A Chinese Childhood
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: N/A
Pages: Good
Markings: Previous owner
Few memoirs capture the texture of a vanishing world with such lyrical precision as A Chinese Childhood, in which Chiang Yee chronicles his early years growing up in Jiujiang, a city in China's Jiangxi province during the twilight of the imperial era and the tumultuous dawn of the twentieth century. With warmth and meticulous detail, Yee paints a vivid portrait of family life, Confucian tradition, local customs, and the sights and sounds of a riverside town — a world at once intimate and richly ceremonial, rendered through the eyes of a curious, sensitive boy finding his place within it. Chiang Yee was a remarkable polymath — painter, poet, calligrapher, and writer — and his distinctive artistic sensibility permeates every page of this memoir, which stands as a testament to the power of cross-cultural storytelling. The prose moves between tenderness and gentle humour, illuminating the rituals of Chinese domestic life for Western readers without ever sacrificing authenticity. Originally published by Methuen and later revised, this second edition endures as a beloved classic of autobiographical literature, leaving the reader to wonder what other hidden worlds await rediscovery in its pages.
Author: Chiang Yee
Format: Hardback
Genre: Biography
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: N/A
Pages: Good
Markings: Previous owner
Few memoirs capture the texture of a vanishing world with such lyrical precision as A Chinese Childhood, in which Chiang Yee chronicles his early years growing up in Jiujiang, a city in China's Jiangxi province during the twilight of the imperial era and the tumultuous dawn of the twentieth century. With warmth and meticulous detail, Yee paints a vivid portrait of family life, Confucian tradition, local customs, and the sights and sounds of a riverside town — a world at once intimate and richly ceremonial, rendered through the eyes of a curious, sensitive boy finding his place within it. Chiang Yee was a remarkable polymath — painter, poet, calligrapher, and writer — and his distinctive artistic sensibility permeates every page of this memoir, which stands as a testament to the power of cross-cultural storytelling. The prose moves between tenderness and gentle humour, illuminating the rituals of Chinese domestic life for Western readers without ever sacrificing authenticity. Originally published by Methuen and later revised, this second edition endures as a beloved classic of autobiographical literature, leaving the reader to wonder what other hidden worlds await rediscovery in its pages.