Elderly woman from rural village authors second book on nature
Qin Xiuying reads her new book in an interview with China Youth Daily.
An elderly woman from a rural community who completed only one and a half years of formal education has published her second book that outlines the ecology and history of the Hetao Plain in northern China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region over the past 60 years, according to China Youth Daily.
Qing Xiuying, 75, wrote the nature-themed collection of prose titled《世上的果子,世上的人》which translates as "The Fruit of the World, the People of the World," featuring lively narratives and engaging life stories of her friends and family back in her hometown in Inner Mongolia.
In this book, various plants and natural items, such as abandoned beehives and beautiful dead longhorns, are used as metaphors to describe the different personalities and destinies of those who have died or continued their lives. Some 20 plants and people in her memory are recorded in the book.
A sketch drawn by Qin Xiuying
This is Qin's second book after her first, "The Sky of Flax," was published in 2015.
As one of the earliest nature advocates in China, Qin has worked on the creation of nature notes since 2011. Despite the brief education she received as a teenager and limited literacy, she started drawing and writing and has strived to improve over the years. Later she even learned how to type on a computer and managed to publish her own book.
She completed most of the book after she returned to her hometown in 2019.
Lu Yonglin, her son, described this book as a process of "digging up the wilderness of her mother's life."
"I'm glad my mom found something that made her happy, something that lifted her spirit," Lu said.
This book explains the long-lasting vitality of the Chinese nation, according to Liu Zhenyung, a renowned Chinese writer, who wrote a preface to Qin's new book. It reads, "One thing I learned from Qin's words is that 'because of fear, we can only be brave; because of our loved ones, we can only be strong. We live a tenacious life due to fear and our loved ones, which is the world's essence and vicissitudes of life.' "
