New Story of the Stone - by Jianren Wu

About the Book

One of China's first works of science fiction, New Story of the Stone is a belated twentieth-century sequel to the beloved eighteenth-century masterpiece Story of the Stone (more famously known as Dream of the Red Chamber).

Book Synopsis

One of China's first works of science fiction, New Story of the Stone is a belated twentieth-century sequel to the beloved eighteenth-century masterpiece Story of the Stone (more famously known as Dream of the Red Chamber). The story follows protagonist Jia Baoyu, borrowed from the original Story, as he is dramatically hurled forward over a hundred years from his own time into a bewildering future: first the decadent semicolonized late Qing China of the author's own time and later an astonishing high-tech Confucian utopia called the Realm of Civilization.

Baoyu is equally disoriented in both places: in China proper, he is distressed by the growth of foreign influence and weakening of the traditional moral code in favor of capitalist consumerism and selfish gain; in the Realm of Civilization, he is amazed by everything he encounters--from flying cars and ingenious medical technologies to the perfectly moral populace. Seen through Baoyu's eyes, the Realm is everything that late Qing China has failed to be and offers a hopeful vision of what it might yet become.

This quick-paced romp deftly highlights some of the major preoccupations of the tumultuous final decade of China's last dynasty while raising important existential questions about China's future. Enlivened by author Wu Jianren's vivid imagination and wry sense of humor, this playful, satirical adventure is essential reading for lovers of science fiction and Chinese literature in translation.

Review Quotes

This unique science fiction novel from the dark days of the Qing empire's last decade revives a beloved protagonist of Chinese literature, ushering him into a modern world filled with wonders and then a future world built on a combination of Confucian morals and advanced technologies. Though it was written more than a century ago, Wu Jianren's novel is closely connected to the current new wave of Chinese science fiction. Both social satire and utopian fiction, it is an ideal book for a range of classes and deserves to reach many readers.--Mingwei Song, author of Fear of Seeing: A Poetics of Chinese Science Fiction

A skillful and nuanced translation of one of the most influential novels from early twentieth-century China.--Paola Iovene, author of Tales of Futures Past: Anticipation and the Ends of Literature in Contemporary China

This impressive first-ever full translation of Wu Jianren's late-Qing New Story of the Stone is a valuable addition to available texts in translation from this period and a key example of some of the earliest Chinese science fiction.--Nathan C. Faries, Bates College

About the Author

Wu Jianren (1866-1910) was a leading figure of the late Qing literary scene, best known as a writer of satirical exposé fiction and influential romances. His other notable works include Strange Events Eye-Witnessed Over Twenty Years and Sea of Regret.

Liz Evans Weber is an assistant professor of instruction in Chinese and research assistant professor at the University of Rochester. She is a 2025 recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Translation Fellowship, which will support work on her next translation project.