My Altay

2017 "China Good Book" Award
The 7th Lu Xun Literature Award 2018
The representative work of Li Juan's "Altay" series, winner of the 7th "Outstanding Chinese Publications" in 2019, is published in a new revised edition after 11 years.
The remote and quiet Akhara Village, the slow and eternal Kawutu, the summer pasture of Shayihengbulak...
Li Juan's "Elves of Altay" captures the beautiful, glittering moments of the northern Xinjiang borderlands with delicate, luminous brushstrokes. The book is divided into two volumes. The first, "Memories" (2007-2009), captures the fragmented and enduring moments of life in Kawutu and Akhara villages. The second, "In Corners" (2002-2006), offers a vivid account of the daily lives of Li Juan, her mother, and her elderly grandmother as they moved with the nomadic herders: running a grocery store, working as a seamstress, helping traveling nomads with clothes and skirts, and collecting wild wood ear mushrooms deep in the mountains. The book also depicts the bulging tents on the Shayihengbulak grasslands in spring, the boisterous Aken singing sessions on the pastures in summer, and the long, snow-covered roads of winter... The Gobi Desert, grasslands, forests, snow-capped mountains, steeds, and herders—these delicate, luminous texts reveal the profound and rich landscape of nomadic life in the borderlands.
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Just as the land grows wheat and corn, it also produces its own speakers. Li Juan is one such speaker.
——Liu Liangcheng You can’t remember some people’s words even if you read them a hundred times, but you can’t forget some people’s words after reading them once.
—Wang Anyi One autumn morning, I saw a squirrel in the woods. With its fluffy tail and frills, it nimbly leaped from tree to tree in search of food. It was so agile, it was mesmerizing to watch, like a performance. Its fluffy tail wasn't just for show, it was a parachute! It effortlessly darted from the treetops, leaving the wild cats on the ground helpless. It was a sly creature, so swift! Looking at it, I thought, perhaps Li Juan is just such a wild squirrel.
She is the Sei Shonagon of Altay. She makes us writers feel hopeless, reminiscent of "The Story of Hulan River"... Just as a master like Xiao Hong miraculously emerged from the icy town of Hulan River in Heilongjiang, so too, a writer like this suddenly emerged from the wilderness of Xinjiang's Altai Mountains.
——Shu Feilian

2021-08-01

花城出版社

280

9787536094352