CHINA DAILY Wednesday, August 7, 2019 | 19 YOUTH Creatures featured
A new volume brings the beauty and imagination of rare Qing Dynasty natural history encyclopedias to modernday readers, Wang Kaihao reports.
f you like fantastic beasts, we know where to find them. Wait! We’re not talking about the Harry Potter prequels, but Deguchi Kana, a Japanese New Zealander who loves Chinese Ithe story of Emperor Qianlong’s language and culture, visits Jeju Island, South Korea. (171199) albums of rare birds, exotic PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY beasts and marine animals — which probably deserves to be adapted into a fantasy film as well. Let’s put this idea aside for a moment, and look at the Qing Japanese travel lover Dynasty (16441911) emperor’s liter ary collection of fantastic animals housed at the Forbidden City, China’s now calls China home former imperial palace, now official ly known as the Palace Museum. By YANG FEIYUE had an exchange program with a Natural History in the Palace [email protected] Chinese high school. She visited Museum, a new threevolume book, Beijing, Shanghai and Shaanxi which was jointly released in July by Since April, Deguchi Kana from province’s Xi’an. “Everything was the Palace Museum Press and CITIC Japan has been mixing business so refreshing and big, quite differ Press in Beijing, provides children, with pleasure. Love of travel and ent from the two island countries its target audience, as well as curi interest in China’s history and cul where I had spent my life,” she ous adults, a new perspective of the ture has driven her to take a job in recalls, adding that the Great Wall, emperor. the Chinese tourism industry. the Palace Museum and the hustle His strong interest in zoology is Kana, in her early 30s, speaks and bustle of the largescale air often overshadowed by the stereo fluent Mandarin and is working as ports and train stations all typical image of him as a fervent col a trainer in Shanghai at Ctrip, a impressed her. lector of jewels and antiques. Chinese online travel agency. Yet, what surprised Kana the From 1750 to 1761, the emperor A girl reads the threevolume book, Natural History in the Palace Museum, which was coreleased by “Working at a travel agency most was the local people. “Chi ordered two court artists, Yu Sheng the Palace Museum Press and CITIC Press in Beijing in July. PHOTOS PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY attracted me, as it gives me some nese children paid lots of attention and Zhang Weibang, to create paint insider benefits,” Kana says, adding to us and were enthusiastic and ings of birds and terrestrial animals, that one such boon is helping her friendly,” she says. while eight high officials with the record, from the past to the present,” said to possess superpowers. Paint become a wise traveler, learning After the trip, she “wanted to requisite knowledge were arranged says Wang Zhigeng, director of chil ers were said to be inspired by The how to make trips cheaper and learn more about Chinese history to write explanatory texts for the dren’s book department at the Classic of Mountains and Seas, or more cheerful, such as finding the and culture”, so she decided to get encyclopedic albums, known as National Library of China who is Shan Hai Jing, a 2,000yearold col optimal time to book budget hotels. enrolled in the University of Canter Niao Pu (“graphics of birds”) and also an editor of the book. lection of mythic geography, beasts Kana’s job is to help Chinese bury, Christchurch, New Zealand Shou Pu (“graphics of beasts”). For example, readers may be sur and folklore. employees at the agency’s hotel which offered Chinese as a major. He also collected a comprehen prised to discover that wild ele The book, despite its title, Natural operations to better understand During her college years, she sive book called Hai Cuo Tu (“an phants lived along the coast of History in the Palace Museum, also work culture in Japan, so they can traveled to China often to practice album of the abundant marine Guangdong province as late as the includes profiles of many fictional better collaborate with their Japa her Chinese. She has left her foot world”), which was illustrated by Song Dynasty (9601279). Now they animals, in a bid to stoke the imagi nese partners. “They may know prints all across the country, from Nie Huang, a natural scientist who can only be found in the tropical for nation. how to speak Japanese, but may the northeastern Heilongjiang spent decades studying the coun ests of Yunnan province. Parents who take their children to not know that some daily expres province, to the southern province try’s waterways and coastal areas. Of course, even royal encyclopedi visit the Palace Museum are often sions are impolite in the context of of Hainan, and Tibet and the Xinji “Western painting techniques as can make mistakes, due to limita bombarded with questions about a Japanese work setting,” she says. ang Uygur autonomous regions in were introduced into the royal court tions in the research of the time. For the decorations featuring sacred ani She also took part in arranging the west. She’s also “intrigued by of the Qing Dynasty through mis instance, the painters have por mals, according to Bao Fang, one of Japanese tests for her 70 Chinese the diverse ethnicities in China”, sionaries,” says Li Shi, a researcher trayed the porcupine as a variety of the book’s editors from CITIC Press. colleagues. She even volunteered where “food and costumes vary a of ancient painting at the Palace boar with quills. “Children always want to know to tutor those interested in lot from region to region”. Museum. Wang says the choice of “natural everything about these animals: improving their language skills Kana came to study at the Beijing “In Niao Pu, we can see that the history” in the title is to encourage Who are friendly and which are after work. To many Chinese col Language and Culture University expressive techniques of traditional interdisciplinary creativity among vicious. Perhaps the book can help leagues, her “serious teaching atti for a month in 2006, after standing Chinese inkwater painting are today’s young generation. parents answer these questions.” tude has motivated many of us to out in a Mandarin test and winning kept,” she says, adding, “but there “People have a long tradition A kaleidoscope of mythical spe learn more about Japanese culture a scholarship. There, she was are also paintings in the album studying natural history and our sys cies are presented, including the and take studying the language amazed to meet young people from which show that typical techniques tematic understanding of nature is auspicious unicorn called qilin; a seriously”, says Chen Xiaobo, one all over the world who shared the from Western paintings were constantly being challenged and flying horse with dragon’s wings of Kana’s colleagues. same interests. The trip turned out applied to deal with shadows and rebuilt,” he says. “But, people wonder called longma, and the dragonlike In her interactions with Chinese to be a turning point for her. add realistic detail.” why it’s rare to see an epochmaking marine animal called jiaolong. colleagues, she found that they are Kana enjoyed a great time with Qianlong loved the three encyclo genius like Charles Darwin, a natu Zhang Jinshuo, chief curator of “kind and enthusiastic to learn”. other foreign students, but found pedias and kept them in his resi ralist who was far ahead of his time. popular science at the National Zoo She has also learned a lot from that their Mandarin was much bet dence for frequent reference and the “I think it’s partially because zoolo logical Museum of China, points out them, and thus sees things in ways ter. She was determined to perfect education of his children. gy, botany, and geography were once that, in recent years, translated that she didn’t before. her language skills, so she contin Natural History in the Palace mixed together and, therefore, the works from the West have often Discovering what the rest of the ued to study at Nankai University Museum is edited from the three situation encouraged a boom of new been the favored resource. The new world has to offer has been the in Tianjin after her graduation in graphic albums by selecting 120 of knowledge in Darwin’s era,” Wang book, he says, offers an opportunity engine for her travel passion since 2007. To better integrate into the their illustrations. The subjects’ says. “Such interdisciplinary think for readers to appreciate a record of she was 11, after she moved from Chinese lifestyle, she spent a few modern names (along with their Lat ing is needed for the younger genera domestic natural history. Japan to New Zealand with her years working in Tianjin. in references, where applicable) are tion today to keep them competitive. “The paintings’ exquisite details family. Her little world embraced She then went back home to pur included, as well as vividlywritten “I hope the book can break the bring the creatures to life,” Zhang creatures and nature from then on, sue a master’s degree in Chinese and background information and stories, barrier between humankind and says. “They show a colorful world of and her parents bought her two represented New Zealand in the based on historical documents. the natural sciences,” he says. “We natural history.” sheep as pets to help her adapt to Chinese proficiency competition The entries range from animals From top: The threevolume loved the idea of adding a little He adds that if things like the her new environment. organized by Confucius Institute more commonly seen by the emper book, Natural History in the romance to the book, so we also somewhat vague portrayal of some “Every day after school, my best Headquarters in 2013, achieving a or, like tigers, donkeys, and dogs, to Palace Museum. Xiezhi, a included ancient poems and cultur animals through error and imagina time was with the sheep. They were top 15 finish. those that Qianlong would have mythical animal included in al allusions relevant to the animals.” tion “are viewed in the bigger pic so cute and clever — they would Her current job offers more never seen in his lifetime, like Shou Pu (“graphics of beasts”) Just like Fantastic Beasts and ture of history and society, it will still leap toward me if I brought bags of space and a chance to apply her giraffes on the African savanna or of the book. Golden pheasants, Where to Find Them, the magic text greatly help us to have a clearer view bread in my hands,” she recalls. abilities and do the work she loves. whales breaking the ocean surface. a type of birds in Niao Pu book written for students of Hog of our own cultural traditions”. Kana’s first visit to China was in “China is my third home, and it’s “In the book, each species is given (“graphics of birds”) of the warts, Qianlong’s encyclopedias, 2003 when the high schooler took so convenient to live here, with Ali an ‘ID card’, which enables readers book. especially Shou Pu, are full of leg Contact the writer at a twoweek study trip, after taking pay and takeout services, to name to look up any information on PHOTOS PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY endary animals, many of which are [email protected] a Chinese class at her school which just a couple of things,” Kana says.