Preface

Every book's beginning has its own inevitability. Perhaps it is a sentence, a memory, or an emotion. Speaking of my connection with Huizhou, it was in truth a "forced" encounter, yet how could it not be seen as a form of destiny?

I remember it was a school study trip back then. Personally, I was usually reluctant to go—my own planned trips would be freer, allowing me to see more of what I actually wanted to see.

In truth, when I arrived in Huizhou with the school, the experience was not particularly breathtaking: the white-washed walls and black tiles, the village of imperial scholars, the octagonal memorial archways, the Old Hu Kaiwen Ink Factory, carving bamboo slips, picking tea leaves at the Xie Yuda Tea Garden, fields of canola flowers, fermented rice buns, the heavily commercialized and homogenized Tunxi Ancient Street, a theatrical performance I can no longer distinguish as Huangmei or Huizhou opera... and that bridge in Hongcun.

To ensure the students' safety, the school did not take us to climb Mount Huang. Despite the teachers' constant warnings not to provoke the dogs, someone still ended up teasing the local cats and dogs, sprained their ankle, and forced a teacher to stay behind at the hotel to care for them.

Meanwhile, my family members who had traveled to Mount Huang with me followed a sightseeing and feasting itinerary that made me green with envy. They bought and gorged on loquats in the villages, picked wild raspberries at the foot of Mount Qiyun—one of the four sacred mountains of Taoism—and visited a truly ancient street to buy dried tofu made with a century-old heritage.

Thus, climbing Mount Huang actually became the driving force that drew me back to Huangshan City for a second time.

In the blink of an eye, seven or eight years have passed since that first visit. Back then, still a child, I clearly had a sweeter tooth than I do now; the lingering flavors of Huizhou ink pastries and character-printed bean candies left a far more wondrous impression on my palate than buying them today ever could.

Seeing the school's Huizhou study trips become more comprehensive year by year—now featuring straw dragon dances, bamboo shoot digging, and building Huizhou-style architecture—I cannot help but feel a twinge of envy.

In truth, my impression of Mount Huang itself cannot compare to the warmth of the hotel manager when we visited again, nor to the artisan preserving his craft in a dark-hued dried tofu shop on an old street about to be renovated, set against a damp, overcast sky.

Xuan paper, Huizhou ink, and She inkstones did not leave a deep impression on me either. Perhaps because members of my family paint traditional Chinese art, I had seen them too often to be amazed. Or perhaps because the study trip only allowed us to experience applying gold leaf to inksticks, my passion for Huizhou ink was not truly ignited until I wrote a script years later.

A beginning that mirrored the experiences of the male protagonist, Cheng Heng, ultimately led to my deeper understanding of Anhui culture and the stories of Huizhou merchants, while awakening my dormant memories of "Greater Huangshan" and "Ancient Huizhou."

Of course, the short essay I wrote in my third year of middle school—which predated the official Tunxi District renovation plan by half a year (looking back now, the formatting was rather crude)—is also a testament to my indelible bond with Huizhou: though my body was absent, my heart was always there.

The hopes for family members doing business away from home and for future generations to excel in their studies; the kindness shown to strangers; the stories and emotions repeatedly depicted in Huangmei Opera that reveal both the limitations of the stage and the legendary nature of reality... the Huizhou opera troupes entering Beijing, the black ink on white paper, the spirit of "no merchant without generosity"—all of these have finally converged once more into the words beneath my pen.

Therefore, when a history teacher and an opera director swap identities, moving from "one cannot change the course of history" to "history is driven by every ordinary person and minor event," and from "what does art change" to "what does art record," I will do my utmost to bring this thousand-year-old cultural lineage to you, my dear readers, through the eyes of ordinary people.

I hope my words can lift a corner of the veil of "Ancient Huizhou" and "Greater Huangshan" cast upon the horse-head walls, allowing "what people are doing today" to take the place of "what people of the past once said."

Looking up to the towering peaks in awe,
The fragrance of ink rises as the pen descends.
Lest future generations forget the past,
May this cultural lineage endure forever.

Ci Liansheng
December 30, 2024
In Beijing