Son of the Earth

Name: Son of the Earth
ISBN: 9787301361658

Zhao YuanPeking University Press · ChinaJun 2026

4.4

Word count: 236K words
Chapters: 24
ISBN: 9787301361658

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Summary

In China, a vast agricultural nation, intellectuals are bound to the countryside and the peasantry by countless ties, and harbor deep, broad feelings for the land and the soil. Through analysis and study of a wealth of modern and contemporary Chinese literature, this book explores intellectuals' cultural feelings toward the land and the peasantry and their spiritual bonds with them, revealing the cultural relationship between writers and the countryside and peasantry and the literary modes of its expression. A highlight of the book is its lyricism—rendered distinctive enough to serve as a "stylistic marker"—because it incorporates the author's own experience and feelings.

Editor's review

The problem Zhao Yuan's book takes up looks plain but is extremely hard to pin down: how exactly did modern Chinese intellectuals' feelings toward the land and the peasantry enter literature, and how do they expose their spiritual structure? Drawing on a wealth of modern and contemporary literary works, she traces the cultural relationship between writers and the countryside and peasantry and its modes of expression—not simply cataloguing rural themes, but probing the true texture and limits of feeling. Particularly noteworthy is that the discussion incorporates the author's own experience and emotions, forming a scholarly style with a lyrical temperament. This is both a stylistic marker and potentially a barrier for readers: it asks them to follow the author's sensibility rather than merely extract conclusions. For readers who want to understand how rural China has been imagined and narrated by modern literature, this book offers a delicate and reflective path, and is well suited to being read alongside rural-themed fiction.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Scholars and students studying modern and contemporary Chinese rural literature and intellectual questions
Readers interested in the relationship between rural China, peasant imagery, and literary expression
Readers who enjoy academic writing with a lyrical tone and strong sensibility
Readers willing to hold literary analysis and their own rural experience up to each other

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking rural social survey data or policy analysis
Academic readers who prefer purely theoretical reasoning and have little tolerance for lyrical prose

Reading tips

Read the table of contents and introduction first to grasp that the author focuses on cultural feeling and spiritual bonds, not thematic classification
With each chapter, read a related rural novel alongside it to test how the author's textual analysis holds up
Note where the lyrical touches appear and consider how they participate in the argument rather than merely ornament it
After finishing, write a passage of your own rural memory and set it against the intellectuals' emotional structure in the book

About the publisher

Peking University Press China · Founded in 1979

Peking University Press is a comprehensive university press whose publishing areas cover classical literature, popular science, social culture, world history, Western philosophy, and culture. Its catalogue contains 6,031 titles, with representative books including A Dream of Red Mansions, Relativity: The Special and General Theory (15th Edition) (with Einstein's classic papers on unified field theory and other topics), Elements, Conics, The Aristocratic Families of the Eastern Jin, The Philosophy of Mythology (Volume I), The Philosophy of Mythology (Volume II), and The Origin of Continents and Oceans. Representative authors include Cao Xueqin, Zhou Ruchang, Albert Einstein, Euclid, Apollonius, Tian Yuqing, Schelling, and Xian Gang. The press has developed distinctive strengths in classical Chinese literature and in the translation of Western philosophical classics, while also covering scientific classics and social and cultural studies. As public information is limited, this description is based only on the books in the catalogue and offers no further extrapolation.

版权信息
自序
第一章大地·乡土·荒原
第一节大地
第二节乡土
第三节荒原
第二章农民与农民文化
第一节农民
第二节土地意识与性文化
第三节在群集中，死亡之际
第三章 “大地”的颜色
第一节模式及其变易
第二节色彩斑驳——读作品札记
第三节方言趣味及其他
第四节南北东西
第四章知青作者与知青文学
第一节知青一代·知青文学
第二节怀念与回归——“知青文学”主题之一
第三节知青历史反思——“知青文学”主题之二
第四节评价难题——“知青文学”主题之三
第五节知青作者
附录知青作者的作品及其电影诠释
初版后记
再版后记

FAQ

How is this book different from ordinary studies of rural literature?

Ordinary studies of rural literature tend to focus on themes, schools, and narrative modes; this book concentrates more on exploring intellectuals' cultural feelings toward the land and the peasantry and their spiritual bonds, revealing the cultural relationship between writers and the countryside and the literary modes of its expression. It grounds its analysis in a wealth of works while incorporating the author's own experience, so it is strongly affective and reflective rather than a mere genre study.

Does the lyrical tone in the book affect its scholarly rigor?

The material explicitly calls this lyricism a "stylistic marker" of the book. It means argument and feeling are interwoven, and readers need to distinguish what is textual analysis from what is the author's emotional projection. Readers used to coolly academic prose may find it uncomfortable, but this approach also makes the discussion more compelling and suits readers willing to read closely and reflect.

How much rural literature do I need to have read?

There is no hard threshold, but the book analyzes a wealth of modern and contemporary literary works; if rural-themed fiction is entirely unfamiliar, understanding will remain superficial. It is advisable to be familiar with at least a few common modern rural novels, or to fill in the works as you read. Readers with rural life experience or a concern for rural issues will also find it easier to enter the author's frame of inquiry.

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About the author

Zhao Yuan Author · Chinese · 1945

Zhao Yuan was born in Lanzhou in 1945, with ancestral roots in Weishi, Henan. She is a researcher at the Institute of Literature of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. She graduated from the Department of Chinese Language and Literature at Peking University in 1969 and received her master's degree in literature from Peking University in 1981, studying under Wang Yao. Her early research focused on modern and contemporary Chinese literature, and she later turned to the study of scholar-officials in the Ming-Qing transition. Her representative works include Difficult Choices, On Ten Novelists, Beijing: City and People, Son of the Earth, Family Members, Father and Son, In Search of Yitang, and the three-volume selected edition Classic Masterpieces of Shen Congwen. Her writing spans literary appreciation and social-science research, combining close reading of fiction and classics with deep inquiry into the intellectual world of scholar-officials and urban culture. Her style is solid and intellectually rigorous, and she has had a lasting influence in both modern Chinese literary studies and Ming-Qing intellectual and cultural history.