I’ve been wanting to learn more about Chinese tea, so when I found out that the library had this, I decided to check it out! Chinese Tea is a fairly short introduction to tea and its relation to Chinese culture, with the following chapters:

Preface: A quick discussion on the origin and history of tea.

Fine Tea from Remote Mountains: This chapter talks about the habitat of tea and how it moved from a wild tree to a cultivated plant. One new thing that I learnt is that “for a very long time people regarded wild tea as superior. The Book of Tea said that ‘those in the wild are superior while those in the garden are inferior’.” That’s the complete opposite from the way of thinking now, where cultivated tea holds a higher value!

The Art of Tea Making: Here, the way tea has been made is discussed, from the earliest way it was consumed (just picking the leaves and chewing them) to tea cakes/tea bricks, and finally to loose tea, the way it’s currently consumed. I was particularly intrigued by the different types of tea food – for example “[e]ven in the Wei Period and in the Jin and Northern and Southern Dynasties, when tea drinking was in full swing because of the influence of Buddhism, tea was also still eaten to some extent, for example as boiled tea with porridge, called Ming porridge. Some people boiled tea with flour – flour tea.” I wonder what flour tea would taste like!

Famous People and Tea Books: This was my favourite chapter! It talked about the following books:

• The Book of Tea by Lu Yu – The original book of tea written in the Tang dynasty, this book made its author famous.
• Record of Tea by Cai Xiang – Song dynasty, written because the author wanted to update The Book of Tea and let people know about famous Song teas like Beiyuan Tea from Fujian.
• General Remarks on Tea by Zhao Ji – By the eighth emperor of the Song dynasty, this book is a summary of the history of tea (the book says a “summary of his predecessors’ achievements“) and the emperor’s experience with tea
• Tea Manual by Zhu Quan – Ming Dynasty, about the functions of tea and a catalog of them
• Additional Book of Tea by Lu Tingcan – Mid Qing Dynasty, due to the changes in regions, equipment, and methods of tea production. Follows the structure of The Book of Tea.

The only one that I’ve heard of before was The Book of Tea, so it was very interesting to see how it influenced Chinese culture and the books that were a response/update to the information in it.

The Spread of Tea from China: Tea moves out from the Middle Kingdom to different parts of the world. Most of the time, this is looked at from the Western point of view, so it was interesting to see it from the other side. I wish this was explored in more detail, especially since the author talks about the relation of tea to the Opium War and the American War of Independence but then doesn’t say more than “while the Opium Wars led to accumulated poverty and weakness of a 1000-year-old country, the latter [American War of Independence] signified the rise of a modern power. The implications of this are worth considering.”

Famous Teas of China: A quick catalogue of some famous teas and stories involving them! Sadly, because the book is so short, there wasn’t a very indepth discussion – for example, when discussing dark tea, only puer was mentioned. And of course, if you have your own favourite Chinese tea, you may be disappointed not to see it here (like Taiping Houkui for me).

Utensils for Tea: A very short chapter talking about how the different types of utensils were preferred at different times, changing as the style and method of drinking tea changed.

Tea and Zen: A chapter on the relationship between tea and religion in China. Basically, there’s a long history. I just bought a book called Tea in China which looks at tea from a cultural and religous point of view, so I’m hoping to learn more about that in there! This was really very brief.

The Tea Ceremony in China: I thought the part about the tea contest was interesting, and there are many pictures here. It’s not comprehensive, but enough to get a feel of what the tea ceremony is like. I thought it was interesting that the book says that “tea drinking should avoid boisterous and untidy occasions.” I’ve always seen the Chinese tea ceremony as more relaxed compared to the Japanese chado, but it seems like there is its own calmness to it. Interesting, the book said nothing about how tea relates to the national character, quite unlike how the tea ceremony in Japan is tied to the idea of being Japanese.

Tea Drinking Customs: The last chapter could be a book by itself! For example, I never knew the deep relationship between marriage and tea – the book says that “in ancient China, when you went to another house as a guest you could not bring tea as a gift if the host had a single daughter, because that would cause misunderstanding.” This was because people thought of the tea tree as loyal and wished that their daughters-in-law would be like that. Luckily for us, this function of tea has largely disappeared and we can give tea to whoever we like.

Overall, this is a great introduction to the many cultural and historical aspects to tea in China. I wish the book was much, much longer because I can tell that there is so much more for me to learn.