Love in a Fallen City

Eileen Chang (1920-1995) was a Chinese American writer known for her sophisticated portrayals of Chinese women in Shanghai and Hong Kong following the end of the Qing dynasty in 1911. Romances (1944), a collection of her short stories and novellas, was a bestseller in China. After moving to the United States in 1955, Chang struggled to break into the American literary market and worked as an educator and researcher at Radcliffe College and the University of California, Berkeley. Chang’s work has undergone a revival in contemporary times in both the United States and China due to its engagement with feminist themes.

The four novellas (“Aloeswood Incense,” “Love in a Fallen City,” “The Golden Cangue,” and “Red Rose, White Rose”) and two short stories (“Jasmine Tea” and “Sealed Off”) in the English translation of Eileen Chang’s work Love in a Fallen City (1943) were selected from Romances. As indicated in Chang’s preface, the stories address the tension between tradition and modernity in a changing society and the shifting expectations of women in the Republic of China. The plots of the stories deal with the instability and conflict caused by sexual desire, love, and marriage.

This guide uses the New York Review of Books edition published in 2007. The majority of the works are translated into English by Karen Kingsbury, except for “The Golden Cangue”, which is translated by Eileen Chang.

Content Warning: The source material features depictions of drug abuse, domestic violence, commercial sexual exploitation of children, and discussion of suicide.

Plot Summaries

The collection Love in a Fallen City is made up of four short novellas with two short stories providing a transition between the tales. The stories all describe upper-middle-class characters navigating love and sexual desire in the cities of Shanghai and Hong Kong during the Republic of China and its conflicts.

The opening novella, “Aloeswood Incense,” tells the story of a young, educated woman, Ge Weilong, who takes up residence at the house of her aunt, Madame Liang, in Hong Kong to finish her studies when her family moves back to Shanghai. Madame Liang, a former concubine of a wealthy man, slowly pulls the innocent Weilong into her life of entertaining rich men for expensive gifts. After becoming enmeshed in Madame Liang’s world, Weilong falls for the unreliable playboy George Qiao. The night George and Weilong have sex for the first time, she sees him being intimate with her maid in the garden. Despite George’s insistence that he doesn’t love Weilong, Madame Liang convinces him to marry her niece. After their marriage, Weilong is used by her aunt and husband to secure money for their household. At a New Year market, Weilong sees sex workers and tells George that she is no better than them for choosing this life. They drive home in silence.

The short story “Jasmine Tea” tells the story of the young Nie Chuanqing. He comes from a wealthy family, but his father and stepmother have addictions to opium and treat him badly. Chuanqing is a loner at school, but Yan Danzhu, the popular daughter of his history of Chinese literature professor, pursues a friendship with him because she sees him as unthreatening and feminine. On the bus home from school, Chuanqing realizes that Danzhu’s father once courted his now-deceased mother. However, his mother decided to marry his wealthy, cruel father instead. After this realization, Chuanqing becomes obsessed with replacing Danzhu and living her life. When she rejects his advances, he beats her unconscious and runs away.

“Love in a Fallen City,” which is also the title of the collection, tells the story of Bai Liusu, a modern, divorced woman living in a very conservative family. With the help of a matchmaker, her family attempts to marry her sister off to a wealthy playboy, Fan Liuyuan, but he falls for Liusu instead. Shortly after, Liusu is invited to go to Hong Kong with the matchmaker. There, Liuyuan and Liusu pursue a delicate and complicated courtship. Eventually, Liuyuan finds Liusu her own house in Hong Kong while he travels to England for work. Before he can leave, however, the city is attacked by the Japanese Imperial Army. The couple weather the war together and decide to get married in its aftermath.

The novella “The Golden Cangue” is translated by Eileen Chang. It begins toward the end of the Qing dynasty. Middle-class Ch’i-ch’iao has married into the wealthy Chiang family, where she cares for her husband, who lives with a disability. Despite the wealth around her, she is miserable. She attempts to have an affair with her brother-in-law, but he turns her down. After her husband and mother-in-law die, Ch’i-ch’iao moves out of the Chiang home with her children. However, Ch’i-ch’iao becomes increasingly isolated and paranoid that people are going to take her money and independence. She seeks to control her children by getting them addicted to opium and discouraging her daughter’s engagement. After Ch’i-ch’iao dies, her son gains his independence while her daughter remains reliant on a man for money.

The short story “Sealed Off” tells the story of an extremely brief romance between the young, innocent, and naïve Wu Cuiyuan and the middle-aged accountant Lu Zongzhen that takes place on a tram in Shanghai during a shutdown of the city due to wartime violence. Zongzhen sits next to Cuiyuan to avoid his wife’s cousin and sparks a conversation with her. Cuiyuan is flattered by his attention and assumes that he has real romantic feelings for her. He even proposes that she become his concubine. However, as soon as the shutdown order is lifted, Zongzhen walks away and sits somewhere else on the tram. Cuiyuan is heartbroken but realizes that what occurs during a wartime shutdown is not real life.

The final novella, “Red Rose, White Rose,” tells the story of everyman Tong Zhenbao, a middle manager at a textile factory. Zhenbao seeks to be entirely in control of his life and his desires. Despite this, he finds himself falling for modern women. While studying abroad in Edinburgh, Scotland, he takes a trip to Paris, where he has sex with a sex worker. Upon his return to Edinburgh, he dates a British Chinese woman named Rose, but despite their physical intimacy, he is determined not to marry her and leaves her behind when he returns to China. After returning to Shanghai, he stays with a friend from school. He has an affair with his friend’s wife, Wang Jiaorui. However, when she tells him she plans to divorce her husband and run away with him, he ends the relationship. Soon after, he marries a bland, traditional woman who treats him with reverence. Zhenbao grows increasingly miserable and spends his money on sex workers and alcohol. One night, his brother, wife, and friends subtly confront him about his poor behavior. He throws a lamp at his wife. Having completely lost control, he vows to do better.