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Biographical note
Wang Yuewen (b. 1962) is a prolific writer and a member of the China Writers Association. He has published numerous novels, short stories, and essays, including Home Village, National Portrait, Yellow Ochre and The Prime Minister of the Great Qing. He has received several literary awards, including the Lu Xun Literary Prize and the Wu Cheng'en Novel Prize. Haiwang Yuan is Professor Emeritus at Western Kentucky University in the US, and Guest Professor of English at Nankai University, China. He is a writer, translator and translation consultant. He has authored and co-authored many books, including Tibetan Folktales, Tales from the Other Peoples of China, The Magic Lotus Lantern, Other Tales from the Han Chinese and This is China: The First 5,000 Years. Among two dozen of his translations are Songs from the Forest, There is a Fish in the Desert, Open-Air Cinema and Illustrated Stories of Chinese Characters for Children. He has consulted on the translation of two Sinoist Books titles.No one expected the Qing Dynasty to fall, least of all the people of Shawan.
Sheltered from time by the mountains that surround the village, they have prospered from tilling the rich soil inherited from their ancestors. Helmed by the Chen and Zhu clans, its feudal traditions leave them unprepared for the chaos about to engulf their homeland.
Amid clashing ideologies within and Japanese invaders without, the two families must lead the village through decades of transformation. As the old certainties are uprooted, a molten nation takes shape around them. But will Shawan still be a place to call home?
Home Village portrays a rural Chinese village navigating the precarious waters of the early 20th century. Centred around the Chen and Zhu clans and spanning multiple generations, the story unfolds amid the turmoil of the Chinese Civil War and Japanese occupation, spotlighting the idiosyncrasies of rural life and its struggle to hold on to customs.