The Spring Festival is the most important festival in Chinese tradition. This festival also embodies all aspects of traditional Chinese culture - the character of the nation, the spirit of the nation, the truth, goodness and beauty of the nation, is a symbol of the Chinese nation's mutual recognition, and is a bond of communication between compatriots of all nationalities in the motherland and overseas Chinese. In this extended version of the Spring Festival, everyone may go back to the countryside to reunite with their parents and relatives, or gather with friends at home, or travel with backpacks to experience different Spring Festival folk ...... in various placesIt will recommend a batch of good books suitable for reading during the Spring Festival, and send an elegant cultural New Year's goods!
You are welcome to scan the code at the end of the article to join the "Southern [gf]207a[ gf]Tuocheng Yue Reading"**In the circle of friends** book list, and take a screenshot to send it to the group, you will have the opportunity to receive new books recommended in the book list.
Looking for "roots" during the Spring Festival
The season is a bit like a pontoon bridge, from this side to the other side, winter is over and spring comes, the old year is dead, and the new year is ......"Zhou Zuoren) Spring Festival is a festival that every Chinese is very familiar with and attaches great importance to from childhood to adulthood, but with the impact of modern lifestyles, the folk customs of the traditional Spring Festival are gradually withering, which is why we feel that the taste of the New Year seems to be getting thinner and thinner, and the most familiar things are becoming more and more unfamiliar, at this time the "root-seeking" Spring Festival folk customs are of great significance.
Lou Zikuang's "New Year's Customs" is a pioneering work in the study of Chinese New Year's customs, which has been highly praised by Eastern and Western scholars since its inception, and has been recommended by Zhou Zuoren, Gu Jiegang, and Albert (Germany) in the preface. The book "collects the customs and customs of the whole of China in the broadest sense, thus setting an example for the study of Chinese folklore in the future."
New Year's Customs".
Lou Zikuang. Taihai Publishing House (Reading Culture) November 2023 edition.
Published in 1932, the New Year'Chinese s Customs covers the New Year's customs of 22 regions in 11 provinces including Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui and Fujian. Due to the early writing time of this book, many of the Spring Festival folk customs recorded in it either no longer exist today, or have changed greatly, but we just use this to compare the great changes in Chinese New Year folk customs in the past hundred years, and it can also help us "find our roots" during the Spring Festival.
If "New Year's Customs" focuses on recording the different Spring Festival customs in China's vast geographical space, then "A Brief History of the Spring Festival" is a book that focuses on tracing the historical origin of Spring Festival folk customs.
A Brief History of the Spring Festival
Written by Zhang Zhichun. Shaanxi Normal University Press, November 2023 edition.
China in the classics and the fireworks of China, these two seemingly unrelated worlds, are actually two sides of the same coin. If we can't see the continuous cultural spirit from the tracing of the source of fireworks, then the classics will lose their vitality; Reading classics, if you can't resonate with the cultural etiquette that you don't pay attention to, then the fireworks lack the soul. Through field research and literature research, "A Brief History of the Spring Festival" points out the source of the Spring Festival, outlines the development of the Spring Festival for us over thousands of years, and introduces the customs, rituals, activities, and objects of people around the country during the Spring Festival. Spring Festival is not just a family reunion on Chinese New Year's Eve and a New Year's greeting event on the first day of the new year, but also from the winter solstice and wax.
8. Sacrificial stove, Chinese New Year's Eve, until broken.
5. The entire celebration process of Renri and Lantern Festival, each node in the period is related to the cultural inheritance and emotional sustenance of the Chinese people for more than 2,000 years.
To have an in-depth understanding of the Spring Festival, it is not enough to understand the folk customs of the Spring Festival, because many folk customs are linked to traditional Chinese mythology.
Heaven and Earth: The Myth of Yu Domain and the Seasons of the Year
by Li Songtao. Shanghai Joint Publishing Co., Ltd., April 2023 edition.
Heaven and Earth: The Myth of Yuyu and the Seasons tells the relationship between the gods and the festivals in traditional Chinese culture, combined with folklore, comparative studies, cultural anthropology, dialects, architecture, etc., with Pangu, Nuwa, Fuxi, Shennong, Yellow Emperor, Zhuan Xuan six topics, each topic is divided into myths and legends and literary and historical allusions, festival stories, sacrificial temples and other specific ink. It is valuable that when this book examines the cultural significance of these myths, it starts with the personal experience and purpose of "culture as life itself".
Legend of the Dragon. The Spring Festival of 2024 is the Year of the Dragon, the dragon is the spiritual symbol of the Chinese nation, as early as in the ancient Chinese classic "Zhou Yi", the dragon was given the national image of "self-improvement", as the descendants of the dragon, do we really understand the dragon? Is it just a legendary animal image, or does it have an animal archetype? How has the image of the dragon evolved throughout history? The book "Dragon: An Unidentified Animal" allows you to bring your unlost curiosity to pursue the real dragon in the land of China.
Dragon: An Unidentified Animal
Written by Ma Xiaoxing. Shanghai Academy of Sciences Press, August 2018.
Dragon: An Unidentified Animal" collects a large number of little-known records about dragons from ancient history books, notes, and local chronicles, and links them with the testimonies provided by many "eyewitnesses". The figure of the dragon looms in the thousands of years of written history in China. No matter how bizarre the colors are added, its basic image and ecological characteristics still remain the biological archetype hidden behind it. What exactly is a dragon? This question may never be answered, but from the literature and history, we can see the ancient and profound historical and cultural roots of the Chinese nation, which makes us think more about the dragon and the spirit of the Chinese nation.
The dragon is equivalent to the totem of the Chinese nation, and during the Spring Festival, there are a series of auspicious symbols in our folk customs, which is the "mascot", which is also the reason why dragon and lion dances often appear in festive activities such as the Spring Festival and the Lantern Festival. The book "Chinese Mascots" provides us with a detailed interpretation of the first and rich connotations of various "mascots" in traditional Chinese culture, which helps us to deeply understand various interesting folk customs.
Chinese Mascot".
Tao Siyan. October 2022 edition by Oriental Publishing Center.
"Chinese Mascots" tells the origin, nature, characteristics, system, function, evolution, and value of Chinese folk mascots, as well as the role and significance of mascots in folk life as cultural symbols of blessing and Jiaqing and artistic symbols full of aesthetic emotions. The book divides mascots into years of age, architectural mascots, instrumental mascots, traffic mascots, ceremonial mascots, heaven and earth mascots, auspicious gods and immortals, species mascots, food mascots, text and pictures, etc., citing a large number of interesting examples and making rigorous explanations.
Folk Spring Festival.
Nowadays, the Spring Festival folk customs are better preserved in the countryside is undoubtedly in the countryside, under the impact of modernization and rapid social development, people are increasingly alienated from tradition, Feng Jicai is strongly concerned about the roots of Chinese traditional culture, and takes the initiative to take on the burden of excavating, protecting and inheriting Chinese folk cultural heritage.
Ancient Village, Ancient Customs".
Written by Feng Jicai. Zhejiang Literature and Art Publishing House, June 2021 edition.
This book is composed of two parts: ancient villages and ancient customs, explaining the difficulties faced by China's folk cultural heritage, the progress of cultural heritage protection investigations, the achievements of conservation and the areas that need to be continued.
Che Dun Dun Ye Ji is also a good book to read on the way home. The author is a 30-year-old office worker who moved away from the city and lived in the suburban town of Chedundun, commuting by small train, wandering in the field on weekends, watching clouds, flowers, animals, and observing everything. Is this the urbanite's version of "pastoral life"?
Che Dun Dun Ye Ji "
Written by Zhou Yingqi. September 2023 edition of Guangqi Books.
Chedundun is very close to the city, and the pace of development is always approaching; It seems to have been abandoned by the city, leaving behind many hidden corners. It's vulgar and wild, but it's full of fun. "I" explored like a wild dog. At first, I only looked at birds, not anything else, and I didn't want to look at people. Gradually, I also looked at insects, flowers, the sky, water, trains, and ships, and found that everything could be observed. As a result, "I" began to look at people again. When we return from the city to the countryside after a long absence, we may read this book to give you a different insight into your life.
The "best taste" of the Spring Festival
Food is naturally indispensable for us to celebrate the Spring Festival, and China's long-standing traditional eating habits have rich cultural connotations. To understand Chinese culture and Chinese folk customs, food culture is inseparable, and "The Taste of Life: 3,000 Years of Food Culture and Characters" is a book that excavates the profound mysteries of 3,000 years of food culture from cultural celebrities in Chinese history.
The Taste of Life".
Written by Li Kai. Tiandi Publishing House (Tianxi Culture) March 2024 edition.
Food and color are closely related to temperament, and the ancients have long understood this. They are well versed in the art and philosophy of eating, and integrate their spiritual temperament and cultural pursuit into ingredients, cooking skills, and flavors, and develop micro-human tastes, depicting traditional Chinese food culture as a historical picture of a delicious life.
"The Taste of Life" selects 14 well-known celebrities and gentlemen, such as Yi Yin, Confucius, Qu Yuan, Du Fu, Su Shi, Zheng Banqiao, etc., to tell in depth about the unique meaning of ordinary food in their hearts, showing the deep relationship between celebrities and food and humanistic allusions. Ordinary food depicts cultural life, and explores the national temperament and cultural spirit contained in it.
If "The Taste of Life" is from the perspective of humanities and history, discovering people in food and understanding the charm of the history of human taste in empathy, then "Flavor Biography: The Adventure of Eating and Human Evolution" uses hard-core science popularization and multidisciplinary integration methods to tell the flavor encyclopedia that makes people surprise or smile, which is very knowledgeable and interesting.
Flavor Biography: The Adventure of Eating and Human Evolution
Rob Dern and Monica Sanchez.
Translated by Feng Taoran. Wenhui Publishing House (Shell Page) July 2023 edition.
In this delicious history of flavors, the author explores the origin of beautiful flavors from the multiple perspectives of biological evolution, archaeology, food science and other disciplines, deconstructs sensory experiences such as taste buds and smell, and tells the scientific secrets and evolutionary stories of sour, sweet, bitter, spicy, salty, umami and smelly.
Deliciousness is the pursuit of flavor by human beings, and the desire for satiety and pleasure drives the evolution of flavor. At the same time, the search for deliciousness led to the invention of tools, beer, fermentation techniques, ......and even the development of new social relations; Other species have their own favorite flavors, which have either contributed to the extinction of large mammals such as megalodons or led to the evolution of fruits. Flavor Biography will both inspire us to re-examine the pleasure that food inspires, and will change the way we think about human evolution.
Column host] Wang Shaobei.
You are welcome to scan the code at the end of the article to join the "Southern [gf]207a[ gf]Tuocheng Yue Reading"**In the circle of friends** book list, and take a screenshot to send it to the group, you will have the opportunity to receive new books recommended in the book list. ↓↓
Click ** to report the material with one click
Author] Wang Shaobei.
*] Southern Press Media Group Nanfang + client.