Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze by Elizabeth Foreman Lewis

First published: 1932; illustrated

Type of work: Moral tale/adventure tale

Themes: Coming-of-age, family, friendship, and jobs and work

Time of work: The 1920’s

Recommended Ages: 13-15

Locale: Chungking, China

Principal Characters:

• Young Fu, an enterprising boy from the country, who has come to Chungking to learn the trade of coppersmith
• Fu Be Be, his mother, who accompanies him and worries about his adventurous spirit
• Wang, the old scholar who teaches Fu to read and write
• Tang, young Fu’s employer, who befriends as well as instructs his apprentice
• The foreign Woman, an administrator at the foreign hospital in Chungking
• Den, another apprentice, hostile to young Fu

The Story

Thirteen-year-old Fu Yuin-Fah’s experiences in the ancient and turbulent city of Chungking begin the same evening that he and his widowed mother arrive and move into their one-room apartment in a poor quarter of the city. On this last evening of leisure before he officially becomes an apprentice, young Fu meets Wang, an aged teacher who lives in the same tenement. This association will in time prove mutually beneficial: Wang Scholar will instruct Fu, and when Wang becomes ill, he will be cared for by his young friend and the boy’s mother, Fu Be Be.

Fu is one of several apprentices being trained by Tang the coppersmith. He quickly befriends one named Li and is generally successful in his dealings with Tang, his assistants, and the journeymen, but from the very first day he encounters open hostility from Den, another apprentice, who mocks him because he is country-bred. Den blames Fu, although he does not say so at first, because one of his cousins failed to be accepted as an apprentice, even though Tang had already made that decision before young Fu’s arrival.

During the period of approximately five years covered in the narrative, Fu grows physically and emotionally; he learns his craft and moves to various levels of responsibility. Yet his path is not without difficulties. On more than one occasion he makes errors of judgment or must pay a price for a hasty or thoughtless action. Quick-witted and curious by nature, he tends to seek out new experiences, and in the process he encounters such scourges of early twentieth century Chinese society as gangs of professional beggars, murderous soldiers, and opium smugglers.

His courage and resourcefulness are tested when he assists Tang in hiding money from bandits encountered on a business trip to Hochow, and again when he climbs onto the roof of the foreign hospital in Chungking to help extinguish a fire. Through this latter action he meets the “foreign woman” (her name is not given), who becomes a friend and helps Li when he is ill; both she and Fu assist an elderly couple made homeless by the flooding of the Yangtze River.

Young Fu’s successes are a result in part of his disregard of tradition, such as the taboos against associating with a foreigner; luck, too, plays a part. At the same time, his good fortune is enhanced by the efforts of the important people in his life: his mother Fu Be Be, a shrewd, devout peasant woman, whose caustic remarks only partially hide her concern for her only child; Wang Scholar, who opens up new worlds to the boy by teaching him to read and write; and his master Tang, who recognizes Fu’s potential, corrects him, rewards him with increased duties, and eventually decides, since he has no family, to adopt Fu as his son and ultimately his heir. On this note of optimism the story ends.

Context

The difficulties and rewards of coming of age, the development of understanding and trust between generations, and the meeting of East and West are major themes in Elizabeth Foreman Lewis’ moving adventure tale Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze. In this her first novel, as well as those that followed, and her earlier short stories, Lewis drew upon her personal experiences as a young teacher in China. Sent by the Methodist Women’s Mission Board to Shanghai in 1917, and later transferred to schools in Chungking and Nanking, Lewis acquired firsthand knowledge of the people and events that would become elements in young Fu’s world. Originally conceived as a short story about a boy and his mother making a new life for themselves in Chungking, Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze became Lewis’ most popular book, winning the Newbery Medal in 1933.

Although Elizabeth Lewis was forced by ill health to return to the United States, she never lost her love and appreciation of the Chinese people. This understanding and experience and the universal appeal of the characters has lent a certain timelessness to Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze, making it a classic children’s book.

Comparisons have frequently been made of the writings of Lewis and Pearl Buck, because of their similar backgrounds; the comparison is particularly apt in regard to Buck’s novel The Good Earth (1931), which preceded Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze by a year. There are a number of similarities; the obvious difference is that The Good Earth was written for an adult audience. Certainly the reading of Lewis’ Chinese novels and short stories is an excellent prologue to the more complex and mature situations explored by Buck.

Lewis’ skillful use of language, including Chinese words and expressions (translated in the glossary with a key to pronunciation), her fast-moving plots, and her clear vision and essential optimism have made her one of the best writers about early modern China. Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze can still, despite war and revolution, convey to the reader those special qualities that have allowed the Chinese people to survive the vicissitudes of fortune.