering hometown sentiments and speaking of friends to discussing calligraphy and painting, analyzing authors, and talking about Qingqiang opera—most of them embody authentic Chinese culture. His insights are precise and insightful. The emotions he expresses about family, friendship, and the world are conveyed in elegant and unpretentious language, neither dry nor ostentatious, filled with genuine feelings that leave readers with a unique sense of shock and enlightenment. His erudition has reached such a high level that he can often be concise and to the point, as seen in essays like "God's Smile," "A Letter to My Younger Sister on Her Eighteenth Birthday," and "Reading Eileen Chang." Moreover, readers can gain unexpected benefits from his insightful articles on the art of calligraphy, such as "Interpreting Painting" and "Li Jiemin's Calligraphy."