The Mandarin (novel)

The Mandarin (Portuguese: O Mandarim) is a novella on the sin of avarice by José Maria de Eça de Queirós (1845 - 1900), also known as Eça de Queiroz. It was first published in Portuguese in 1880. The first English version, translated by Richard Franko Goldman, was published by The Bodley Head in 1965.[1] A translation by Margaret Jull Costa, was published by Dedalus Books in 1993. A revised version was published by Dedalus in 2009, together with three short stories.[2]

This article is about the Eça de Queiroz novel. For other novels, see Mandarin § Novels.
The Mandarin (and Other Stories)
Cover of the 2009 English-language version
AuthorJosé Maria de Eça de Queirós
Original titleO Mandarim
TranslatorMargaret Jull Costa
Cover artistMarie Lane
CountryPortugal
LanguagePortuguese
SeriesDedalus European Classics
GenreFantasy
PublisherDedalus
Publication date
1880
Published in English
1963 (The Bodley Head); 1993 (Dedalus)
Pages84
ISBN9781903517802

Background

The story was serialized in a shorter version in the Diário de Portugal and, with the addition of six chapters, it was sold as a book in 1881. It was initially attacked as being a departure from the realist style used by Eça in his earlier works. He was also accused of plagiarising the idea from a story by Alphonse Daudet, although The Mandarin was accepted for serialization in the French Revue Universelle Internationale in 1884.[3][4]

The Plot

Teodoro, a poor Portuguese civil servant in Lisbon, receives a visit from the Devil in disguise who offers him the chance of inheriting unlimited riches if he rings a bell placed on a book by his side, which will lead to the death of a rich Mandarin, Ti Chin-fu, in distant China.[5] This Teodoro duly does, resulting in his inheriting the Mandarin's fortune and starting to spend enormous sums. However, he finds that fabulous wealth brings with it unexpected problems. In time, remorse sends him to China to look for the dead Mandarin’s family. Failing to find them, he returns to Lisbon still haunted by the crime.[6] His attempts to renounce the inheritance come to nothing. Sensing that he is dying he bequeaths his millions to the Devil, with the observation that “The only bread that tastes good is the bread we earn day by day with our own hands: never kill the Mandarin”.

Reviews

Keates describes the novella as a "brilliant mischievous essay in fantasy chinoiserie, irreverently subverting the trope, created half a century earlier by Balzac in La Peau de chagrin, of the Oriental curse masquerading as a blessing".[7] Another reviewer considers that the choice made by Teodoro was a “reworking of the ‘Mandarin paradox’ first posed by French writer Chateaubriand in 1802”.[4][8] Sobre notes the way Eça uses allegory to make criticism of society and the human condition, observing that the novel provides interesting observations on the relationship between people’s possessions and the way others treat them,[9] as well as on the morality of humans.

Adaptations

The book was adapted as a Portuguese TV miniseries in 1991.[10]

References
  1. Ericson, Raymond. "Richard Franko Goldman Obituary". Fanta-Levey Genealogy. Retrieved 4 July 2018.
  2. Eça de Queirós, José Maria (2009). The Mandarin and Other Stories. Dedalus. ISBN 9781903517802.
  3. Maria Filomena Mónica, translated by Alison Aiken (2005). Eça de Queiroz. Woodbridge: Tamesis. ISBN 1855661152.
  4. Jull Costa, Margaret (2009). Introduction to The Mandarin and Other Stories. Dedalus. ISBN 9781903517802.
  5. The French expression ‘’tuer le mandarin’’ means 'to harm someone whom you know you will never meet in order to gain some personal advantage and in the certain knowledge that you never will be punished'.
  6. Biggins, Alan. "The Mandarin (and other stories)". Dedalus Books. Retrieved 4 July 2018.
  7. Keates, Jonathan. "The Mandarin and Other Stories". goodreads. Retrieved 4 July 2018.
  8. Morgan, Ann. "Portugal: a moral dilemma". A year of reading the world. Retrieved 4 July 2018.
  9. Sobre, Célia. "[Opinião] O Mandarim, de Eça de Queiroz". Estante de Livros. Retrieved 4 July 2018.
  10. "O Mandarim". IMDb. Retrieved 9 June 2021.
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