Thanks to the Belt & Road Initiative launched by China, it is now well known that there are three ancient Silk Roads: two terrestrial and one maritime. Top of mind is perhaps the Oasis Silk Road, a web of routes passing through the central zone of Eurasia from China to West Asia and Eastern Europe via a string … Continue reading July 18 HK Book Fair Event: Steppe Silk Road Talk by Travelogue Author H.K. Chang
The book’s Chinese title, 凿空 (Zaokong), is layered in meaning. Abudan is literally being “hollowed out” by oil drilling and the villagers’ clandestine tunneling. Yet the title carries an older resonance. In 139 BCE, the Western Han envoy Zhang Qian set out under Emperor Wudi on a mission to the Western Regions (西域), an ancient name for … Continue reading 凿空 (Zaokong): A Xinjiang Novel and its Enigmatic Title
The English-language rights to the novel《凿空》 by Liu Liangcheng (刘亮程) have now been purchased by UK-based publisher West Link Books. I co-translated it with Jun Liu (刘浚). Several years ago, we translated Confessions of a Jade Lord by the Uyghur author Alat Asem, which is also set in Xinjiang. Audible Annals of Abudan is set during the early 2000s in … Continue reading “Audible Annals of Abudan” (凿空): Liu Liangcheng’s Novel Set in Southern Xinjiang to be Published in English
As I announced recently, my translation of Chi Zijian’s Last Quarter of the Moon has been launched for a North American readership by Milkweed Editions. More aptly entitled Right Bank of the Argun in Chinese – after the tributary of the Amur that marks the boundary between Russia and northeastern-most China – the novel is a moving tale of the … Continue reading An Illustrated Sequel of Sorts to Chi Zijian’s “Last Quarter of the Moon”
Noting that my rendition of one of China’s best-selling novels about the twilight of the reindeer-herding Evenki, 额尔古纳河右岸 (The Last Quarter of the Moon), was to be launched in January 2026 – targeting the North American market – China Publishing & Media Journal (中国出版传媒商报) offered to interview me. I gladly accepted and answered in English, … Continue reading Q & A: “Last Quarter of the Moon”
February 2026: Now available for purchase here Roaming the Steppe Silk Road By H. K. Chang (漫游草原丝路, 张信刚 著) Translated by Bruce Humes in collaboration with the author In the 1960s as a doctoral student in the United States, H. K. Chang happened upon a copy of Owen Lattimore’s 1940 edition of Inner Asian Frontiers of China at a used … Continue reading New Travelogue: <The Steppe Silk Road>
More than a decade after my translation of the classic tale of the nomadic, reindeer-herding Evenki of northeast China, Last Quarter of the Moon (额尔古纳河右岸， 迟子建 著), was first published, Milkweed Editions --- an independent, non-profit literary publisher --- is launching a special edition targeting N America as of January 13, 2026. Previously published by … Continue reading Launch: N American edition of “Last Quarter of the Moon”
The Russian version of the Dunhuang-based archaeologist Fan Jinshi’s biography, биография фань цзиньши сердце мое в дуньхуане , has just been officially launched at the 2025 Moscow Book Fair. This makes it the second foreign language edition to date; my translation of her《我心归处是敦煌》(Daughter of Dunhuang: Memoir of a Mogao Grottoes Researcher) was published in 2024. … Continue reading “Daughter of Dunhuang”: Fan Jinshi’s Biography Launched at Moscow Book Fair
In Balancing What Can Be Said with What Can Only Be Implied, Shelly Kraicer explores the cinematic themes of young Uyghur filmmaker Ikram Nurmehmet, imprisoned in Xinjiang since 2023, likely due to having studied in Turkey: It is always difficult for what China calls “ethnic minority” (i.e. non-Han Chinese) filmmakers to make the films they … Continue reading Ikram Nurmehmet: Travails of Uyghur cinematography in the People’s Paradise
Jun Liu and I have completed our translation of a novel, 凿空, by Liu Liangcheng, a Han author born and bred in the part of northwest China that borders on Central Asia. The novel’s working title is The Audible Annals of Abudan, but the Chinese title can be rendered as “Hollowed Out.” Ms. Yvonne Wang … Continue reading Trilingual Links to Writing by Xinjiang’s Liu Liangcheng (刘亮程)
Altaic Storytelling 