Sorry, dear blog readers. If you are interested in reading K: A Novel, you might as well know that self is reading at a snail’s pace because she keeps posting quotes (There is something she wants to quote on almost every page). She’s also reading Book # 4 in the Ruth Galloway mystery series, and she alternates between reading about Ruth Galloway or about Professor K.
When K: A Novel opens, Professor K is already in Kun Chong Prison. No idea how long he’s been there, but it’s long enough for him to have an established routine.
He thinks back to the months leading up to his imprisonment:
When did I cross the line?
In my fourth year I started sending students online news articles that were blocked in mainland China, say, a story about peasants in Anhui province getting bumped off their land with paltry compensation, while a Party official received a fat kickback from developers. Nothing new there. Some of my students were curious about international perspectives, so I’d send them an article or two, and they’d reply, “This is so inspiring. Thank you for the articles! I definitely will take it into account.“
There is something very droll about the way Professor K recalls his interactions with his students, and it’s clear he was such a naif, so American. Wonder who reported him. Could it have been one of his students? One of those who thanked him for his lectures by saying, “This is so inspiring”?
Stay tuned.
Kanlaon 