HIStory 3 - Trapped, the novelisation
Jun. 26th, 2019 12:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
issenlloThere's this literary term called the pathetic fallacy, which is defined as (quick google) as "the attribution of human feelings and responses to inanimate things or animals, especially in art and literature". Modern Chinese narratives have a lot of this - well, classical Chinese uses a ton of allusions and references, and my theory is that modern narrative that use the pathetic fallacy is the less fraught, and more assessible version of that stylistic technique.
That's my amateur view anyway: I'm definitely not trained in Chinese narratology, especially that found in modern Chinese fiction. But it's a reason I stopped reading popular Chinese novels. Nirvana in Fire being an outliner in this respect.
Which is a long way of saying that whenever the narrative in the Trap novel trips me up, it's in these moments. Am also not keen on descriptions of people as cute little animals, which happens not infrequently.
On the other hand, there's loads that made me laugh like a loon, speculate or try to figure out.
1. Meng Shao Fei is 30 years old and Tang Yi is 29. Make of that what you will.
2. Remember that scene where Meng Shao Fei is comforting Tang Yi after the revelation that Chen Wen Hao is his father? It was a devastating scene, and heart-wrenching. Well, in the novel, there is a lengthy sex scene afterwards which is pretty explicit. It's... nice? Hot? They go at it all night, and I'm tickled at the implication that Tang Yi is a superhuman who doesn't collapse right after climax but tenderly carries(!) Shao Fei to the bathroom for a nice wash-up.
I think the novel betrays its BL roots here, wherethe halfway/two-third point is where you 'reward' readers with an explicit sex scene, whereas in terms of dramatic tension, I think the drama works beautifully by NOT having a sex scene.
2a. The part where Tang Yi massages Meng Shao Fei's bruised back (after his confrontation with Hong Ye) is painted as the scene where MSF realises he is in love:
(i) Tang Yi waits in MSF's room for him to return to his room with medicinal ointment;
(ii) Tang Yi doesn't just massage his back, he goes all the way down to MSF's ass;
(iii) MSF sheds tears (wtffff) after the massage, at the realisation that he's in love but his feelings will never be returned, boo-hoo. Erm, what?
3. I'm however a bit sad that the novel doesn't have the scene in hospital where Tang Yi tenderly moistens MSF's lips with a cotton bud and they stare into each other's eyes. Because that was the clincher for me, in terms of their relationship. They were already so coupley, it didn't matter who did the 'love confession'.
4. No mention of Chen Wen Hao's suicide. Dare I hope that this means CWH isn't dead in the novel version? I mean, I get how it is portrayed in the drama, and the scene of Tang Yi breaking down at the cemetary after hearing a gunshot is dead (sorry) powerful. But CWH not being dead gives more scope and continuity, both fic-wise and as a way of anchoring the story in the real world. Because the work of stopping drug dealing never ends?
5. The epilogue with Jack and Zhao Zi is a bit annoying for the emphasis on who is topping. Apparently Zhao Zi can never top because Jack simply manages to hoodwink him into thinking he's topping because he's positioned above Jack. Wtf.
6. The backstory for Jack is good to have, not least because I'd already guessed/deduced some of it. But hello, Chinese narrativity (see point 0), it is time to stop describing people as "male with hair as red as blood". It's the same rant against excessive use of epithets. I mean, it's dramatic for the first few times, and then, y'know, I know who you're describing and also it is not that red.
6. The epilogue that describes Hong Ye and Gu Dao Yi's married life is supposed to be cute, but it veers a bit closer to tiresome. I do love that Hong Ye tells Gu Dao Yi to forget about having more kids because she's already risked her life for this one. Otherwise, it comes very close to a hacknayed ending of wedding and birth of a kid.
7. Again, CWH in jail for 24 years. W.T.F.
That's my amateur view anyway: I'm definitely not trained in Chinese narratology, especially that found in modern Chinese fiction. But it's a reason I stopped reading popular Chinese novels. Nirvana in Fire being an outliner in this respect.
Which is a long way of saying that whenever the narrative in the Trap novel trips me up, it's in these moments. Am also not keen on descriptions of people as cute little animals, which happens not infrequently.
On the other hand, there's loads that made me laugh like a loon, speculate or try to figure out.
1. Meng Shao Fei is 30 years old and Tang Yi is 29. Make of that what you will.
2. Remember that scene where Meng Shao Fei is comforting Tang Yi after the revelation that Chen Wen Hao is his father? It was a devastating scene, and heart-wrenching. Well, in the novel, there is a lengthy sex scene afterwards which is pretty explicit. It's... nice? Hot? They go at it all night, and I'm tickled at the implication that Tang Yi is a superhuman who doesn't collapse right after climax but tenderly carries(!) Shao Fei to the bathroom for a nice wash-up.
I think the novel betrays its BL roots here, where
2a. The part where Tang Yi massages Meng Shao Fei's bruised back (after his confrontation with Hong Ye) is painted as the scene where MSF realises he is in love:
(i) Tang Yi waits in MSF's room for him to return to his room with medicinal ointment;
(ii) Tang Yi doesn't just massage his back, he goes all the way down to MSF's ass;
(iii) MSF sheds tears (wtffff) after the massage, at the realisation that he's in love but his feelings will never be returned, boo-hoo. Erm, what?
3. I'm however a bit sad that the novel doesn't have the scene in hospital where Tang Yi tenderly moistens MSF's lips with a cotton bud and they stare into each other's eyes. Because that was the clincher for me, in terms of their relationship. They were already so coupley, it didn't matter who did the 'love confession'.
4. No mention of Chen Wen Hao's suicide. Dare I hope that this means CWH isn't dead in the novel version? I mean, I get how it is portrayed in the drama, and the scene of Tang Yi breaking down at the cemetary after hearing a gunshot is dead (sorry) powerful. But CWH not being dead gives more scope and continuity, both fic-wise and as a way of anchoring the story in the real world. Because the work of stopping drug dealing never ends?
5. The epilogue with Jack and Zhao Zi is a bit annoying for the emphasis on who is topping. Apparently Zhao Zi can never top because Jack simply manages to hoodwink him into thinking he's topping because he's positioned above Jack. Wtf.
6. The backstory for Jack is good to have, not least because I'd already guessed/deduced some of it. But hello, Chinese narrativity (see point 0), it is time to stop describing people as "male with hair as red as blood". It's the same rant against excessive use of epithets. I mean, it's dramatic for the first few times, and then, y'know, I know who you're describing and also it is not that red.
6. The epilogue that describes Hong Ye and Gu Dao Yi's married life is supposed to be cute, but it veers a bit closer to tiresome. I do love that Hong Ye tells Gu Dao Yi to forget about having more kids because she's already risked her life for this one. Otherwise, it comes very close to a hacknayed ending of wedding and birth of a kid.
7. Again, CWH in jail for 24 years. W.T.F.