Flying Fish from Paris

Author: Yu Feng
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-04-14
Features: A "post-professional growth" story recommended by Su Tong in 2006, and the first novel in China featuring themes from top-tier European and American business schools. The book portrays the efforts and struggles of several Chinese MBA students studying at leading European business schools as they attempt to challenge their own limitations: Chen Xiangmo, whose Chinese perspectives clash with Western thinking; Xu Bin, a talented and wealthy student obsessed with conquering the hearts of Western beauties, vividly reflecting the anxiety of many Chinese men about the perceived decline or absence of Asian male charm in Western culture; Wang Lin, a money-driven creature in China's new economic order, who sees rapid wealth as the meaning of his personal survival. The protagonists attempt to find a bright future while maintaining cultural self-esteem; one internalizes gender relationships as a criterion for self-affirmation; another believes that money makes everyone equal. Thus, cultural self-esteem, the desire for conquest in cross-cultural relationships, and the ancient allure of money together give the novel Paris Flying Fish the metaphorical meaning of "fish learning to fly": a costly leap, a leap that ultimately returns to the water, but also a leap of a romantic soul.