What does the Chinese character in Fae Myenne Ng's Steer Towards Rock frequently used to mark chapters mean and what writing style is it in?

September 30, 2008 3:23 PM

What does the Chinese character in Fae Myenne Ng's Steer Towards Rock frequently used to mark chapters mean? And what writing style is it in? You can see the character in the Amazon look-inside feature for the book (click excerpt on the left to see the character).
posted by Kattullus to Writing & Language (5 answers total)

One thing that might be important, most chapters in the book are named after the point-of-view character of that chapter and most of the chapters marked with this Chinese character are from the point of view of the protagonist of the novel (but not all).
posted by Kattullus at 3:25 PM on September 30, 2008

That's not a character I'm familiar with.

It's similar to 埋, bury, plus 白, white, but of course not that.

There is no character that extends the flat bottom of the right top part like that under the 土 part.

My guess is that it is just a stylized character.
posted by troy at 9:01 PM on September 30, 2008

Oh, one thing, the main character's two names are Jack Moon Szeto (assumed) and Yuo Seen Leung (real) if that provides any clues.
posted by Kattullus at 9:30 PM on September 30, 2008

It looks like two characters, "坦白" stacked on top of each other. Together, the word means "confession".
posted by hellopanda at 9:35 PM on September 30, 2008

Thanks, hellopanda! That makes perfect sense in the context of the novel.
posted by Kattullus at 9:41 PM on September 30, 2008