Plot Summary
As the book opens, the widowed Fu Be-be arrives in Chungking with her 13-year-old son Yuin-fah and a letter from a village friend to Tang Yu-shu, a master coppersmith, asking that Young Fu be given an apprenticeship in Tang's establishment. Because the widow is alone and Young Fu is her only son, he is allowed to complete his apprenticeship while living in a small rented room with her, rather than living in the shop, a plot device which allows us to see more of the city than might otherwise be the case.
In the chapters that follow, Young Fu goes from being a young and somewhat arrogant boy of 13 to a more capable and humble youth of 18. Along the way, he has encounters with soldiers, foreigners, thieves, political activists, an old scholar, the poor of the city, the rich of the city, and government officials. He is alternately swindled, attacked by bandits, reviled and praised as his coppersmith skills grow.
Read more about this topic: Young Fu Of The Upper Yangtze
Famous quotes containing the words plot and/or summary:
“The westward march has stopped, upon the final plains of the Pacific; and now the plot thickens ... with the change, the pause, the settlement, our people draw into closer groups, stand face to face, to know each other and be known.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“Product of a myriad various minds and contending tongues, compact of obscure and minute association, a language has its own abundant and often recondite laws, in the habitual and summary recognition of which scholarship consists.”
—Walter Pater (1839–1894)