Top 50 Chinese Novels - Left Vermilion Bird, Right White Tiger

Author: Zhou Daxin
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2001-10-01
Features: Over the past two decades, several generations of writers with vastly different concepts, experiences, and mindsets have emerged, as have countless works with diverse themes, narratives, and styles. The selected works in The 50 Best Chinese Novels (1978-2000) confirm, to some extent, that this view is not unfounded. Chinese writers, constrained by historical traditions and real-world environments, cannot develop their fiction and ideas without reference to these traditions and realities. Around the 1970s, novels began to reveal distinct pursuits and characteristics that differed from the unified era. As a form of imaginative and fictional writing, it gradually shed its singular political objectives and emphasized didactic functions. Issues related to human nature, such as inner suffering, emotional needs, and ideological conflicts, began to be reflected and expressed in novels.
Content: This is the left gate of a Han dynasty tomb, with a red bird (Zhuque) carved at the top of the door. The right gate features a white tiger. This Han tomb was discovered by my father in the autumn of the 25th year of the Republic of China, located on the sunny slope of Qifeng Ridge, ten miles west of Nanyang City. Upon entering this gate, you will see ninety-four exquisite Han dynasty stone carvings. Come in and see for yourselves! Child, you do not know how grateful I am to you! Yes, grateful to you! You have yet to fully realize what you have discovered—a treasure! A treasure, child! Xiao Nan, Han'er, come over, I want to tell you that this unique and magnificent stone carving tomb must have been from the period when Han dynasty stone carving tombs flourished, roughly between the establishment of the Eastern Han Dynasty by Liu Xiu and the reign of Emperor Shun.