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Leading Chinese children's writer Cao Wenxuan, winner of the 2016 Hans Christian Andersen Award, is to publish a new book with Walker in January 2020. Dragonfly Eyes is translated by Helen Wang, who also translated Cao's previous novel with Walker, Bronze and Sunflower.
Speaking to The Bookseller at the Beijing International Book Fair, at the stand of his Chinese publisher Phoenix, Cao explained that Dragonfly Eyes is based on the true family story of a woman he met while giving a lecture in one of China's regions. Seeing her mixed ethnicity, he asked her about her background, and the story she gave him inspired the novel.
Dragonfly Eyes is told through the perspective of a granddaughter reflecting on the lives of her grandparents, and it opens in the 1920s, where a Chinese sailor is travelling between Shanghai and Marseilles; when the boat needs repair, the soldier goes to a cafe, and there he meets a French girl. The sailor's family has a silk business in Shanghai. Settling down with his new French bride, for a while he acts as the family's business representative in France; but during the Second World War the family business suffers, and after Pearl Harbour he is called back to Shanghai to save it.
"The man tells his wife, 'I need to go back to Shanghai, but you and our child must stay here'," Cao explained, speaking through an interpreter. "But she goes to a cupboard, and there is her suitcase already packed, she is ready to come with him. There are fires everywhere in Shanghai, but there are fires in London and Paris too - the world is in crisis - so the family moves to Shanghai."
Calling the novel "one of my favourites", Cao said: "What is of interest to the international market is telling a story of China but with a human story that is international. Bronze and Sunflower [set at the time of the Cultural Revolution], Dragonfly Eyes, those stories could only have happened in China during particular historical periods; China is a country that suffers a lot, but years later the turbulence turns into beautiful stories you can share."
Asked if now is a good period to be a children's writer in China, with the booming market, Cao responded: "As an author, commercially, people are starting to read and children are being encouraged to read. But for me as a creator my work needs to be of great artistry rather than just of the moment. As a writer you can write for the moment, but my ambition is to write for history."