Shanghai Color

Name: Shanghai Color
ISBN: 9787108063687

程乃珊SDX Joint Publishing Company · ChinaJun 2025

4.0

Word count: 156K words
Chapters: 30
ISBN: 9787108063687

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Summary

She loves food: catch a whiff of candied roasted chestnuts and her feet refuse to move. She chased fashion, curling her hair with discarded electrical wire even in the turbulent years. She chased stars, once tracking one all the way to Beverly Hills for a hug and a photo with Gregory Peck… Born in 1946, a true daughter of a distinguished family, yet closer to today's young people than anyone. She is a daughter of Shanghai—or rather, she is Shanghai itself: seemingly compliant amid the alternation of old and new eras, yet stubbornly holding her ground, square within and round without, content in her own joy. And so the words that flowed from her pen… legends lie dormant in ordinary alleys, brimming with vigorous vitality. Though she has been gone six years, that fiery zeal for life of hers still bustles across the page, infecting all who make and read books.

Editor's review

Shanghai Color is the posthumous work of Cheng Naishan, an important writer of the late Shanghai School of literature, published by SDX Joint Publishing Company. The book is not a novel but a collection of cultural essays centered on the colors of Shanghai. With her distinctive "old Shanghai" perspective, Cheng Naishan delicately captures and interprets the city's visual memory and aesthetic codes. From the "brick red" of shikumen lanes and the "autumn brown" of plane trees in the French Concession to the "grey white" of the Bund's architecture, and from the "sweet pink" of calendar posters to the "ink green" and "sapphire blue" of qipaos, she elevates color from mere visual perception into a symbol carrying history, culture, class, and ways of life.

As an editor, I believe the book's core value lies in its "literary texture of nonfiction." Cheng Naishan's writing remains as vivid and steeped in everyday street life as ever, but here her brush leans more toward cultural archaeology and aesthetic analysis. She does not merely describe colors but traces their origins (such as imported pigments versus local dyeing and weaving), their social metaphors (such as the civic-class aesthetic embodied by the "blue cloth qipao"), and their evolution through changing times. This makes Shanghai Color more than a nostalgic essay collection: it is an exquisite reader for understanding Shanghai's urban character and civic aesthetics. For readers, it is like a key toothed with colors, seeking to open a side door into the city's spiritual core.

One caveat, however: the book's narrative tone carries a strong personal memory and classical sensibility, a fond backward glance at modern Shanghai (especially the 1930s to 1960s). What it offers is a highly stylized "Shanghai color spectrum" filtered through literature, not an objective academic study of urban color. Its pleasure lies in following the author's keen perception and rich associations on a city ramble full of sentiment and insight.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Those interested in Shanghai School culture, Shanghai's urban history, and civic life
Literature and art lovers, especially readers who enjoy cultural analysis through details such as color and objects
Loyal readers of Cheng Naishan hoping to feel her late style and thinking in this posthumous work
Those in design, visual art, or urban studies seeking humanistic inspiration

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking rigorous academic research or comprehensive urban history materials
Readers expecting Cheng Naishan's classic family-narrative novels
Those with little basic knowledge of or cultural resonance with Shanghai, who may find the content too fragmented and local

Reading tips

Read it as a "slow-reading" essay collection, going chapter by chapter or picking color themes that interest you; there is no need to rush
Pair the reading with old photographs, paintings (such as calendar poster advertisements), or related film clips to greatly enhance the experience and understanding
Read it alongside other nonfiction about Shanghai (such as Chen Danyan's Shanghai's Wind, Flowers, Snow, and Moon) to appreciate the differences in perspective between authors

About the publisher

SDX Joint Publishing Company China · Founded in 1932

SDX Joint Publishing Company is a publisher known for its humanities and social science titles, covering classics, culture, history, social fiction and politics. Its catalogue of 826 books includes Chinese and foreign literary classics such as The Scholars, Camel Xiangzi and Selected Short Stories of Chekhov, scholarly works such as Studies of Chinese Cave Temples, A Study of the Tuoba History (Revised Edition) and The Nine-Rank System: A Prehistory of the Imperial Examination, and translations such as Red Star Over China and Notes from the House of the Dead. Its authors include renowned Chinese and foreign writers such as Wu Jingzi, Lao She, Su Bai and Chekhov, as well as scholars and translators such as Chen Xiaoming, Wang Benhua, Guo Changbao and Zhu Xiansheng. Its publishing character lies in balancing the popularisation of classics with academic depth, with attention to textual quality and the transmission of knowledge.

版权信息
总序她多么爱生活，爱得太多太多
坐标系
绿屋情缘
记忆里的老上海豪宅
南京西路：静安区的母亲河
南京西路花园公寓
外滩：新人类的伊甸园
老唱片
我与上海滩
当我们年轻的时候
平·克劳斯贝在我家
好先生
上海先生
小开
大都会的小男人
Arrow先生
雅皮先生
海派先生曹可凡
上海滩上老克勒
老克勒未老
与女共舞
风向标
调沙拉酱和捣糨糊
贵族之血
从长衫到牛仔
斗篷和风衣
包中乾坤
“阿飞”正传
代跋

FAQ

How is this book rated on Douban, and what are the main reviews?

The book scores highly on Douban, with the exact rating changing over time but generally above 8.0. Reviews mostly praise the author's unique color perspective, delicate and expressive writing, and precise, affectionate capture of old Shanghai's charm, considering it a cultural sketchbook "full of sentiment and insight." Some readers note that its content leans toward personal memory and aesthetics, with a relatively narrow focus on a specific historical period and social class.

What kind of writer was Cheng Naishan, and how does her writing background connect to this book?

Cheng Naishan (1946–2013) was a renowned contemporary writer of Shanghai School literature, born into an old Shanghai banking family, with deep experience of and engagement with the city's urban culture and civic life. Her representative works, such as The Blue House and Poor Street, mostly center on the family upheavals of different social classes in Shanghai. This book is her late-life nonfiction attempt to fuse personal memory, family history, and cultural observation; her profound "Shanghai experience" is the foundation on which all its color narratives rest.

Is this book suitable as an introductory guide to Shanghai?

The book offers a very unique and sensory entry point to Shanghai, but it is not a systematic introductory guide. It is better suited to readers who already have some impression of or interest in the city, deepening their understanding of its cultural temperament, historical layers, and aesthetic details through the micro-lens of color. For a more comprehensive historical and social overview, it is advisable to read it alongside general histories or social-studies works.

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About the author

程乃珊 Author

Cheng Naishan is a Chinese-language author known for writing about Shanghai's urban memory and everyday culture, with four of her works included in this collection. Her writing centers mainly on essays and social-science subjects, and her representative works include Shanghai Lady, Shanghai Color, Shanghai Memory, and the series collectively known as Cheng Naishan's Shanghai Story Trilogy. These titles suggest that her writing revolves around the city of Shanghai, focusing on urban life, its people, and the everyday details of changing times, with a strong sense of regional culture and nostalgia. Her prose tends toward the plain and delicate, often beginning from concrete scenes of daily life to sketch Shanghai's distinctive urban character, giving her a recognizable voice among readers of similar writing. Public information about her personal life—such as her birth year, native place, and education—is limited, so her works themselves remain the main way to understand her writing.