Confession of a Bear
This story by one of China's best contemporary authors offers great insight into modern Chinese society.
The hustle and bustle of twenty-first century Shanghai serves as a backdrop for a story rive with office politics and social intrigue. An aimless man, lacking the ambition that those around him possess, is tasked with delivering donated satellite phone equipment to a remote village where the people are peaceful and lead lives that are the complete opposite of his colleagues in the city.
In that remote village, the man becomes acquainted with the wild bears that are arcane symbols of long lost virtues. His presence changes the village, while his absence from work makes him an unwitting player and pawn to an office coup in the making, one that will change his life for either better or worse.
Sun Wei's search from deliverance from the malaise in modern Chinese society, she discovered that real wisdom and elegance can be found in the cultures of ancient times, when people were at peace with their souls and content with the generosity of Mother Nature instead of being tormented by the pursuit of wealth.
Sun Wei is a Chinese novelist, short-story writer and essayist. She was born in 1973 in Shanghai and grew up in a family of intellectuals.
She is among the Chinese generation known as "the last idealists"; in her two early novels, To Where the Flowers Blossom (2006) and The Good Old Days with Democracy, Science and Law (2008) she created an intimate portrayal of the pursuit, efforts and loss, dreams and dignity of her generation. Her sentimental and poetic style greatly moved readers.
Since becoming a full-time writer, she spent several months each year living in remote areas in China studying the local rituals, customs, religion, and collecting folk legends and myths of different ethnicities. In her search for deliverance from the "malaise" in modern Chinese society, she has discovered that real wisdom and elegance can be found in the cultures of ancient times, when people were at peace with their souls and content with the generosity of mother nature instead of being tormented by wealth creation. Her anthropological interest formed the basis of her following two novels Death of the Last Arcadian Village and The Confession of a Bear (2010).
Her literary awards include First Prize at the second New Literary Writers of Shanghai Contest in 2005. She participated in the Shanghai/Cork literature residency in Cork, Ireland in 2011 and Life of Discovery 2012 of the International Writing Program of the University of Iowa in the United States.
