Reading between the Party Lines – China’s books boom and what it means

The Bunker – News without the nonsense

Podmasters

News, Government, Politics, Society & Culture

4.6 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 23 June 2022

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Can China control what its authors write as tightly as President Xi might want? Writers have found dazzling ways to sidestep the “literary president”’s clampdown on free expression. China expert and Times book desk veteran Megan Walsh tells Andrew Harrison how the Chinese are reading everything from world-beating subversive science fiction… to lurid pot-boilers with titles like ‘My Dangerous Billionaire Husband'… to anarchic works of online fiction that often run longer than the Bible. What does it tell us about the world’s rising superpower? “Xi Jinping has put himself forward as literary president.” “People don't think that fiction from authoritarian regimes is worth reading… but they’re wrong.” “Chinese readers are very good at reading between the lines.” “We expect Chinese writers to always be political, but that’s not always why people write.” https://www.patreon.com/bunkercast Presented and produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jacob Archbold and Jelena Sofronijevic. Audio production by Jade Bailey. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	My name is Stan. I'm at. Nice to meet you. So you took up photography where? I've always loved
0:05.5	photography but I turn it into earning a living at 60. I enrolled on a day course.
0:11.8	Well college. I loved going to college. It's good you can retry. I'm enrolled on the day course. But college?
0:13.0	I loved going to college.
0:14.0	It's good you can retrain and do something.
0:16.0	Yeah, yeah.
0:17.0	Let's talk about working, learning, saving and making the most of living longer.
0:22.0	Phoenix Group is the UK's largest long-term savings and retirement business.
0:28.0	Search Phoenix Group living longer.
0:30.0	Pets brings so much joy.
0:32.0	From those happy greetings at the door to the warm cuddles on the sofa
0:36.7	so give a little love back with dental life from Purina a range of delicious chues made for dogs and tasty snacks for cats that help clean and support your pets, teeth and gums, essential for their overall well-being and a happy, healthy life. They give you plenty of smiles so
0:55.3	look after theirs with dental life. Pick up dental life in the pet food aisle. Hello and welcome to the bunker daily I'm Andrew Harrison.
1:11.2	When politicians are asked about what they're reading,
1:15.0	we expect to hear about works of political philosophy,
1:17.0	or Dickens or Gerther or Trollope,
1:19.0	or maybe to ring that populist bell, Harry Potter.
1:22.0	But towards the end of his presidency
1:23.7	Barack Obama cited something unexpected a dense epic of Chinese science fiction
1:28.6	called the three-body problem by a former computer engineer turned superstar author called Liu Xichin.
1:35.0	It was just wildly imaginative, Obama said. The scope of it was immense.
1:39.0	That was fun to read, partly because my day-to-day problems with Congress seem fairly petty, not something to worry about
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Podmasters, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Podmasters and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.