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"This remarkable anthology of Chinese speculative fiction offers seven tales of societal responsibility and individual freedom. . . . By turns cryptic and revealing, phantasmagorical and straightforward, these tales balance reality and fantasy on the edge of a knife."--Publishers Weekly, starred review

A woman impulsively decides to visit her grandmother in a scene reminiscent of Little Red Riding Hood, only to find herself in a town of women obsessed with a mysterious fermented beverage. An aging and well-respected female newscaster at a provincial TV station finds herself caught up in an illicit affair with her boss, who insists that she recite the news while they have sex. An anonymous city prone to vanishing storefronts begins to plant giant mushrooms for its citizens to live in, with disastrous consequences.

In this first book in the brand-new Calico Series, we bring you work by some of today's most exciting writers from China and Hong Kong, including Dorothy Tse (tr. Natascha Bruce), Zhu Hui (tr. Michael Day), and Enoch Tam (tr. Jeremy Tiang). Lightly touching on issues of urbanization, sexuality, and propaganda, the collection builds a world both utterly disorienting and disturbing familiar, prompting the question: Where does reality end and absurdity begin in a world pushed to its very limits?

The Calico series, published biannually by Two Lines Press, captures vanguard works of translated literature in stylish, collectible editions. Each Calico is a vibrant snapshot that explores one aspect of our present moment, offering the voices of previously inaccessible, highly innovative writers from around the world today. That We May Live is the first book in the series.

Product Details

Price

$16.95 $15.76

Publisher

Two Lines Press

Publish Date

March 10, 2020

Pages

112

Dimensions

6.0 X 0.6 X 6.9 inches | 0.5 pounds

Language

English

Type

Paperback

EAN/UPC

9781949641004

About the Author

Dorothy Tse is an award-winning writer from Hong Kong. She has published three story collections in Chinese and one in English, Snow and Shadow (translated by Nicky Harman). She was cofounder of the Fleurs des lettres literary journal and currently teaches literature and creative writing at Hong Kong Baptist University.

Chan Chi Wa, born in Hong Kong, is a freelance writer, editor, and film critic. He was the president of the Hong Kong Film Critics Society from 2012 to 2015 and editor of the literary magazine Fleurs des lettres from 2007 to 2011. His short story collection The Elephant That Vanished was published in 2008.

Enoch Tam has been writing for more than ten years and follows the practices of renowned Hong Kong authors Quanan, Xi Xi, Dung Kai-cheung, and Hon Lai-chu, and devotes his creativity to the combination of surrealist and magical realist city writings.

Zhu Hui was born in Jiangsu, China. He is editor-in-chief of the journal Yu hua and author of four novels and more than eighty short stories. His awards include the Wang Zengqi Award and the 2018 Lu Xun Literary Prize, China's most prestigious literary award.

Yan Ge was born in Sichuan, China. Her first short story collection was published in China when she was seventeen. She is the author of thirteen books, including six novels. She has received numerous awards, including the prestigious Maodun Literature Prize (Best Young Writer), and she was named by People's Literature magazine as one of twenty future literary masters in China. The English translation of her novel The Chilli Bean Paste Clan was published in 2018, and her novel Strange Beasts of China, translated by Jeremy Tiang, is forthcoming from Tilted Axis Press in 2020.

Chen Si'an is a playwright, theater director, poet, short story writer, and literary translator. She was born in Inner Mongolia and now lives and works in Beijing. She has written three collections of short stories and six plays. Her plays have been performed at the Royal Court Theatre, the Edinburgh International Festival, the National Theatre Company of China, and the Beijing International Fringe Festival. She is executive editor of Wings Poetry and founder of the international script-reading event Sound and Fury.

CJ Evans is theauthor of A Penance (New Issues Press) and The Category of Outcast, selected byTerrance Hayes for the Poetry Society of America's New American Poets chapbookseries. He received the Amy Lowell Poetry Traveling Scholarship, and currently livesin California, where he is the editorial director of Two LinesPress, a publisher of international literature in translation.

Sarah Coolidge received her BA in comparative literature from Bard College. She enjoys reading books in Spanish and English, and she writes essays on photography and international literature.

Reviews

"This remarkable anthology of Chinese speculative fiction offers seven tales of societal responsibility and individual freedom. . . . By turns cryptic and revealing, phantasmagorical and straightforward, these tales balance reality and fantasy on the edge of a knife."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"With enthralling and precise language, this first book in Two Lines Press' Calico series of collected translated literature impresses...This collection of speculative Chinese fiction is compelling and provocative, exploring the thin line between reality and absurdity. " --Booklist (starred review)

"That We May Live is an unforgettable collection, serving as evidence to the fact that sometimes, like a distant star, our world is seen most clearly when viewed askance." --The Arkansas International

"...give[s] the reader an oblique insight into contemporary social issues in Hong Kong and China, issues which however, could occur just about anywhere." --Asian Review of Books