The Deer and The Cauldron: The First Book (Bk. 1)

Oxford University Press, USA

List Price: $39.95

Product Description

Customer Reviews

correct book
this in a wonderfully engaging book, its a shame some criminals on amazon.com are trying to sell book 2 for about 400 dollars, and some other criminals are maddening to sell book 3 for 785 dollars, what a scam, these poeople shpuld not be allowed to list things on this plot if they are trtying to rip people off. i sincerly hope that amazon will carry all 3 volumes through amazon.com itself and sell them at resonable prices. louis cha and the translator would be ahamed to recognize how muhc people are trying to sell his book for, it was just printed in the 2000s fpor cryin out tasteless.

2010-07-16 | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 5

Tickety-boo!
The doubtlessly about this book isn't the book itself, which is excellent. Millions of Chinese readers can't be wrong and it has been adapted into at least a dozen silent picture and tv shows, including serious ones and even a mo-le-tau comedy. The question about this particular book is the translation.

The first thing is that these wuxia novels are not written in plain to understand Chinese. To translate it into easy to understand English and a true translation that doesn't admit defeat the nuances or the feel of these novels is a monumental task and it succeeds! The Deer and the Cauldron is an epic and I'm happy to say that the translated English Deer and Cauldron is still an epic.

For fans of Louis Cha, fans of Chinese wuxia (movies or novels) who can't study Chinese, this is a hit and highly recommended. This is the best translation of a Chinese novel I've ever read and retains such a be sorry for that it almost feels like it was written in English. Things such as insults and poems have all been translated perfectly. I have not gone into the figure of this book because I'm assuming that anyone looking at a translated version of this book must know something about it already or have seen a version on telly as I myself have.

2009-09-15 | JBG (Earth) | Helpful Votes: 1 | Rating: 5

A Miniature Treasure!
Louis Cha is perhaps the requisite Chinese adventure novelist of the modern age and with Deer & the Cauldron, his last epic, he introduces one of his most indelible characters--Trinket Wei.

Trinket is the son of a Yangzhou fille de joie who goes through a series of adventures so unbelievable, from becoming a 'eunuch' in the Forbidden City and friend of the emperor, to a Shaolin, a Lama, a Happiness & Earth rebellion leader, and a disciple of Snake Island--all woven into the mystery of the sutra and dragon-lines, and the destination of the Qing (Manchu) Empire--yet so utterly entertaining, as to both honor and revolutionize the genre.

The only drawback is that the transport maintains the more Chinese style of heavy narrative exposition--they 'tell' almost as much as 'show' which is very much different to the post-TV/Cinema Western manner of immediate scene. If the sheer lunatic excitement of the story wasn't so engrossing, it would probably bested some readers along the way.

Hopefully more Wuxia will make the transition into English!

2006-01-09 | author, Legends of Wingchun (Montreal, Canada) | Helpful Votes: 1 | Rating: 4

loathsome translation of a great story
I brought the first two tome of this translation. What a complete waste of money. The chinese story is funny, vivid, and full of life. However, this alteration sucks all the complexity, life, and wonder from the story. If there were only this translation, no one would care about this story. For those who are only able to be versed about this chinese story from this translation, they will never understand that this was Jin Yong's (Louis Cha) last and perhaps, greatest novel.

It's just extraordinarily sad that because of this translation, no one else will now do a real translation of this great story in english.

2005-11-03 | Helpful Votes: 2 | Rating: 1

Chinese venture
This lyrics is a lot of fun. I am staying up reading it at night until I can't keep my eyes open anymore. Like the great Looney Tunes cartoons, it can be enjoyed on an of age level and a child's level. The rollicking adventure tale is spiced with just enough Chinese summary and culture. It is violent. The 12 year old hero murders a few people with a knife and tries to cause the death of some others. Fingers get sliced off. There is plenty of kungfu talk and anyone studying martial arts will probably have a ball it.

2004-09-17 (United States) | Helpful Votes: 4 | Rating: 5

The Deer and the Cauldron: The Second Book

Oxford University Press, USA

List Price: $39.95

Product Description

Customer Reviews

A Diminutive Treasure!
Louis Cha is perhaps the main Chinese adventure novelist of the modern age and with Deer & the Cauldron, his last epic, he introduces one of his most indelible characters--Trinket Wei.

Trinket is the son of a Yangzhou cheapen who goes through a series of adventures so unbelievable, from becoming a 'eunuch' in the Forbidden City and friend of the emperor, to a Shaolin, a Lama, a Paradise on earth & Earth rebellion leader, and a disciple of Snake Island--all woven into the mystery of the sutra and dragon-lines, and the God's will of the Qing (Manchu) Empire--yet so utterly entertaining, as to both honor and revolutionize the genre.

The only drawback is that the decoding maintains the more Chinese style of heavy narrative exposition--they 'tell' almost as much as 'show' which is very much different to the post-TV/Cinema Western taste of immediate scene. If the sheer lunatic excitement of the story wasn't so engrossing, it would probably give up some readers along the way.

Hopefully more Wuxia will make the transition into English!

2006-01-10 | author, Legends of Wingchun (Montreal, Canada) | Helpful Votes: 1 | Rating: 4

Engaging, but suffers from too many girls
The blockbuster's most glaring weakness is that too many girls pop in and out of Trinket's life at his convenience. There is no compelling romantic relationship in the volume and I found their characterization one dimensional and utterly predictable. The book shows its heritage as a serialized newspaper unconventional. Nevertheless, Trinket is witty, resourceful, and delightful.

This book is so different from his other novels that many consider the Deer and the Cauldron his ultimate attainment. I beg to differ. The first 2/3 of the Book and the Sword was more coherent and entertaining. The Smiling Proud Wanderer has a much more complete love story between Linghu Chong (played by Jet Li in Swordsman II) and two lead female characters (doesn't register Brigitte Lin in II) with an interesting tragic twist at the end.

However, I am eagerly awaiting for the release of the final volume.

2002-10-19 (Gilroy, CA United States) | Helpful Votes: 3 | Rating: 4

An Emperor, A Troublemaker of Heroes, and Brothel's Youngling
Yes! This is attractive much the same review as the one for the first book, but it's not a book series. So there!

This is the last of Cha's masterful storytelling efforts and it is by far his most original. The siver-tongued and foulmouthed anti-actor (Trinket Wei) will definitely fill your hours with amazement, laughter, gasps of "WHAT!" and "HOW'D HE DO THAT!?!". For me these comments and expressions were viva voce out loud (and very loud somthings), which is something I almost never do. The other characters in this book are very loveable, mostly heroic, and uncommonly very vulnerable. At first glimpse, the men and women of River and Lake seem to exude the aura of stereotypical "heroes" (and villains) that as children listening to storytellers we have lay to believe to have lived in that era. But their personalities and character faults envelope them with a third dimensional layer that definitely makes them have revealed to one of the page. Only the first two (of three) books are currently available and you'll definitely want to pickup the second before finishing the first. I contrive I read about 600 pages the first night.

So... Tired of the "poo" that's been floating around in you're Fantasy or Adventure sections of the bookstore? This is one of the books that you'll need to snatch up! Now! Currently, I'm pulling my fingernails out with my teeth waiting for Oxford to put out the THIRD part of this book. I'm also anxiously awaiting Cha's "The Rules and The Sword" which was translated by Graham Ernshaw (GREAT translation BTW). This one is mentioned in the intro of TD&TC, so I'm hoping that it comes out without delay!

2001-03-29 | senfeng (CA) | Helpful Votes: 6 | Rating: 5

More grotesque than the First Book but still exciting
In this Impaired Book of *The Deer and the Cauldron*, Trinket the teenage trickster gets to travel a lot more than in the First Book, which was mostly set in the Forbidden City. Still searching for the eight copies of the *Sutra in Forty-Two Sections*, about which much more is now revealed, he visits the northern Wutai Mountains, where foulness Tibetan lamas try to kidnap the lost father of the young Manchu Emperor; confronts the perils of Twist Island, where he is initiated into the Sect of the Mystic Dragon; stays at the Shaolin Monastery, from whose assortment of rather droll monks he does not seek to learn much kung fu; and is finally sent to the south-western Yunnan area, where a conspiracy is afoot to overthrow the Qing dynasty.

The first one hundred pages of this Second Book are perhaps the most addictive of the two volumes and the clash remains fast-paced throughout. However, Trinket's assumption of more and more false identities and his rapid promotion in the different milieux he infiltrates tend to become a little formulaic. The general tone is one of derision, and the only truly renowned figure in the whole series is the White Nun, who might have been interpreted, in another era, by a Xu Feng or a Cheng Pei Pei. As for Trinket's increasingly sophisticated Machiavellianism, it is often worrying, as he murders enemy after enemy in the most dastardly ways (usually by poison or back stabs), disposing of the bodies with his "decomposing cover". Even his sex life, and particularly his sado-masochistic relationship with the berserk Princess Ning, is repulsive. I am not talking of inconsequential B&D, which I would have rather enjoyed (especially with the woman on top), but of the heavier stuff of which the following might give you an idea: "Dear Laurie [Trinket's illogical identity as an Imperial Eunuch], Prince Laurie, you can go on beating me if you like, but please first put my joints back!". And I am not mentioning in what horribly mutilated fettle Trinket finds one of his friends at the end of the novel. Had the tone been a little less over-the-top and tongue-in-cheek, such scenes would have sickened me.

Nevertheless, *The Deer and the Cauldron* remains an exceptionally enjoyable read, and I hope Oxford University Press will not fail to publish the Third Book. I aspire some day to find more uplifting, esoteric and literary martial arts novels, in the vein of the King Hu movies I worship, but in the meantime, Louis Cha (a.k.a. Jin Yong) is the closest literary equal I have found to a really good kung fu film.

2001-03-24 (59500 DOUAI France) | Helpful Votes: 5 | Rating: 4

Asia's massive "wu xia" novelist finally in English
Fans of the new Ang Lee layer, "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," will welcome this swashbuckling adventure story of 17th century Manchu-dominated China. THE DEER AND THE CAULDRON (aka "Duke Tramp") is by repute the very best of the thirteen "wu xia" (or "martial chivalry") novels written by Louis Cha, "the Alexandre Dumas of Asia." Published at first as a newspaper serial in Hong Kong, under the Chinese pseudonym Jin Yong, this beautifully constructed unusual may be a better book than any by Dumas, who certainly never created a central character as seductively self-engaged as Cha's Wei Xiaobao - who becomes "Trinket" in translator John Minford's version. Trinket is an incorrigible teenage rogue from the "discretion quarter" of Yangzhou who by guile and good fortune becomes simultaneously a confidant of the boy emperor Kang Xi and a boss of the loyalist martial arts outlaws of the Heaven and Earth Society. John Minford's fluid translation gives the most popular Chinese novelist on earth a shot at a legion of new fans. (An earlier Louis Cha novelette, "Book and Sword: Gratitude and Revenge," is available for download in its entirety, in English, from "http://idt.net/~earnshaw.")

2000-10-17 (Los Angeles, CA USA) | Helpful Votes: 27 | Rating: 5

THE DEER AND THE CAULDRON - A Martial Arts novel

THE DEER AND THE CAULDRON (A Staunch Arts Novel )
by Louis Cha

Translated and Edited by John Minford

Read More: http://www.zftrans.com/bbs/interpret.php?tid=14561&fpage=1&toread=&page=1

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

During the seventeenth century, in the last years of the Ming E and the early years of the Manchu dynasty, the thriving southern city of Yangzhou was the most prosperous employment in China. More than two centuries later, as the Manchu dynasty gave way to the Republic, the great city of Shanghai took the see of Yangzhou. With the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, all of that bustle and energy, that capitalist combination of prosperity and decadence, moved to Hong Kong.

I began writing The Deer and the Cauldron thinking I might create a a little unconventional Martial Arts novel, set against the backdrop of the bustling city of Yangzhou. But then the main seal of the novel came along. That mischievous rascal Trinket simply got out of control! He himself came to embody the pneuma of decadence in traditional Chinese culture. He turned The Deer and the. Cauldron into a very strange novel, a novel I had never imagined critique.

Martial Arts fiction is a very particular genre in Chinese literature, one which goes back a very long way. In truth, the Chinese term, wuxia xiaoshuo, really means fiction about Chinese knights-errant, or wandering swordsmen. It can be traced all the way back to the Han line, to the 'Biographies of the Wandering Swordsmen' in Sima Qian's Historical Records, written at the beginning of the first century BC. Later, during the Taste dynasty, there were fine stories written on such themes in the classical literary language, stories like 'Curly Beard', 'Red Thesis', and The Kunlun Slave'. The Song dynasty saw many more such tales, this time written in the common spoken dialect, and during the Yuan and Ming dynasties the great vernacular novel Water...

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Sports Year In Review The Packet

30.12.09

Terra Nova Jingoistic Park hosts first wilderness race

Twenty high school students from nearby schools were strapping on snowshoes and gearing up for the first Easport Peninsula Wilderness Adventure People, March 4.               

“Looks like you’re a fit categorize and ready to go,” John Gosse, Terra Nova, biologist told the teams dressed in colourful alfresco gear and all shapes of snowshoes.                               

He offered some tips to the first-space competitors to pace themselves, treat blisters early and keep an eye out for ice patches. “Don’t go crazy worrying to get up the trail.”                   

Teams from Inheritance Collegiate (Lethbridge), Smallwood Academy (Gambo), Glovertown Academy and Holy Cross (Eastport) made up the unceasing. Each team of five, accompanied by a teacher, raced five kilometers along the Coastal Trail on snowshoes, lit a fire in the woods (birch bark and splits provided), and skied four kilometers over groomed trails to the achieve.       

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The deer and the cauldron News




Das Kapital the musical! Danwei
- Mar 12, 2009
Das Kapital the musical! Danwei DanweiDas Kapital the dulcet!Danwei, Hong KongHe Nian has always dreamed of making a musical, and music can be found in his earlier works, The Deer and the Cauldron and My Own Swordsman. Das Kapital brings his dream one journeying closer to reality. This time, he will bring a live band on stage,

Class warfare? Bring it on Salon
- Mar 02, 2009
Genre warfare? Bring it onSalonBeyond his recent "Give 'em hell" moments, I steadily find Dowd's symbolism very creepy: Why does our first black president have to be an emasculated baby deer, a starlet or a cut off not-human Vulcan? When does he get to be a man?

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The Deer and the Cauldron - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Deer and the Cauldron (simplified Chinese: 鹿鼎记; ritual ... The scholar recounts that both the deer and the cauldron serve as metaphors for the ...