Standards for Taiwanese book imports by Chinese resellers have become stricter, an independent bookstore owner in Beijing said yesterday.
In the past, with the exception of titles written by exiled Chinese writer Gao Xingjian (高行健), most books published in Taiwan could be imported to China, the owner said, speaking anonymously.
However, now certain publishers that print works touching upon subjects that are sensitive in China, such as democracy, protests and human rights, are now blacklisted entirely, the person said, citing the experiences of Gusa Publishing (八旗文化).
In other cases, books are allowed to be imported, but have entire sections torn out,
By William Hetherington / Staff writer, with CNAStandards for Taiwanese book imports by Chinese resellers have become stricter, an independent bookstore owner in Beijing said yesterday.
It can be embarrassing for a China scholar like me to read Eileen Chang’s pellucid prose, written more than sixty years ago, on the early years of the People’s Republic of China. How many cudgels to the head did I need before arriving at comparable clarity? My disillusioning first trip to China in 1973? My reading of the devastating journalism of Liu Binyan in 1980?