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    Murder in Ancient China: Two Judge Dee Mysteries
    Murder in Ancient China: Two Judge Dee Mysteries
    Murder in Ancient China: Two Judge Dee Mysteries
    Ebook46 pages46 minutes

    Murder in Ancient China: Two Judge Dee Mysteries

    By Robert van Gulik

    3.5/5

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    About this ebook

    Judge Dee—Confucian Imperial magistrate, inquisitor, and public avenger, based on a famous statesman—was Dutch diplomat and Chinese cultural historian Robert van Gulik’s (1910–67) lasting invention. A welcome addition to the elite canon of fictional detectives, the Judge steps in to investigate homicide, theft, and treason and restores order to the golden age of the Tang Dynasty. In Murder in Ancient China’s first story, we watch as Judge Dee attempts to solve the mystery of an elderly poet murdered by moonlight in his garden pavilion; in the second, set on the eve of the Chinese New Year, the Judge makes two rare mistakes—will peril result?
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press
    Release dateDec 13, 2013
    ISBN9780226146881
    Murder in Ancient China: Two Judge Dee Mysteries

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    Reviews for Murder in Ancient China

    3.5/5

    18 ratings3 reviews

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    • 3/5
      A couple of short stories featuring Judge Dee from Ancient China. The two stories included are "The Murder on the Lotus Pond" and "Murder on New Year's Eve." The first story is a bit longer than the New Year's Eve one. Both show Judge Dee's powers of deductive reasoning. He's kind of like the Sherlock Holmes of China without a regular sidekick like Watson. Although the setting was in ancient China, the stories were so short that the reader didn't completely feel in that setting. I sometimes even wondered how historically accurate certain procedures were, although I didn't discover problems with a couple that I checked. I guess it just seemed a bit odd to me that some of those things would have been around in A.D. 667. This is interesting, but I think I'd like to read a longer work by the author to get a true feel for his work.
    • 3/5
      Short mysteries are almost always slightly disappointing, these too-brief tales are no exception. I enjoyed reading about Judge Dee again. I first encountered the stories thirty-five or so years ago and was captivated by the settings and pleasures of the ancient world van Gulik crafted.As a place to start reading the Judge Dee mysteries, I wouldn't recommend the reads; but if a quick hit of a time so remote that it feels more like a fantasy world than an historical epoch is needed then here you are. Those of us who, at some murky moment in the past, devoured the books will get a nostalgic pleasure from them.But don't expect subtle, character-driven development, there just wasn't room for that in such short works.
    • 3/5
      A quick, enjoyable read and a good introduction to Judge Dee. The mysteries themselves weren't terribly difficult to figure, and this ebook had several punctuation / spelling / formatting errors that proved to be distracting. But it has me interested in further writing by van Gulik, which was probably the point.

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    Murder in Ancient China - Robert van Gulik

    Murder in Ancient China: Two Judge Dee Mysteries

    Robert van Gulik

    Chicago Shorts

    Murder in Ancient China: Two Judge Dee Mysteries comes from Judge Dee at Work by Robert van Gulik, © 1967 by Robert van Gulik.

    All rights reserved.

    Chicago Shorts edition, 2014

    ISBN: 978-0-226-14688-1

    CONTENTS

    The Murder on the Lotus Pond

    Murder on New Year’s Eve

    THE MURDER ON THE LOTUS POND

    This case occurred in the year A.D. 667 in Han-yuan, an ancient little town built on the shore of a lake near the capital. There Judge Dee has to solve the murder of an elderly poet, who lived in retirement on his modest property behind the Willow Quarter, the abode of the courtesans and singing-girls. The poet was murdered while peacefully contemplating the moon in his garden pavilion, set in the centre of a lotus pond. There were no witnesses—or so it seemed.

    From the small pavilion in the centre of the lotus pond he could survey the entire garden, bathed in moonlight. He listened intently. Everything remained quiet. With a satisfied smile he looked down at the dead man in the bamboo chair, at the hilt of the knife sticking up from his breast. Only a few drops of blood trickled down the grey cloth of his robe. The man took up one of the two porcelain cups that stood by the pewter wine jar on the round table. He emptied it at one draught, then muttered to the corpse, ‘Rest in peace! If you had been only a fool, I would probably have spared you. But since you were an interfering fool . . .’

    He shrugged his shoulders. All had gone well. It was past midnight; no one would come to this lonely country house on the outskirts of the city. And in the dark house at the other end of the garden nothing stirred. He examined his hands—there was no trace of blood. Then he stooped and scrutinized the floor of the pavilion, and the chair he had been sitting on opposite the dead man. No, he hadn’t left any clue. He could leave now, all was safe.

    Suddenly, he heard a plopping sound behind him. He swung round, startled. Then he sighed with relief; it was only a large, green frog. It had jumped up out of the pond on to the marble steps of the pavilion. Now it sat there looking up at him solemnly with its blinking, protruding eyes.

    ‘You can’t talk, bastard!’ the man sneered. ‘But I’ll make double-sure!’ So speaking, he gave the frog a vicious kick that smashed it against the table leg. The animal’s long hindlegs twitched, then it lay still. The man picked up the second wine cup, the one his victim had been drinking from. He examined it, then he put it in his wide sleeve. Now he was ready. As he turned to go, his eye fell on the dead frog.

    ‘Join your comrades!’ he said with contempt and kicked it into the water. It fell with a splash among the lotus plants. At once the croaking of hundreds of frightened frogs tore the quiet night.

    The man cursed violently. He quickly crossed the curved bridge that led over the pond to the garden gate. After he had slipped outside and pulled the gate shut, the frogs grew quiet again.

    A few hours later three horsemen were riding along the lake road,

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