The Tea Master Trilogy · There Are Fragrant Trees in the South

Author: Wang Xufeng
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2000-12-01
Features: This series includes: "A Splendid Tree in the South," "The Sleepless Watch," and "Building a City with Grass," which are not sold separately. The full set is priced at 58.24 yuan. Please click to purchase separately. "A Splendid Tree in the South" is China's first long novel reflecting tea culture. The story takes place in Hangzhou, the capital of green tea, where Hang Li Zhai, the inheritor of the Wenyou Tea House, is a tea merchant in Jiangnan during the late Qing Dynasty. Refined and scholarly, he is not good at managing his business and ultimately dies on the couch of a courtesan. The next generation of tea practitioners is Hang Tianzui, who grows up in the era when the feudal dynasty completely collapsed and the Republic of China was born. He is always torn between and. Educated, talented, passionate, and ambitious, yet indecisive; he loves his lover, wife, concubine, and children, but ultimately loves them with a sense of loss and has no choice but to flee to the Buddhist temple. Hang Tianzui's three sons and two daughters experience an even broader era. They participate in the rise and fall of Chinese tea in various capacities and through different ways. Among them, the fate of the nation, family, and individuals is intricate and tumultuous. The rise and fall of the tea house are closely linked to the rise and fall of Chinese tea over the past century, and the novel thus portrays a long scroll of the fate of Chinese tea practitioners in modern and contemporary history. This novel recently won the Fifth Mao Dun Literature Prize: "The green smoke of tea, the steam of blood, the collision of hearts, and the entanglement of love intertwine in the author's elegant, gentle yet powerful and restrained brushwork. The vicissitudes of the century, the history of Hangzhou, the rise and fall of tea, and the sentiments of tea people all complement and merge into one, demonstrating the author's particularly rare and rigorous historical insight and skill in depicting large-scale social phenomena in the current era."