My Life as Emperor

by Su Tong

Book Overview

From the celebrated author of Raise the Red Lantern comes a spellbinding novel about life in the imperial court of a child emperor. In this chilling yet enormously entertaining tale by acclaimed... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 140136666X
• ISBN13: 9781401366667
• Release Date: February 2005
• Publisher: Hyperion Books
• Length: 290 Pages
• Weight: 1.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.8" x 8.3"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Solid read

Having already read 'Raise the Red Lantern', I decided to give this book a try. It's not a bad book, with some solid and evocative descriptions - such as what happens to the concubines and the Palace of Discarded Concubines, along with what happens to the Emperor's love - this book is a interesting read in a fictional but Chinese-styled empire. I do wish there had been some more detail. The description made the book sound as if the Emperor was more crazy/cruel, and compared to the description, he actually comes across as rather mild, which disappointed me. I wanted to see an Emperor who would abuse his power more (and thus make a more fascinating and exciting novel for us to read) and even though this young emperor does do a few bad things, he's actually more meek and mild than what you would think despite his rages and tantrums. I enjoyed 'Rice' more than this book, but if you're a fan of Su Tong, you should at least find this book enjoyable. A decent 3.5/5 stars for a enjoyable read.

Wisdom in the midsts of cruelty

Su Tong made a quick name for himself when his novella _Raise the Red Lantern_ was made into a great film. One might think that such success could spoil an author to continue to write what has already been successful, but his next book, _Rice_, offered its own challenges when Su Tong took on a deeply disturbed and violent man as his protagonist. _Rice_ was a great book, because even through horrific events, Tong looked for the rationale of every character and allowed them to present themselves in honest ways. Now, with _My Life as Emperor_, Su Tong takes the other perspective--rather than focus on a poor crook, his focus is now a young man named emperor of the fictional Xie Empire. Su Tong has fully confirmed his masterful ability to mix the harsh and cruel realities of social commentary with genuine pathos for the characters within those commentaries. It is a wise and splendid mix--Su Tong addresses the problems of the hierarchies of people while treating the people themselves with compassion and empathy. Duanbai, who ascends to the throne of the Xie Empire at the age of 14 even though he was not the first-born to the dead emperor, is a troublesome narrator, for he is spoiled and gets drunk on his own power quite easily, but still he is someone to sympathize for, for even with the power to have a person's tongue removed at his whim, he is still under the thumb of his grandmother, who will gladly strike out with her longevity cane. The implications of Duanbai's rash ruling are not as clear as they could be to convey the misery the new emperor is inciting in his own empire, but the growth of Duanbai in his friendship with a eunuch named Swallow and of course the problems people find with his claim on the throne, makes this a wise and wonderful book. Even if you find the book a little shallow at first, I would stay stay with it, for the ending is masterful. Su Tong adds another successful work to his canon, possibly because he works on a very simple yet effective paradigm--even in the most awful situations, people will create their own happiness or misery.

A Gripping Tale

My Life As Emperor by Su Tong is really hard to put down once you start. His writing style just pulls you in as you try to figure out the mind of the protagonist, Duanbai, the fifth emperor of the Xie Empire. The tale starts out with the death of the fourth emperor and the unexpected appointment of his fifth son, Duanbai, as the emperor. Duanbai is only 14 years old, and is completely unprepared for the job. While he wastes his time with his pursuits, the real government is his overbearing grandmother who rules with an iron fist. On commiting his first act of cruelty, he feels regret, but his grandmother tells him that he would do the same, so he goes down the road to being a cruel and thoughtless ruler. His frustration at his powerlessness and his complete inability to rule leads him to strike out at those around him. This tendency is made worse by his poor mental health. As his empire crumbles around him, though, he begins to see some things which offer him some comfort and perhaps a path to a better life. It may be difficult to imagine the cruelty which the protagonist enjoys, and some may be put off by it. Some may even claim that such cruelty is unimaginable, but I don't think that is true. The world around us is surrounded with cruelty which is just as bad as anything this emperor does. The only difference is that we have come to accept that cutting out prisoners' tongues is unacceptable, while we rationalize the cruelties of our modern age. In reading this book, I hope that you step back from the fictional world of Duanbai's empire, and take a look at our own world. If you do that, reading this book can become a powerful experience.

Honest not flowerly review

I am a female on active duty with the navy on the USS Kitty Hawk currently stationed in Japan and being so, I do not write flowerly reviews because my time is short. I have seen the film version of "Raise the Red Lantern" which left such a profound impact on me when I saw this book written by the same author I had to purchase and immediately read the book. So far the shock and awe (to borrow a term from CNN) of "My Life..." has lived up to the same feeling I get from watching "Raise the Red Lantern" I try as I am reading this to imagine how life would be if I were a spoiled 14 year old boy suddenly thrown into the role as Emperor. Nothing I can imagine even comes close to the horrors this young man demands performed. From cutting out the tongues of wailing women so they do not disturb his sleep, to ordering the torture of a man who tried to stand against this young snot nosed child. All the man did was ask for the taxes to be lowered in an area struck with bad luck during the farming year. I am a little more than half way through the book and so far it's hard to put down at night so I can rest before work. This is not a book for the light hearted nor for someone with a weak stomach. The careless way this young man can order the drowning of a maid to cover his selfish needs makes me glad I am a good mom who has raise a teenaged daughter with enough common sense and compassion to think of others and not herself. Please pick up this book and give it a go.

A Kingdom's Fall, an Emperor's Rebirth

Along with Mo Yan and Gao Xingjian, Su Tong is widely regarded as one of mainland China's premier novelists, and with good reason. MY LIFE AS EMPEROR, the third of Su Tong's works to be published in English (after RAISE THE RED LANTERN and RICE), tells a brilliant and compelling tale of fate, decay and decadence, and palace intrigue fueled by the whims of a fourteen-year-old and his manipulating grandmother, a figure strongly reminiscent of China's famous Qing Dynasty dragon empress, Cixi. Yet within this bleak context of impending doom, the author gives us a phoenix tale, the story of an unlikely rebirth into a life of peace and contemplation. MY LIFE AS EMPEROR is set in an unknown place at an indistinct time, although the author closes by locating the renamed imperial capitol as Changzhou in Jiangsu Province, not far from his own Suzhou birthplace. At the death of his Emperor father, fourteen-year-old Duanbai - the fifth of his father's sons - is unexpectedly called by his grandmother, Madame Huangfu, to assume the throne of the Xie Empire. Sun Xin, an alchemist and his deceased father's attendant - now reduced to madness - proclaims that calamity will soon befall the Empire. And it indeed does as Duanbai's ascendancy sets off a chain of palace intrigues among his half brothers. Duanbai himself is feckless and capricious, immature and utterly unprepared for his responsibilities. Duanbai's sleep is filled with night demons, and he is given to acts of pettiness and stunning viciousness alternating with acts of deep sympathy and love. The only person he can trust, his mentor Juekong, is banished from the capitol to live out his life as a monk on Bitter Bamboo Mountain. He befriends a palace eunuch named Swallow and falls deeply in love with a concubine, Lady Hui, but his empire is beset by enemies from within and without. He ultimately loses his throne to his oldest brother, Duanwen, and is banished from the capitol to live life as a commoner as his punishment. The balance of the novel tells the story of Duanbai's life after his fall from power. Written in 1992, MY LIFE AS EMPEROR offers an engrossing story line filled with memorable characters and fascinating insights into imperial life. As in his other works, Su Tong can be brutally cruel and explicit, but wondrously lyrical and richly symbolic. As he suggests in his Preface, this story is a dream from within the dream world in which he lives and writes. It is a dream filled most notably with birds and bird images: the foreboding white herons on the book's opening page, his eunuch Swallow, Lady Hui's Singing Oriole Pavilion, the birdlike feeling of tightrope walking, and the Double Eagle crest of the invading Peng Empire among others. From young Emperor Duanbai's favorite cricket cages to his escapades with tightroping walking, MY LIFE AS EMPEROR is a tragic story of unasked for imprisonment and deeply sought freedom. In the end, stark military power prevails in the public sphere, but th