Shengtianmenkou (Upper, Middle, Lower)

Author: Liu Xinglong
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-01
Features: Liu Xinglong spent six years immersed in writing, recently completing a million-word epic novel titled The Sacred Gate (in three volumes). It is a rare long masterpiece on realistic themes in China. The novel spans from the early 20th century to the late 1960s, depicting the fates of two families—the Xue and Hang clans—in Tianmenkou, a small town in eastern Hubei. It features over 50 characters, presenting "the great destiny of ordinary people." The work profoundly reflects the changes in national fortune and individual destiny, as well as the brilliance and baseness of human nature. Liu Xinglong, known as a fast writer in the literary world, took six years to create this long novel. He said, "This novel has been brewing for many years. After starting, I paused it several times and even abandoned nearly 200,000 words I had already written—it truly deserves the term 'immersed in creation.'" Parts of this 1.1 million-word novel were published in magazines such as Contemporary, and it quickly garnered attention from critics. One critic remarked, "This is a work that has restructured the history of the 20th century in China."