This bit of news is simply wonderful. As part of Sinolingua‘s Abridged Chinese Classic Series, all three volumes in Bā Jīn‘s “torrents” trilogy (Jīliú sānbùqǔ / 激流三部曲) are now available in abridged editions in word-parsed Hanyu Pinyin (with Chinese characters underneath), along with a few notes in English and mp3 files of the text being read aloud.
These books would make great material for those who are
- studying Mandarin
- trying to memorize Chinese characters
- learning Hanyu Pinyin
- wanting to read something in Mandarin that isn’t too damn hard but isn’t a children’s book either
- looking for something to read in Mandarin that doesn’t require much or even any knowledge of Chinese characters (ABCs and other “overseas Chinese,” take note!)
Through the generousity of the publisher, Pinyin.info now offers sample chapters from each of these three classics of twentieth-century Chinese literature along with audio files of the text being read aloud.
- Jiā (家/Family)
- Chūn (春/Spring)
- Qiū (秋/Autumn) (2 chapters)
I’m very pleased to offer samples from these books on this site and hope these editions will be enjoyed by many readers worldwide and become standard texts in many classrooms.