Traditional books back in fashion

Now published on various online platforms, including Tencent Cartoon, bilibili.com and lofter.com, targeted at young people including students at middle school, college and university, Word Man has been updated to 70 chapters. On Tencent Cartoon alone, it has got more than 35 million likes and 1,225 people rated it 9.8 points out of 10. The first book came out last October.

Word Man is just one of more than 100 works of Chinese traditional culture that Xiron has launched and is working on especially at a time when it has become a new fashion among young people nationwide.

Pan Liang, editor-in-chief of Xiron, observes that in the last three to four years, an increasing number of products have become popular among young people because they are conceptually related to traditional Chinese culture, such as hanfu－apparel worn in ancient times, cosmetics and cultural creative products like folding fans, lipsticks, or the figurines of emperors launched by the Palace Museum. In the autumn of 2017, people queued for hours to take a look at the precious painting Qianli Jiangshan Tu (A Panorama of Rivers and Mountains) from the Song Dynasty (960-1279) when it was on exhibition at the Palace Museum.

"Chinese traditional culture has become a fashion these years possibly because people feel confident about our country and culture," he says.