The Other China 在路上   ‘Hope is like a path in the countryside. To start out with there is nothing there but, as people walk this way again and again, a path appears.’… Read

Xi Jinping’s Empire of Tedium Appendix LIX 本位   An innate tension within the Chinese party-state is that between top-down centralism and obsessive localism. From its inception in pre-revolutionary Russia, Communist Party organisation has been a cell-like structure that, while imposing directives from above, is often autonomous in its actions.… Read

The Other China 乘風歸去   Wu Fei 吳非 is a genre-bending composer, guzheng virtuoso and vocalist from Beijing. She is also a dear friend of China Heritage. We are delighted that she has given us permission to reproduce some of her recent work here.… Read

The Other China 坐觀 China Heritage marked the last day of 2023 in the company of Lao Shu 老樹, among others. We featured a painting by the Beijing-based artist with the following inscription: It’s a nightmare out there,
assholes wherever you go.… Read

驅邪   We are reissuing A Monkey King’s Journey to the East on 1 January 2024, seven years since it was published on 1 January 2017, the first essay in China Heritage.… Read

The Tower of Reading 舐眼   Zhang Dai (張岱, 1597-ca. 1684) was an historian and essayist active in the late-Ming and early Qing dynasties. Below we offer two translations by Duncan Campbell. … Read