{"product_id":"2026100005181-secondhand-fortress-besieged","title":"Fortress Besieged","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCondition remarks:\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBook: Good                          \u003cbr\u003eJacket: No dust jacket\u003cbr\u003ePages: Good                  \u003cbr\u003eMarkings: No markings\u003cbr\u003eCondition remarks: Condition as shown in image. Faded cover with slight creasing. **ENGLISH and CHINESE text.**\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA landmark of modern Chinese literature, Fortress Besieged is a sharp, satirical novel set in 1930s China that chronicles the misadventures of Fang Hung-chien, a hapless young man who returns from Europe with a fraudulent diploma and stumbles through a series of romantic entanglements and social humiliations. Qian Zhongshu — one of China's most celebrated intellectuals — wields his wit like a scalpel, dissecting the pretensions, hypocrisies, and absurdities of the educated class with devastating precision. The novel's central metaphor, drawn from a French proverb about marriage being a fortress that those outside wish to enter and those inside wish to escape, illustrates the universal human condition of perpetual dissatisfaction and self-deception. Written with dazzling erudition and a tone that is at once comic and melancholic, the narrative presents a panoramic portrait of a society caught between tradition and modernity, East and West. Widely regarded as the Chinese equivalent of Evelyn Waugh or Kingsley Amis at their most acerbic, Fortress Besieged remains a timeless and brilliantly observed comedy of manners.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Secondhand Stock","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48820235960539,"sku":"2026100005181-SECONDHAND","price":60.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0523\/7646\/9701\/files\/795ae458-f230-466b-8ec4-b6b42f882054.png?v=1780055119","url":"https:\/\/bookgrocer.com\/products\/2026100005181-secondhand-fortress-besieged","provider":"Book Grocer","version":"1.0","type":"link"}