The Baochu Pagoda still stands in Hangzhou, and the misty rain over West Lake is unchanged. But the man who traveled north twice will never return.
He was the guardian of Wuyue, and the “King of Huaihai” under the Great Song. Outside the city of Jinling, he once gazed from afar at the talented ruler who knew only how to write lyrics. At a palace banquet in Bianliang, he also once traded pleasantries with the emperor of grand ambitions.
Li Yu poured all the anguish of a fallen kingdom into his verses, while Qian Chu swallowed in silence the burden of preserving his realm.
When Zhao Kuangyin handed him the stack of memorials urging him to “keep Qian Chu” as a farewell gift, he knew he had long been a bird in a cage. Li Yu’s death made him see the ending clearly at last.
With delicate prose, this book parts the mists of history to recreate Qian Chu’s harrowing inner struggle on the eve of surrendering his territory to the Song. Here you will find courtly intrigue, the integrity of scholars, the helplessness of emperors, and a conversation between two last emperors that transcends life and death.
Who can judge the merits and sins of a thousand years? See how a small boat, carrying the livelihoods of a hundred thousand people, slowly sails toward the sunset over Bianliang.
