Written on Water

Praise

“Chang’s constant, vivid presence in these essays allows the reader to step wholly into her mind—a collage of the universal and the personal, the minute and the infinite.” —Daljinder Johal, Asymptote Journal

“One of the most anticipated books of 2023.” —The Millions

“Original, memorable and unlike anything else that has come from the era. A fine contribution to Chinese letters in translation.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Daily life, human interactions, and fashion are—particularly for 1940s China—considered female topics, and if Eileen Chang has any political dreams, they are for a space in which women’s problems can be accepted and considered.” —Rain Taxi Review

“Written on Water showcases why . . . Eileen Chang still enjoys an enormous popularity among readers, both in China and overseas. Chang’s stylized depictions of Chinese manners and morals, her witty inquiry into urban trivia, and her ‘celebration’ of historical contingency are a tableau vivant of modern Chinese lives at their most complex and fascinating.” —David Der-Wei Wang

“Before Joan Didion, there was Eileen Chang. A slender, dramatic woman with a taste for livid details and feverish colors, Chang combined Didion’s glamor and sensibility with the terrific wit of Evelyn Waugh. She could, with a single phrase, take you hostage.” —Jamie Fisher, The Millions

“China’s Virginia Woolf.” —The Wall Street Journal

“Her writing . . . is cinematically crisp, and phantasmagorical. . . . She had the lunatic sensibilities of Marc Chagall, married to a Henri Matisse-like elegance.” —Ilaria Maria Sala, The Wall Street Journal

“As Chang is gaining a growing number of readers in different languages, her work is being positioned where it always belonged, next to other world classics.” —Robert McG. Thomas, The New York Times