The Ordinance of Late Spring

The Ordinance of Late Spring is a lengthy historical romance set in a fictional dynasty whose manners and scenery resemble those of the Qin and Han eras, written by Haiqing Nadiaotian for the Jinjiang Literature City platform. The heroine, Wang Huiyan, was born into a distinguished family; her father rose to the post of Grand Tutor to the Crown Prince, and from childhood she studied in the palace academy, developing a breadth of knowledge and vision rare among young ladies of her station. But when a sudden storm of factional strife over the succession erupted at court, her father fell from power and returned to his native place, and she was sent beyond the frontier to serve as a female scribe to a princess dispatched in a marriage alliance. She remained there eight years. The novel opens as the princess dies of illness and Huiyan returns to the Central Plains with the envoy's retinue after so long an absence. Her family, once so illustrious, has declined: her father is dead, creditors come knocking, and she herself, past twenty and still unmarried, is regarded by relatives and friends as an old maid. Yet she does not dwell on past glories. Instead she treasures the hard-won reunion with her mother, elder brother, elder sister, and younger siblings, and drawing on the knowledge and experience gained over her years beyond the frontier, she goes into partnership in a north-south trading business, supporting the household by her own efforts. Meanwhile, the young emperor—who in his palace-academy days was once taken to task by her—has never forgotten her. He does not press her with imperial authority but appears again and again like an ordinary admirer, probing her feelings by indirect means. In Huiyan's heart there is another: Sima Kai, the childhood companion she secretly loved in her youth. Betrothals, broken engagements, a military expedition, palace banquets—events unfold layer upon layer. Through a wealth of everyday detail the novel depicts the food, dress, daily life, rites, and customs of gentry households in the Han era, and traces how one woman comes to see her own heart clearly in the space between marriage and selfhood, arriving at last at fulfillment. The book runs to more than 340,000 characters.