Looking Back

Name: Looking Back
ISBN: 9787549564958

金宇澄Guangxi Normal University Press · ChinaMay 2022

4.2

Word count: 116K words
Chapters: 13
ISBN: 9787549564958

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Summary

"My mother said that only in one unfinished letter did she ever see your father's emotional recollection: when the cold northwest wind blows, it reminds me of the bleakness of my youthful years..." In this book about his father and mother's past, Jin Yucheng keeps a posture of "searching." He opens up a period of history and lets the past within it surge forward, carrying the breath, details, tremors, and sorrow that belong only to that era... This book tells the story of Jin Yucheng's parents, and also the story of ordinary people in that era.

Editor's review

In this book Jin Yucheng does something restrained: he does not rush to sum up his parents' lives for them, but keeps a posture of "searching," letting letters, memories, and period details surface on their own. The book tells the story of his parents, and also offers a microcosm of how ordinary people lived through the upheavals of the twentieth century. The writing carries the warmth of old letters; details like the northwest wind and the bleak youthful years make history feel less like a framework and more like air you can sense. Its strength lies in the proper distance the narrator keeps from his material—there is a son's emotion, and also a writer's prudence. Best read slowly in a quiet setting, especially suited to readers interested in family history, personal memory, and their relationship to an era. It offers no grand conclusions, yet makes you want to pause and think about the untold stories in your own family.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in family history and personal-memory writing
Readers who like Jin Yucheng's work and want to understand its background
Nonfiction readers interested in the lived history of ordinary people in the twentieth century
Literary readers who prefer slow, careful reading and restrained narration

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting strong plot and fast pacing
Readers looking for systematic historical research or social analysis
People with little interest in family pasts and the memoir form

Reading tips

Read slowly and pay attention to details in the letters and places where the narrator pauses—emotion often hides there.
Before or after reading, try to sort out one or two stories about your own elders, and compare the experience with the posture of "searching."
Jot down the book's timeline; it helps you understand how the parents' experiences correspond to the historical background.
Best read in several sittings, one or two chapters at a time, leaving room for afterthought and association.

About the publisher

Guangxi Normal University Press China · Founded in 1986

Guangxi Normal University Press is a publisher known for literature, foreign literature and history titles. Its 1,175 books in the database show a solid accumulation in classics and prose collections, including foreign literary works such as Les Fleurs du mal: Annotated Poems of Baudelaire, Snow Country, Dubliners and The Wild Palms, as well as modern prose compilations like The Complete Prose of Zhou Zuoren. History and philosophy also hold a notable share, with titles such as Running Dogs: Clerks and Runners in Qing County Yamen and The History and Thought of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom reflecting attention to Qing local administration and modern history. In art literature there is the 16-volume Ten Bamboo Studio Painting and Calligraphy Manual. Its author resources include foreign writers Charles Baudelaire and Yasunari Kawabata, translators and annotators Liu Nanqi and Zou Bo, and scholars such as Zhong Shuhe, Bradly W. Reed and You Chenjun. As public information is limited, this characterization is based only on the books in the database, which together present a profile balancing Chinese and foreign literary classics with academic works in the humanities and social sciences.

版权信息
我的父母
一切已归平静
黎里·维德·黎里父亲
黎里
维德
黎里
上海·云·上海母亲口述
上海
云
上海
我们回望
家书

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a memoir?

From the available information, it tells the past of Jin Yucheng's father and mother; it is nonfiction personal-memory writing with a memoir character, not a fictional novel. The book keeps a posture of "searching," letting the past and period details emerge naturally.

Can I read this directly without having read other works by Jin Yucheng?

Yes. The book centers on the parents' past and does not depend on familiarity with his other works. If you have read his fiction, you may appreciate the narrative style and concerns more, but that is not a prerequisite.

Does the book deal with grand history or small family matters?

The two are interwoven. The information shows that the book contains both specific stories and letter details about the father and mother and lets those stories surge forward with the breath and sorrow of that era; it reflects era experience through family memory rather than offering a macro-historical argument.

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About the author

金宇澄 Author

Jin Yucheng is a Chinese novelist and essayist. Public information about him is limited, and this database does not systematically record details of his life, education, or professional positions. It currently holds four of his works: the novel Blossoms, the nonfiction work Looking Back, the four-volume collection Family Letters, and the essay collection The Shuffling Era. Blossoms is his representative work, known for its Shanghai-inflected voice and street-level storytelling, and was adapted into a同名 television series starring Hu Ge, Ma Yili, and Tang Yan. The Shuffling Era is regarded as a sourcebook for Blossoms, reflecting his long-standing attention to Shanghai's urban memory and everyday life. Looking Back leans toward documentary and biographical writing, while Family Letters presents personal and family records in epistolary form. Overall, Jin Yucheng's writing is often categorized as social fiction, documentary literature, and classic works, with a nuanced, restrained style and a strong sense of place and period.