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Dai Sijie, a Chinese author and director, is famous for his autobiographical novel Balzac and the Little Chinese Dressmaker. He was re-educated during China’s Cultural Revolution and later studied art history. He moved to France in 1984 and began his career as a director and writer. Balzac and the Little Chinese Dressmaker has been translated into 25 languages and adapted into a film, but is banned in China. Sijie’s second novel, Le Complexe de Di, won the Prix Femina in 2003. He currently lives and works in Paris.
Dai Sijie, born in China in 1954, is an author and director who is particularly famous for his novel Balzac and the Little Chinese Dressmaker, a book about two young people who undergo a period of re-education during China’s Cultural Revolution. Just like the two young men in the story, Sijie was re-educated between 1971 and 1974. During those years he spent time working in a field in a rural area of Sichuan province. After his re-education, Dai Sijie completed high school and college in China. As a student, he focused his studies on art history.
In 1984, Sijie left China and went to France on a scholarship. In France, he began his career as a director and writer. He directed the film Chine, ma douleur which translates to China, My Sorrow, released in 1989. He also directed Le Mangeur de lune and Tang, le onzième.
Sijie’s first novel, Balzac and the Little Chinese Dressmaker, was originally written in French under the title Balzac et la Petite Tailleuse chinoise. It is quite clear by comparing the events in the novel with the author’s biography that there is a good deal of autobiography in the book. In Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, the main character and his friend Luo gain access to a secret shop of smuggled European novels. Although possession or reading of such novels is a serious offense under Maoist rule, boys are so engrossed in works of fiction that they take the risk. They spend many hours reading these forbidden texts in the back room of a tailor’s shop which is manned by a young seamstress, with whom both are in love.
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress has become a nationwide bestseller in America. It has been translated into 25 languages and distributed internationally. However, it has not been translated into Chinese and is banned in China. Balzac and the Little Chinese Dressmaker was adapted into a film released in 2005. The author wrote the film’s screenplay and also directed it.
The author’s second novel, Le Complexe de Di, won the Prix Femina in 2003. In 2007 Dai Sijie published a new novel, Par une nuit où la lune ne s’est pas levée. She currently lives and works in Paris, France.
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