“I no speaking English.
I fearing future.”
Xiaolu Guo’s novel, A Concise-Chinese English Dictionary For Lovers, tells the story of a 23-year-old woman, Z, who moves to London from a small Chinese village to learn English, and finds herself in an affair with an older Englishman. Z’s narrative begins chaotic and broken as she tackles grammatical errors, tense inconsistencies and complex homophones; she is a beginner to the English language when she first lands in “Heathlow Airport.” Through Z’s fragmented language, Guo demonstrates the powerful impression of words even when dislodged from their formal grammatical arrangement.
Language does not appear as a barrier between the reader and the protagonist, instead Z’s narrative is humorous, emotive and tangible. Creatively, Guo immerses her readers in Z’s journey; her narrative becomes more and more fluent until she eventually conquers the English language. As such, the very pages which the reader holds becomes Z’s annotated Chinese-English Dictionary, serving as a kind of diary for her. Whilst Z learns English, the readers are witnesses to her own self-discovery. Linguistic Chinese-English translation is central to the storyline, but the foundation of the text is supported by Z’s cultural translation and self-mediation. Her real name is Zhuang, yet the English find it unpronounceable and as such she becomes Z. Through this name change, Guo comments on cultural and self-restriction in order to align herself with Western understandings and perceptions. The novel could be described as a coming-of-age story, yet its politically charged nature makes it all the more intriguing.
Guo emotively displays the isolating experience of moving to another country and the vulnerable position in which Z finds herself. Everything is different; the culture, the language, the weather, and the older man who Z falls for. Guo strips England and the Western world of its familiarity and, as readers, we learn to see all of its perplexities through unacquainted eyes. The protagonist makes sense of all of this whilst negotiating language, not just grammatically but in terms of meaning and feeling. A Concise-Chinese English Dictionary for Lovers teaches a valuable lesson in cultural empathy and understanding, which continues to be something invaluable in today’s discriminatory and divisive climate.
Challenging English culture for Z also means challenging her home customs, and learning about Chinese culture was personally one of my favourite elements to this multifaceted book. One of Z’s biggest challenges is tenses. In Chinese, ‘love’ “has no tense. No past and future. Love in Chinese means a being, a situation, a circumstance. Love is existence, holding past and future,” Z explains. These simple linguistic differences exemplify how language drastically shapes our interpretations of concepts and emotions.
Personally, I found myself drawn to themes such as translation, racism and female self-discovery, but it is worth mentioning that Guo’s novel is candidly humorous and light-hearted. The love story is complex and political, yet the novel is endearing and easy to read. The wit of the narrative keeps a quick pace whilst Guo simultaneously presents topics which warrant further consideration. Her unique style made the novel a refreshing read, and I would highly recommend it.
