A Short Introduction to Wukang town & Deqing county.

 

Wukang is the administrational, economic and cultural center of Deqing county in northern Zhejiang province. It has been a location of some importance and a center of varied cultural activities for more than 1700 years, or since the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty (AD 220). On a somewhat grander historical scale, the area has had human habitation at least since Neolithic times.

It is located in the western part of the county and surrounded by mountains. The climate is warm and since rainfall is plentiful it is fairly humid.

 

China National Scenery Resort Area, Mogan Mountain, is located inside Deqing County. In the hot summer, it is said one "needs no fans at daytime, and can¡¯t do without quilts at night." Mogan Mountain is regarded as an "Emerald Green Fairyland," for 92% of its surface is covered by green plants that enrich and purify the air. Because of its beautiful scenery Mogan Mountain is frequently referred to as the "Foremost Famous Mountain South of the Yangtze River." In the Chinese vernacular it is said to boast three kinds of attractive landscapes; those of bamboo, cloud and springs, as well as the four excellent features or qualities of freshness, serenity, coolness, and greenness. Mogan Mountains is also honored as the "World's Architecture Museum." There are more than 200 well-shaped villas all with different styles such as classical Chinese style, modern Chinese style, Western Europe pastoral style and European Medieval castle style, etc.

 

 

Wukang has been home to numerous well know scholars and artists, foremost of which is probably the Tang poet Meng Jiao, dubbed the poet of the bitter chant. His poetry is often angry and discordant, not polished and gracious like that of his contemporaries, and his poem sequences in particular can be disturbing. Later critics disliked his work intensely and he is not amongst the most popular of poets in recent centuries. His most famous poem is "A TRAVELLER'S SONG"(translation from Witter Bynner's Jade Mountain[1]):

The thread in the hands of a fond-hearted mother

Makes clothes for the body of her wayward boy;

Carefully she sews and thoroughly she mends,

Dreading the delays that will keep him late from home.

But how much love has the inch-long grass

For three spring months of the light of the sun?

 

 

The countryside of Deqing county surrounding Wukang is beautiful and plentiful, producing bamboo, tea, silk, various fruits and vegetables, aquatic products, grain and more.

Formerly an important distributing center for various goods between the mountaineous region to the south and the great plains to the north, and connected to the Grand Canal (between Beijing and Hangzhou), today Wukang is very conveniently located 180 km from Shanghai, 45 km from Hangzhou, and connected by a very modern highway system to Ningbo, Yiwu and other major commercial cities on the east coast of china.

 

 


[1] The jade mountain; a Chinese anthology, being three hundred poems of the T'ang dynasty, 618-906. translated by Witter Bynner from the texts of Kiang Kang-Hu. NY: A.A. Knopf 1957.

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