Customer Reviews

ORIENTAL TALES

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If you enjoy finely crafted story telling, exquisite imagery, painterly prose, and highly imaginative explorations of timeless emotional and philosophical themes then this book of short stories is for you.

Comprised of Yourcenar's reinterpretation of folk tales from various cultures, as well as tales of her own imagining, the author herself pointed out in her introduction to the work that the title Oriental Tales is a bit misleading. Settings range from the Orient to Greece, Italy, and India, to name a few.

The themes, however, are universal- lost love, regret, transcendence, redemption, heroism- and the telling is of unparalleled quality. I have re-read this small book at least twice a dozen times and never has it failed to bestow some new gift of understanding or beauty.

Oriental Tales by Marguerite Yourcenar is a Fantasy Book with many stories (hince oriental TALES). I can't say I have read a book like this one before. The only one that comes to mind are those little children multiple scary storybooks.
The first story is about an old painter and his apprentice. It takes place in old China. They travel abroad to paint landscapes. Later on, their funds were low so Ling, the apprentice, pilfered food from the market. Wang Fo, the painter, and Ling were taken to the Dynasty Emperor that night. Ling was beheaded and Wang Fo painted a magic picture with Ling and sailed into the horizon.

The stories in this book provide great imagery, in part, because the setting took place in old Eurasia. The stories were written in a way I haven't experienced before. They combine many subjects like Heroism and Triumph over bad. But some of these had depressing endings.
"Her tanguishing eyes died out like the reflection of stars in a waterless cistern, and nothing could be seen through the gap except two glassy eye balls that no longer gazed upon the sky." pg 49, an example of a depressing part. The style was hard to follow, but that made it enjoyable.

Out of 5, it is a 4. The book was difficult at first and was translated by Alberto Miguel to English from French. There are complex, symbolic sentences everywhere. If you like books on mystical Asia and books with multiple themes, I suggest you go and get this book.