The Nine-tailed Turtle
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The Nine-tailed Turtle (Chinese: 九尾龜, also translated as Nine-tailed Turtles, Nine-headed Turtle, or Nine-times Cuckold) is a novel by Zhang Chunfan [zh] (?-1935), an author from Piling (near modern-day Changzhou). The novel centres around the life of a scholar named Zhang Qiugu, who leaves his wife to spend time with famous courtesans in China's pleasure districts.
The Nine-tailed Turtle | |||||||||
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Traditional Chinese | 九尾龜 | ||||||||
Simplified Chinese | 九尾龟 | ||||||||
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The book was serialized from 1906 to 1910 and has 192 chapters,[1] making it one of the longest novels produced in China's late Qing and early Republican eras. During that time, it was "phenomenally popular",[2] and was one of the most widely read books of the 1920s,[3] as well as one of the most popular novels of its time written partly in Wu Chinese.[4] In the 20th century, many intellectuals criticised it for its erotic content, and during the intervening years it "fell into oblivion",[3] with the result that by the 1980s it was difficult to obtain even a Chinese copy of the novel.[5] However, by the 21st century it had a continued high circulation with new editions and print runs.[3]