Shi Tiesheng: 我的丁一之旅 (My Travels in Ding Yi)

The latest addition to my website is Shi Tiesheng‘s 我的丁一之旅 (My Travels in Ding Yi). This was Shi Tiesheng’s final book and he packed a lot into it. The story is told by a spirit who inhabits the bodies of humans. He first started with Adam in the Garden of Eden and still loves Eve, for whom he is always on the look-out. However, he now spends most of his time in a Chinese boy (later man), Ding Yi, though he also flits in and out of or author, Shi Tiesheng, with whom he does not always agree. Ding Yi, as an adult, is very much into sex, something the spirit does not comprehend, except as a means of reproduction, though he does understand love. Not having a body himself, he does not understand humans’ greed for food either. Indeed, considering how long he has been inhabiting humans, he seems remarkably ignorant of their behaviour and foibles. Much of the book concerns the issue of sex and love. Ding Yi and others are influenced by the film Sex, Lies, and Videotape. Indeed, Ding Yi writes a play based on it. While this is certainly an interesting tale, I found it dragged a bit but you will certainly learn about how a non-human feels about sex and love.

Leave a comment