Mindy: We're here with Dina Brumfield to talk about Unbound, A Tale of Love and Betrayal in Shanghai. So, first of all, why don't you talk a little bit about your personal background and some of the elements from your own life that helped inspire you to write this book?
Dina: This book is a very, very intimate account of mine and people around me, their lives. So I was born in China in Shanghai and I was raised there, lived in a time when basically China was closed off to the entire world. In the time that I was in China, China went through a lot of change from entirely closed to slowly open up. Eventually, I left China to join my family in 1989. You can figure that English is my second language. So I came over here, had a very limited language scale, and I never thought I would write a book in English.
Of course. I mean I always aspired to be a writer when I was kid, but I thought I would write in Chinese. I thought, you know, the dream to be a writer is just pretty much dead. I mean, it's impossible for me to make it become reality. However, the life that I had in China… somehow it just stayed with me during the time I'm here--I've been here more than 30 years.
So I went back to China several times. Talk to people there, the young people there. China went through a huge change since I left. Basically raised to a World Player pretty much on the equal footing with us. Now I talk to young people. They Say what are you talking about? Like it’s so far fetched of a story to them? And I wasn't that long ago that I go, Oh, my God, it's only 30 years and people forgot. So that's why I feel like I'm compelled to write a story. As I said, loosely based on my life and also people around me. The reason I do that is because I think history shouldn't be forgotten. When you remember history, there is less chance for history to repeat itself.
It is about two very strong woman, a granddaughter and grandmother who lived in the 1970’s and 1930’s Shanghai--by the way 70’s Shanghai and the 30’s Shanghai are to complete different worlds--and their struggle to free themselves from, you know, visible and invisible bonds.
You know, I'm not a seasoned writer and English is my second language. So it was very difficult for me to write, so I didn't have, like, a preconceived outline as how the story should go. You know, I'm not… I wasn't very sophisticated. I'm still not very sophisticated in terms of writing. But somehow this book, I guess it's from my heart. It touched a lot of issues. Women's rights, like freedom, these issues, they're still very relevant in today's world.
Mindy: Talk to me a little bit about English being your second language and writing a novel in your second language. I'm sure that really produces a whole slew of complications and just an added layer of difficulty for you. Did you write it in Chinese first and then translate, or did you just dive in and began writing it in English?
Dina: I started in English. Actually, I'm in no man's land right now. So after 30 years in the United States, I don't say my English is great, but my Chinese is terrible, too. So I forgot. My writing in Chinese has become really difficult now, so I really appreciate that the Chinese computer in the Chinese apps I can look up. But anyway, yes, I started in English when I started writing a book, and when I started, I just wrote one page, just the first thing of my book because that scene was my experience and I lived through it. So after all, these years, I still could see it. So I took a writing class and the teacher says, Well, you write something, write one page. So I said, Well, what am I supposed to write? But I could see my experience. Actually, it's almost like, very visual, like the picture in my mind. So I just wrote What I saw and the teacher says it’s actually really good. I need a lot of, you know, clean up, of course, but he actually likes what I wrote. So that was the starting point of my book.
Mindy: How old were you then when you decided to sit down and begin this process?
Dina: Forties. I was raising my son at the time, my job just didn't work out the way I wanted. I used to live in California. Then I moved to D. C. And my company Let me take my job with me, so I worked remotely. But over the time--I did that for about like fifteen years--Over the time the company went to re-org and I wasn't in office, and so I was disconnected with office politics and as a result they just dumped me into some corner. I thought the heck, I'm just gonna quit. My husband says- You always wanted to write a book. Maybe it's time for you to try it. Are you kidding? I cannot do that. I just don't have the skill. It's impossible, he said. Okay, try it. Try it. You don't know until you try it. So that's how I signed up for the writing class. And that's how it started.
Mindy: Coming back to the book, one of the things that's really interesting about it is it has two different timelines. It's set in 1930’s and in 1980’s Shanghai. So writing about those two different time periods and how different China was in 50 years, can you talk a little bit about that about writing the two different timelines and kind of exploring those differences in the same setting?
Dina: Actually, this is the interesting part of the book. Well, in the 1970s and 1980s I'm very familiar with it because I lived through it. That wasn't difficult for me all these years. I still can see what Shanghai was like when I lived there. However, 1930s is an entirely different story because 1930’s Shanghai - It was called the Paris Off East. It was a booming city and it was full of nightlife. You know, a lot of foreigners there in Shanghai in 1930’s. Shanghai was divided by different countries. You know, they have a foreign concessions, so they have Chinese concession. French concession, British concession, the foreign concession. Even they have a lot of similarities, but because they have different cultures, so each concession is different, their architecture is just different. And the restaurants, they're different. And of course, people who lived there were different.
You know, it was very interesting in China--and I heard a lot of stories from my grandma about 1930 China. But, you know, I didn't live there. I couldn't feel it. I couldn't touch it, you know, just, it’s quite removed from me. So I was thinking how I can bring that up from paper into life. Fortunately, I live in D. C. So I went to the Library of Congress. So and they have a Asian reading room. And when I talked to the librarian about my book about what I wanted to do, he said, Oh, I know what you need to do.
So he pulled me to the corner, and he gave me a lot of old newspapers about China, what they call microfiche. You can see the image of 1930’s China, So I basically just got engrossed in that thing for a month. Every day I go there like I gotta work, and I just, you know, visualized and see and read the news and see the images of people, how they walk and what the city looks like and just over and over and over and over. And then I eventually could see a picture of that time in Shanghai. And that's how I started.
Mindy: Going back then, just to those time jumps 1930s and then to 1980s. And then again, just-- it's not necessarily part of the book, but here today China, of course, is greatly changed again. So, do you see any relevance then, between your book and what is happening in China today? Can you talk about the timeliness of your novel?
Dina: I'm not a political person, but I see a lot of similarities in 1930s women. I'm talking - this book is mostly about women. Their life is very restricted. I mean they don't have a lot of freedom. Everything is basically determined for them. Although in the 1930s it was a lot less common -- But still, some women still have bound their feet. That's a lot of physical restriction put on women. That the book is about a grandmother, and she lived in the 1930s and she tried to find love for herself, which failed, of course. Then she tried to break through what was imposed on her and to find freedom in the course of looking for freedom, she sacrificed a lot, and she had to abandon her daughter.
In my time in the 1970s, women had a lot more power then. We were equal. We could go to school. We call it the college. You know, we could get pretty much all the jobs man could. Again however, the restriction posted on us is not man and a woman. By then, it's all political. We had to tow the party line. We couldn't do a lot of things that we wanted to do. We couldn't even dress the way that we want to dress. We couldn't listen to the music you wanted to listen to and we had no freedom to pursue what we wanted to do even after you go to college, because a job was assigned to you. So that there is, there's a lot of restrictions. As a result, the character in my book then left the country to pursue her own freedom.
Today people seem like they have so much freedom. They have a lot more money in their pocket. They could have traveled the world. They could have a lot of things that I couldn't do. However, they still have to tow the line. They cannot say they cannot openly, you know, express their idea, if it's not in line with the party line. And they still have to be very, very careful. So otherwise, you just don't know what's gonna happen to you. The security law, they passed in Hong Kong. I was so sad, you know, that just opens the door for people to go to your home, take your parents away for no reason, and then they slap something on you saying, Oh, you said something against our security law. Whatever. China has changed the law on the surface, but deep in core, I'm not saying the same, I'm sure some steps forward but still have a lot of similarities. So that's why I think my book touched upon that subject.
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Mindy: And like you said, it is focused on women and female characters. So can you talk a little bit specifically about the woman's life than in China in the 193o’s versus the 1980’s and the difference specifically for females?
Dina: In 1930s China, Even though Shanghai was very modern at the time, a very modern Metropolitan, the core was still very restrictive for women. They cannot date. They cannot marry somebody they love, and the marriage is mostly arranged by family and in some cases, arranged when they were just born. And most women at the time, they didn't go to school. A lot of women at the time couldn't read and write. When they were at home, their fate was controlled by their fathers, when they married after they married, their fate was controlled by their husbands. They had no rights.
And if they have Children and the husband divorce you and you don't get your Children, the Children automatically belong to the husband's family. So you are nothing. Ao most divorce was unthinkable back then. There is this saying in China is like - you married chicken you go with chicken. Marry dog, Go with dog. So if you are married, you're married. Doesn't matter who you married. You're gonna stick for the lifetime whether you're happy or not.
Women had no education. That's why my character was very unusual. And she not only chose her own lover to marry and she actually decided to divorce him. Of course, she had to sacrifice a lot, but yeah, she was very strong. And she stood up for herself. In the 1980’s Women, as I said on the surface, Mao during this time was really promoting equal rights for women, although it was not entirely equal because I remember when I was kid, heir salaries were determined by the government. My dad's salary was more than my mom's so I guess that wasn't equal, even though my mom was a very skilled surgical nurse.
So when I was growing up, I didn't feel a lot of restrictions. I went to school with boys. I took the college examination and I went to college just like any other boy. Not so much restriction for girls, but the restrictions were on a large scale as a system, systematic repression basically, imposed on everyone, not just girls. I left China 30 years ago. Now I'm looking at the Chinese government. There are quite a few powerful women there, and I look at the business and it seems like there are quite a few women there. But I think over time women in China, they did elevate themselves quite a bit. Sexism, it's much less, and I think they provide the opportunity for women to move up. So long as you tow the line. You have to tow the party line.
Mindy: Unbound is your first novel and, of course, highly personal to you and had so many elements of your own life and the lives of the people around you. It took you 10 years to write and publish this book because it is so intensely personal. Do you have any plans to continue on writing more novels or working more in The publishing arena?
Dina: Being a writer has been my dream, and now I actually can hold my book. It's quite amazing. Yeah, I think I will write more, but a lot of people are asking me if I'm going to write the sequel. I'm not sure about that, but I'm writing, my second book is already… I finished the first draft of my second book, but I'm not happy with it. So am I taking another like 5 to 6 years to write it, so I don't know. But yes, I'm gonna continue to write.
Mindy: That's wonderful, and you are right about holding your book. It is a wonderful moment to see something that was mostly in your mind. And as you were saying before, it's like a Series of pictures for me, too. It's very visual. It's like a movie in my head, and when you've moved that out into the world and it's a physical thing that you can hold, it's a very, very cool feeling.
Dina: It is. I cried.
Mindy: I think I probably did, too, to be honest with you. That first novel is so special in so many ways and yours particularly because it's so personal.
Dina: Yes,it is very personal. So hopefully the second novel is not going to be personal, and I've actually decided to write a different story. I have a couple of stories in my head, so some will be a lot of a lot more fun, less heavy.
Mindy: That's wonderful. Last thing - Why don't you tell us where listeners can find you online and where they can buy the book?
Dina: It's a historical book, and a lot of you know, historical facts are very unfamiliar to people in this country, So I actually on my website Dina Brumfield dot com I put some background to help readers to understand my book so you can look for Dina Brumfield dot com And also I have Facebook, Instagram, under my name Dina Brumfield.
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