International Booker shortlist: ‘Taiwan Travelogue’ feels repetitive despite its innovative methods
· Scroll
Yáng Shuāng-zĭ’s Taiwan Travelogue is a Matryoshka doll of a novel. Its making is as complicated and layered as the story it tries to tell – where the translator and author change roles, the identity of the author shape-shifts, and a controversy about its authorship and corrections complicate subsequent editions.
Visit freshyourfeel.org for more information.
Translated from Mandarin Chinese by Lin King, Taiwan Travelogue is shortlisted for the 2026 International Booker Prize, and is, without doubt, the most inventive novel competing for the prize.
On the Taiwan trail
The reader wades through an armload of information before beginning the novel proper.
The novel begins in May 1938, before the Second World War, with the arrival of 26-year-old Japanese novelist Aoyama Chizuko in Taiwan. At this point, Taiwan is a Japanese colony and Aoyama-san is on a tour at the invitation of the Japanese government. She shows little interest in official events and is instead determined to experience the “real” Taiwan. Japan is the Mainland, while Taiwan, the Island.
She has a formidable appetite too, and wants to experience as much of the Island through flavours and food, as with sights. Aoyama-san befriends Chizuko (Chi-chan), who has been hired as her interpreter. Intelligent but demure, Chi-chan is an accomplished cook and uncomplainingly indulges Aoyama-san’s requests. They travel through the...