Hmmm.... I was actually expecting a cohesive story until I found the book and saw the subtitle: Chinese Stories for Children. Unexpected because the year before Tales from Silver Lands was the winner, apparently there was a taste for the exotic in the '20s. I found that I really enjoyed this book (though I don't believe for a minute that they are real folktales).
My favorite part was how funny the book could be. And they were subtle jokes, mostly clever wordplay and the like, in fact they reminded me of another old favorite...
Ittttttt's baaaaaack!!!
My favorite examples:
"Black fish scales covered his body; black feathers grew upon his limbs. Because of his color he was sometimes called Oo Loong. From that it would seem that Oo means neither white nor pink." ...that is the best definition of context clues ever.
"When Han Hsin beheld the soldiers approaching at top speed, there was no doubt in his mind as to what harsh errand brought them. He knew they intended to have his head. But Han, having lived so long with his head, had become fond of it, and preferred to keep it on his shoulders."
See? That's good stuff!
But there is the underrunning current of 'Look! See how exciting this is? See how different? China! Inventions! Chinese! Emperors!' While there is undoubtedly a Chinese style to these stories I should hope that anyone reading them realizes that they are not real folktales. When a character that only does things that please him is named Ah Fun you should probably wonder if maybe the author wasn't using -and I'm loathe to use this term, but for lack of a more familiar term- Chinglish. Pardon me now while I go gargle that word away.
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