Li Po of the T'ang Dynasty was one of the greatest poets in world history. His status in Chinese poetry is roughly equivalent to that of Shakespeare in English-language poetry. He was a Taoist mystic and a wandering swordsman as well as a poet, and the greatest emperor of the T'ang Dynasty once seasoned his soup for him in deference to his genius. According to legend, he died of drowning when he drunkenly reached out over the edge of his boat to try to hug the reflection of the moon.

Simon Elegant's “A Floating Life” is a historical novel about the great Li Po, and I read it primarily because of my love for the poet's work. I don't think the novel was a complete success, but it does have its good points. I'll talk about what I didn't like first, and then what I did.

Given the poet's reputation as a swordsman and his record of seeking out and dueling other swordsmen in his youth, I think the book could have given a little more attention to this side of his life. Instead the author seemed a little too focused on his college literature classes- typical literary devices such as “Unreliable Narrator” are a little too in-your-face to be truly effective. This is why I ultimately prefer pulp and genre fiction to “literary” fiction- a pulp writer would just go ahead and use a trope like that without even worrying about it, probably without even knowing there was a word for it. And the result would be a lot less self-conscious and artificial-feeling. As it is, you can almost hear the author thinking “I know, I'll use Unreliable Narrator by relying on a Framing Story- Professor would be so proud!”

Add in some completely egregious potty humor, and you have a book that feels vaguely annoying- simultaneously arsty and vulgar. But here's what I did like.

The author's portrayal of Li Po's personality feels convincing and true to life. I think he basically understood Li Po as a man, which is a pretty impressive feat more than a thousand years after the poet's death. Simon Elegant's Li Po is transcendently talented, but he's also a self-destructive egotist who doesn't know when to shut up. He ends up destroying everything he values in life because he just can't stay out of it when he ought to- and that's exactly what really happened.

I didn't like everything about this novel, but I do feel as if I know one of my favorite poets a little better after reading it. That means it was well worth reading.