Chapter 24 twenty one.new Hope

In the spring of 1943, the Liangs suddenly proposed a plan that brought hope and creativity to the whole atmosphere.Huiyin wrote to Fairbank and said: "Sicheng has an idea to make some plates about Chinese architecture into black and white films, add Chinese and English explanations, and send them to you to make microfilms and send them to the United States. Publish or find funding for publication. The English version will be published later, and the Chinese version will be published in China. In this way, one or two sets of our works can be published before the end of the war or just after the end of the war. So that the staff here will have something to look forward to In other words, we will have a definite goal for our work next year. So many units have written to us asking if we have any books about Chinese architecture published. It seems that we have not made more efforts in printing in the past. It is a pity. "

Sicheng himself wrote another letter to Fairbank, probably not knowing that Huiyin had already written the letter. "I've just finished a set of about eighty drawings, could you please micrograph them so we can have at least one copy before they're published?" What they demanded with such eagerness—to make eighty pictures into microfilm, it was not difficult for Fairbank to do it in Chongqing.He is the president of the American Publishing Service, which is affiliated with the US embassy, ​​which collects Chinese and Japanese publications, reports to various departments of the Washington government, and assists the State Department in implementing cultural exchange programs.Because of the strict weight restrictions for flying over the hump at the time, these publications had to be sent in microfiche.To this end, Fairbank hired an American technical assistant in this area.Fairbank returned a letter to the Liangs, promising to cooperate fully in their plans.However, due to the various troubles in Sichuan during the war, this matter took several months to complete.

Meanwhile, Sicheng had to work through the night to finish his drawing.At night, his light comes from the grass of the original vegetable oil lamp.He rests his chin on a small vase as he leans over his drawing board at work.This supports the weight of his head, which, along with frequent adjustments to posture, takes the pressure off his spine, which was stiff during the Kunming arthritis attack. The history of Chinese architecture he is writing, he says, "is much larger and wider than was required at the beginning. But it will take more time to make it short and still applicable. If it is shortened but not applicable , that simply won't work.

"Besides, it's the first book of its kind. I've waited years for a book like this to come out. It's the best concession I can make, and yet Huiyin and I are happy in a sense, For we have at least the basic framework of what we imagine to be working from frenzied fieldwork and random studies of generation." Sicheng arrived in Chongqing at the end of November.Fairbank wrote, "He came here for the first time last night and saw the microfilms of his pictures of the history of Chinese architecture, and the lads loved taking pictures of them because they were so good. Sicheng weighed only 102 pounds and was writing Visibly tired after finishing the 110,000-character history of Chinese architecture, he and a draftsman and Hui Yin had to work until midnight. But he was as energetic and ambitious as ever, and had the qualities that made him like a The reserve and charm of acting like a nobleman."

The microfiche of these large and beautiful architectural drawings, so important to illustrating architectural history, is a small but essential contribution of an American government agency to fostering cultural exchange.These drawings were reproduced in duplicate, one of which Sicheng immediately sent to me in Washington for preservation.Another copy he left in China. Liang Sicheng's Chinese "History of Chinese Architecture", as he said, "is an attempt to systematize the materials collected by me and other members of the China Architecture Society in the past twelve years."He divided the past 3,500 years into six architectural eras. He went through each era with reference to historical and literary documents, described the architectural remains of each era, and finally analyzed the Combine buildings from various eras found in

In addition to this history of Chinese architecture, Sicheng also wrote an abridged book in English, using his paintings as illustrations, explaining that it was written in Chinese and English, and adding photos of the Architecture Society.He conceded that both books would have to wait until the end of the war for publication, but he preferred not to delay the preparation of words and pictures. His years of research on the Song Dynasty architectural document "Zao Fa Shi" has reached such a stage.He used modern engineering drawings to draw all the architectural methods in the book, and explained the obscure architectural terms of the Song Dynasty.This was made possible thanks to his field studies of existing Song Dynasty buildings.There are also a large number of photos of real buildings in the Liao and Song Dynasties, which are also a kind of illustration.More than a hundred sketches have been completed: the preparation of the ink and captions is also well underway.This book is also an unprecedented contribution to the understanding of Chinese architectural history. It is tentatively named "Annotation of Chinese Architectural Standards", and it will not be published until after the war.