The Visitor

Xiao HongMay 2017

3.9

Word count: 685 words
Chapters: 3

Summary

This short piece is excerpted from Xiao Hong's Market Street. Once the tutor advertisement was posted, people began showing up—to seek treatment, to recite Zhuangzi, and even to practice "flying over eaves and walking on walls," asking the tutor whether he could do it.

Editor's review

Excerpted from Market Street, "Visitors" is a street-scene sketch with a touch of absurd comedy. No sooner is the tutor advertisement posted than callers arrive in droves: some to seek treatment, some to recite Zhuangzi, some to practice "flying over eaves and walking on walls"—and they seriously ask whether the tutor can do it. Xiao Hong does not rush to judge these people; instead she lets one preposterous visitor after another take the stage, setting life's hardship and absurdity side by side through dialogue and action. In just a few pages, the mismatch between the advertisement and the visitors sustains a gentle comedic tension, beneath which lies the real texture of making a living in the city—the advertiser must eat, and each visitor has his own urgency. Its strength is its lightness of touch: no sentimentality, no preaching, only scenes laid out for the reader to laugh at—and, after laughing, to sense the faint bitterness. Suited to reading in spare moments, and to close study as a sample of Xiao Hong's street writing.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who enjoy Xiao Hong's essays and street-sketch style
Those who want absurd humor and a feel for life in a short piece
Students and researchers studying the Market Street series
Readers who prefer light, brisk narration in spare moments

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting a full story arc and character growth
Those who prefer serious, weighty themes and are unmoved by light comedy
Readers who need clear plot conclusions and moral judgments

Reading tips

Read straight through first, feeling the rhythm of visitors arriving one after another; on a second pass, note how the absurdity of each visitor's reason escalates.
Pull out the "flying over eaves" passage on its own and see how Xiao Hong creates a laugh with one earnest question, without commentary.
Read alongside other pieces in Market Street to observe Xiao Hong's consistent lightness of touch in writing about making a living.
After reading, try retelling it to someone and see which details get the strongest reaction—those are the text's comedic pivots.

版权信息
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FAQ

Who are these "visitors"?

They are a mixed lot: some come to seek treatment, some to recite Zhuangzi, and some to practice "flying over eaves and walking on walls," seriously asking whether the tutor can do it. They come because of the tutor advertisement, yet their purposes have nothing to do with teaching—a chain of absurd mismatches.

Where does the humor come from?

From the mismatch between the advertisement and the visitors' purposes, and from the visitors' deadpan absurdity. Xiao Hong neither comments nor exaggerates; she lets dialogue and action speak for themselves. The more ordinary the telling, the funnier it seems—and after the laugh comes the faint bitterness of making a living in the city.

What does it mean that this is excerpted from Market Street?

Market Street is Xiao Hong's series of essays on street life in Harbin, drawn largely from the everyday struggle to make a living and the people around her. "Visitors" continues that vein, recording the absurd and the real in street life as a sketch; read it in the context of the series' street writing.

It's short—how should one read it?

Read it through in spare moments, then revisit passages such as the "flying over eaves" section for detail. It can also serve as a sample of Xiao Hong's street sketches, read alongside other pieces in the series to observe how she handles the subject of making a living in a light comedic tone.

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About the author

Xiao Hong Author · China · 1911–1942

Xiao Hong, originally named Zhang Naiying, was a modern Chinese woman writer from Hulan, Heilongjiang. She rose to fame in 1935 with The Field of Life and Death. Her works are mostly set in the rural society of Northeast China, focusing on how ordinary people live and struggle with fate in turbulent times, with delicate, compassionate writing. Her representative work Tales of Hulan River unfolds through memories of her hometown and its people; its plain, natural language and essay-like narration portray local customs and individual experience, and it is regarded as an important achievement of modern Chinese literature. Works such as Ma Bole and Commercial Street also show her sustained observation of social reality and daily life. She died in Hong Kong in 1942 at the age of thirty-one. The library holds 175 of her works, commonly classified as social fiction and classics, reflecting her lasting influence among readers and publishers.