A young American engineer sent to China to inspect the unruly Yangtze River travels up through the river's gorges searching for dam sites. Pulled on a junk hauled by forty-odd trackers, he is carried, too, into the settled, ancient way of life of the people of the Yangtze -- until the interplay of his life with theirs comes to a dramatic climax.
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"In a deceptively simple story, Hersey has captured all the magic, the terror and the drama of that extraordinary stretch of water....Even in Mr. Hersey's hands, the American's discoveries of his own mind and of the Chinese people are dwarfed by the laws, the demands and the ageless vitality of the Yangtze."
-- The New York Times Book Review
"A rewarding novel; it is clearly thought and beautifully projected on the screen of the imagination." -- Atlantic
-- The New York Times Book Review
"A rewarding novel; it is clearly thought and beautifully projected on the screen of the imagination." -- Atlantic
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A young American engineer sent to China to inspect the unruly Yangtze River travels up through the river's gorges searching for dam sites. Pulled on a junk hauled by forty-odd trackers, he is carried, too, into the settled, ancient way of life of the people of the Yangtze -- until the interplay of his life with theirs comes to a dramatic climax.
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28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Revisiting A Single Pebble,
By Lydia Kraus (St. John's University, Staten Island, N.Y.) - See all my reviews
This review is from: A Single Pebble (Paperback)
Although published almost 50 years ago, this book deserves another look using a modern, critical lens. Overshadowed by Hersey's other works, specifically Hiroshima and A Bell for Adano, A Single Pebble offers a great deal to the reader. The book is far more than a fictionalized travelogue of a trip up the Yangtse River. It is a work that documents exposure to the acts and ideas of another culture by an American used to thinking of himself as representative of all that is modern and educated, and therefore all that is to be considered as desireable or superior. As a reader, I came away from the book with the idea that all that I think glitters may not be gold. It should be noted, however, that this is not an American-bashing book; both sides--the narrator and the Chinese people he meets--are guilty of a type of national myopia when viewing the "Other" in their midst. Those interested in Postcolonial and Cultural studies will find plenty to occupy them, whichever side of the debate they fall on.
14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Like Hersey says, life is like a towpath.,
By A Customer
This review is from: A Single Pebble (Paperback)
This is a great short novel. A young engineer, he's never named, goes to China to plan a dam. Culture shock sets in. What do these Chinese need with a dam? The main Chinese character is the man who walks the towpath ashore, taking the little boat upriver. Conventions and mores and customs interfere. Even the flipping of your hand can get you into trouble. Beautifully written; Hersey loved each sentence. The towpath man, his feet knowing every inch of miles of towpath, is unforgettable.
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Book I Had To Read For School Turns Out To Be A Great Book,
This review is from: A Single Pebble (Paperback)
When I recieved the list of the six books that we had to read for freshmanyear in high school I was devistated. "There goes my summer." But, fortuantley, the first book I picked up was John Hershey's "A Single Pebble." I was drawn in when I read about the American engineer who would travel through China to look for spots to build dams. Then I was touched when I met the cast of characters aboard his junk boat. The owner's wife treated the American engineer with much love, when no one else really did. This eased his homesickness. The others, such as Big Pebble, and the owner, Old Big, were mysterious characters. This book, lathough I had been to China before, helped me understand Chinese culture better. I thought that they would be open to something as useful as a dam, espically after you read all the hard times they have to go through to get through a single river and how long it takes. But I was suprised.
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