"Cha, Louis - Book 03 - The Deer and the Cauldron" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cha Louis)

Epilogue-The NeverТEnding Quest 535



TRANSLATORТS NOTE

This Third Book finally brings the English Trinket trilogy to a close. Apologies
to all (including the author) who have had to wait so long to follow their
antiТhero into wellТearned early retirement. Special thanks to Anastasia Edwards
at Oxford University Press, who has shown extraordinary patience, and provided
enormous doses of sympathetic encouragement and enthusiasm at crucial times.

I hope TrinketТs antics in this volume will entertain. For all his faults, he
remains, in my opinion, along with Monkey, Jia Baoyu, and Ah Q, one of the
unforgettable characters in Chinese fiction. He is the heart of the book. That
is why, although this third volume (like the second) is abridged from the
Chinese original (it represents volumes 4 and 5 of the Chinese edition), it has
been my goal throughout to preserve as much as possible of Trinket himself, his
words and deeds, his (often obnoxious) personality, his feelings (or lack of
them).

My Shifu David Hawkes has once again gallantly contributed his kungfu skills to
the completion of this saga. And my everТloyal sisterТinТarms, Rachel May, has
in this volume gone far beyond the call of editorial duty. Without her creative
collaboration and ingenuity, the book would quite simply never have been
finished.

Fontmarty, August 2002

IMPORTANT DATES IN THE HISTORICAL BACKQROUND

To the extent that Deer (Сs a historical novel, the action takes place between
roughly 1663 and 1689

1559 Birth in the NorthТEastern Long White Mountains of Nurhachi, the Exalted
Founder of the Manchu Imperial House of Gioro, descended from a noble family of
the Jurched Tartars (rulers of China in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries,
during the Jin or Golden dynasty).

1592 Birth of Abahai, eighth son of Nurhachi.

1572Т1620 Reign of the Ming Emperor Wan Li; beginnings of the Ming (Bright)
dynastic decline.

1616 Nurhachi declares himself Khan or First Emperor of the Later Jin dynasty
and presides over a growing Manchu state in the NorthТEast.

1626 Death of Nurhachi, who is succeeded by Abahai, the Illustrious Ancestor.

1628 Accession of Chong Zhen, grandson of Wan Li, and last Emperor of the