主角

Yi Qin'e is eleven when she enters Qinqiang, the opera of Shaanxi, at the bottom of the troupe: helping in the kitchen, feeding the pigs and sleeping by the stove. Discovered by her teachers and later recruited by the provincial company, she rises over some forty years to become the queen of the form, from the start of the reform era to the present. Around her are hundreds of others, rival actresses, old masters, cooks and backstage hands, each the lead in their own life, and the novel follows the rise and decline of the art itself. A girlhood in which she narrowly escaped assault leaves her wary of love, and she is pulled again and again into conflicts she did not seek.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form

Novel

Genres

Coming of age (assigned by AI)

Set in

China, 1970s–2010s

First published

2018 by Writers Publishing House