Hi, after writing this review, I found out that I have already read it way back in 2017! But apparently, my experience reading this the second time around is the same and I made many of the same points but in a different way. Still, I’ve not posted a review on this blog specifically so I’m still going to post it.

It occurred to me that I’ve not read that many Chinese ghost stories (Singapore True Ghost Stories definitely do not count) and so when I found this in the library, I decided to pick it up! And then had to download it and sideload onto my kobo instead of just syncing it but that just shows my committment to the book.

Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio collects 164 tales by Pu Songling. I don’t really think any of them are very scary but they definitely are strange – foxes and ghosts feature prominently in them and it’s a world where the natural and the supernatural are seen as one whole. For example:

The Lost Brother is a tale where a man has three wives (first one got carried off by bandits, second one died) and two sons by the latter two wives. Despite the best efforts of his third wife, the two brothers care for each other, which is why the older brother is devastated when a lion carries off his younger brother. That is improbable but still within the realm of “everyday”, the supernatural aspect is that the older brother dies and is given information that his brother is still alive so he comes back to look for him.

Another story is Miss Yingning or the Laughing Girl which involves insta-love, implausible coincidences, and of course, a fox spirit.

I actually think it’s pretty hard to summarise the stories without giving them away but they are delightfully unique. It’s true that they can feel repetitive if you’re reading it in one sitting, because there’s only so many fox maidens/spirits who fall in love with human stories you can absorb but generally these are very different from the myths and legends that I’m used to reading.

The only thing that I wasn’t too happy about was that the translation is from the early 1900s and it shows. Mostly in the way that Western-cultural references are added in – I remember a few references to Western classical characters and one chapter is even titled “A Chinese Solomon”. That made me wonder about the accuracy of the translation – is it trying to translate the text faithfully (if not literally) or is it more free and easy with adding or deleting material for the audience? I would be interested in reading a side-by-side comparison of two translations to find out!

Overall, though, this is a valuable collection of stories for people who want to read about Chinese ghosts and spirits. I don’t really recall seeing something like this before (outside of TV shows) and I enjoyed these stories where what we consider the supernatural is just part of daily life.