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Sunday Morning News

Author Discusses His Award-Winning Novel Set in China

Aired January 9, 2000 - 8:44 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: The 1999 recipient of the National Book Award for Fiction is an Emory University professor who only began writing in English 11 years ago. The title of his book is "Waiting" and the setting is China. Ha Jin joins us on the set here in Atlanta. Welcome.

HA JIN, AUTHOR, "WAITING": Thank you. Thank you.

PHILLIPS: Well, the book is definitely a beautiful love story. Why don't we sort of talk about the background. I noticed something interesting that you mentioned. After the Tiananmen massacre you decided that you were, it was impossible to write honestly in China. What did you mean by that?

JIN: I was very shocked at the time and I thought I would be a writer, some kind of writer eventually in Chinese. And then I realized it would be impossible because it couldn't, I couldn't be on to write, I couldn't write honestly in mainland China. So that's why I decided to stay.

PHILLIPS: Is it because, I know the book is centered around an arranged marriage, a very traumatic love story.

JIN: Yes.

PHILLIPS: Is it because true love suffers so much in China because it's dominated by cultural bindings?

JIN: It was very, very old-fashioned. The arranged marriages mainly take place in the countryside now, not in cities. But again, the story begins in the early '50s so it was kind of an old timer.

PHILLIPS: And it's something you don't talk about when you were there, correct? So you had to come out here to write the book?

JIN: People talk about it but I heard of the story 18 years ago but I didn't understand it. I couldn't interpret the story. That's why I had to come here and to understand the story, just by the distance from China and the experience of American life helped me understand the deep meaning of the story.

PHILLIPS: Well, what is the deep meaning? What is it you want readers to walk away with? JIN: I think the protagonist, Lincoln, he's emotionally crippled, in a way retarded. He's a good man, a decent man, but incapable of loving others. I heard of the story but I could not interpret it in a way that I can reveal the deeper meanings. That's my interpretation of it. Of course others can interpret it different than me.

PHILLIPS: What do you think that this book tells us about the Cultural Revolution in China?

JIN: The book, in fact, only covers a very small, only a very small part of the book deals with the Cultural Revolution indirectly, in fact. That is just a context. I think the focus of the book is the psychology of the life of, the soul of these people.

PHILLIPS: And the book, once again, is "Waiting" and it's a tough-minded love story, wouldn't you say?

JIN: Yes. Yes. It's a loveless story, in fact.

PHILLIPS: A loveless story.

JIN: Yes.

PHILLIPS: Oh, if we only had more of that, huh?

JIN: Thank you.

PHILLIPS: Thanks for joining us. We appreciate it.

JIN: Thank you for having me.

PHILLIPS: All right. Ha Jin, thank you.

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