Red Poppies

Red Poppies (Chinese: 尘埃落定) is a 1998 Chinese-language novel by the Tibetan Chinese writer Alai, whose theme is based on the Tibetan custom and traditions. The novel consists of 12 chapters with a total of 481,000 Chinese characters. It won the Mao Dun Literature Prize in 2000.^[1]

Set in Ngawa, Sichuan, the novel chronicles the stories of a Tibetan Tusi and his family from the 1920s to 1949, which gives a general introduction to the economic development in Ngawa, the territorial disputes among Tibetan chieftains, and the fights for throne succession.

• The first-person narrator: considered as an 'idiot', the second son of Tusi Maiqi, mother is a Han Chinese
• Tusi Maiqi: father of the first-person narrator
• Mother: the second wife of Tusi Maiqi, a Han Chinese woman as a gift given to Maiqi by a merchant trading furs and herbs
• Brother: the eldest son of Tusi Maiqi, son of Maiqi's first wife, considered as the successor of Tusi Maiqi
• Sangji Zhuoma: maid of the first-person narrator
• The lame butler
• Weng Bo Yi Xi: Lama of Gelug
• Suo Lang Ze Lang: attendant of the first-person narrator
• Yang Zong: used to be the woman of the chieftain Zhazha, belongs to Tusi Maiqi after Zhazha's death
• Lama Menba
• Sister: half-blooded, shares the same father with the narrator, lives in London
• Uncle: Tusi Maiqi's younger brother, trades in India
• The silversmith: later marries Sangji Zhuoma

• Special commissioner Huang: an official of the national government
• Tusi Ronggong: a female Tusi
• Tana: the beautiful daughter of Tusi Ronggong
• Tusi Laxueba
• Tusi Wangbo

Comments by the selection committee of the Mao Dun Literature Prize: "The novel narrates from a unique viewpoint, with a rich connotation of Tibetan culture. A slight of fantasy enhances the artistic expression. The writing style is light, charming and poetic".^[2]

• TV series: a television adaptation of Red Poppies was first shown in 2003.^[3]
• Dance drama: Red Poppies was adapted into a dance drama by Hong Kong Dance Company in 2006.

• Li, Huimin (2016-03-23). 《狼圖騰》、《塵埃落定》英譯研究: 從互文性角度分析兩部以中國少數民族邊地為背景的中文小說英譯 [A Study of Wolf Totem and Red Poppies: An Intertextual Analysis of English Translations of Two Chinese Novels Set in China’s Ethnic Minority Regions] (PDF) (Thesis) (in Traditional Chinese). Hong Kong Baptist University. - Abstract in English

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