The Orange Tree

by Dong Li, Srikanth Reddy

Debut collection of poems that weaves stories of family history, war, and migration.

Dong Li’s The Orange Tree is a collection of narrative poems that braids forgotten legends, personal sorrows, and political upheavals into a cinematic account of Chinese history as experienced by one family. Amid chaos and catastrophe, the child narrator examines a yellowed family photo to find resemblances and learns a new language, inventing compound words to conjure and connect family stories. These invented words and the calligraphy of untranslated Chinese characters appear in lists separating the book’s narrative sections.

Li’s lyrical and experimental collection transcends the individual, placing generations of family members and anonymous others together in a single moment that surpasses chronological time. Weaving through stories of people with little means, between wars and celebrations, over bridges and walls, and between trees and gardens, Li’s poems offer intimate perspectives on times that resonate with our own. The result is an unflinching meditation on family history, collective trauma, and imaginative recovery.

The Orange Tree is the recipient of the inaugural Phoenix Emerging Poet Book Prize for 2023.

Genres: Poetry

96 pages, Paperback

Published March 31, 2023

Reviews

[Lily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't think I can even put in to words what an incredibly stunning, daring, and devastating collection this is from Dong Li. Every single poem struck a nerve, and I appreciated the context given in Srikanth Reddy's forward for what was to come.

I would definitely recommend reading these poems one at a time; they require all of your focus (I mean that in the best way), and you'll want to sit with each one for a while after finishing.

Content warning: Rape, violence, torture, displacement, suicide, murder

[Alberto G. Pons · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dong Li’s The Orange Tree: an outstanding case of prose-verse fusion

Extraordinarily raw and personal, The Orange Tree is a testament to Dong Li’s originative mastery of poetry, to the extent of successfully transforming it into a new form that maintains intact its essential features, while providing a remarkable reading experience.

The content of this work is equally as fascinating. Topics such as family, pain, history, misfortune and community amalgamate to what I believe to be the core of this cluster of verses: the search for identity in a disrupted past.

Despite its crudeness, this work has been a rather pleasant read as it has unquestionably marked a watershed in the contemporary lyrical sphere.

[Kaya Perry · Rating 5 out of 5]

the imagery was so rich and full and beautiful and painful. each poem was layered with themes of death and war, love and connection, nature and cycles. very rich for the senses and held me in its grip the entire read, i hardly put it down

[Olivia Cyrus · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Orange Tree is a poetry collection by author Dong Li that serves as an ode to family and the nationalism that underpins it.
In the first poem, Li contemplates the Chinese ideal of women embodying water and men embodying fire, two contrasting earth elements that somehow go together and rely on each other for balance. He subtly discusses how these perceptions of femininity and masculinity are ironic, being that when a man, after facing disaster, seeks comfort from the fury of the world, it is a woman that will "hold his cold body to her warm body." Using these ideas of contrast, Li also elaborates on the cultural and war histories of China that came about when China’s spring and autumn clashed, bringing the Great Wall down into rubble and many of the citizens with it. He believes, though, that it is the Chinese’ resilience that makes them a nation and a community like no other. Simply put, "the Chinese choose to live," as death is something one has to seek for themselves.
In the story, Li describes how the orange tree and its symbolism came to be. A gift from his great-grandpa to his grandma, the orange tree traveled with the Li family everywhere they fled after the Japanese invasion of China. It was only when they were able to find refuge that the orange tree was allowed to bloom. And with the changing of the tides of war and the tick of the death toll, the orange tree continued to bear beautiful fruit, serving as a symbol for unification and perseverance within the family.
This is when the narrator begins to shift his symbolic focus from the orange tree to the river, snaking throughout the town and breathing life into a city ravaged by violence. With the flourishing of the river, new memories flooded Li's mind, taking the place of rusted ones. He used a lovely phrase to describe his home's revitalization: the river was a "wake of skin // shield of blood // gushing // to sterilize // hill country.” When bodies fall, the river picks them up and washes them away without a trace, cleansing the city with its hands of persistence and revivification.
The next section is one in which Li tells the story of a young girl leaving her home in a manner comparable to that of a flying animal. Hoping to leave the community where women and men were raped and left for dead, this girl, holding tightly to her lilac, must face isolation and the unforgiving snow to begin a new life for herself.
He concludes the novel with a section devoted to imaging death as something as beautiful as the fire and water, the orange tree, the river, and the lilac, symbols of persistence and renaissance despite trial and tribulation. He begs readers to consider death as something more beautiful, contrary to what he himself did at the beginning of the novel, as that is the only way to find freedom and beauty in unpleasant memories.
All in all, The Orange Tree is a beautiful collection of prose and poetry in which Li displays and reasons with the ideas of loss and chaos. Only rarely in the story is there a moment of stillness or peace. With every line, Dong is pivoting into a new thought that was developed by the line before that. Furthermore, Dong is able to showcase how death, nostalgia, and change all work hand in hand in a way that makes loss and the peace it inevitably brought to his life his greatest memory of his childhood.

[Lori Rottenberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

In poetry both narrative and lyrical, Dong Li weaves a family saga of loss, war, and migration in The Orange Tree. The book traces the author's family's history starting in the 1930s, when Japanese forces invaded China and committed widespread crimes against the native population. The orange tree was part of the garden of the family compound, held by the family for generations, but also a symbol for the family itself as it survived the Japanese occupation, the Korean War, and the Cultural Revolution under Communist rule. We get to know both the historical particulars of the family as well as lyric explorations of its members so we can feel viscerally the circumstances of their lives as they must have felt them. At once accessible and formally inventive, this is a beautiful, haunting debut collection that will be of interest to poetry fans, those interested in recent Chinese history, and any readers who want to understand and experience through finely crafted verses the impact of history on individuals.

[Yolanda | yolandaannmarie.reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

[arc review]
Thank you to NetGalley and the University of Chicago Press for providing an arc in exchange for an honest review.
The Orange Tree releases March 31, 2023

”And no one ever picked oranges again.
Still the orange tree bore fruit.
Winter comes and goes.
Oranges fall and grow.”

This is a collection of poetic prose that is introspective of Chinese history. The writing style is very unique and full of passion. I loved the addition of beautiful Chinese calligraphy throughout.

I found the section titled “The Army Dreamer” difficult to read in terms of the content, but my favourite of them was “The Orange Tree”.

There are some heavy topics mentioned including suicide, rape, and other graphic and violent events.

Looking forward to seeing how this delivers in a physical reading format.
I’d recommend this to readers who enjoy Ocean Vuong’s work!

[Daisuke · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was introduced to Li this year through his translation of Song Lin's collected poems, The Gleaner Song (Deep Vellum, 2021), and knew immediately that this was someone capable of attentive, understanding love — not just for language and poetry, but for people. Such is the case with The Orange Tree. When I learned of this forthcoming collection, I immediately asked Li if he would be willing to share an ARC with me, and I am so lucky that he obliged. While I will save the majority of my thoughts for later, I could not resist sharing this now: The Orange Tree is by far one of the best poetry collections I have read in recent years. Every few lines or so, I found myself having to pause, stunned by these sometimes painful, sometimes beautiful, always revelatory poems about the expansiveness of human connection with the world and those around us. five stars.

[Seher · Rating 4 out of 5]

"no traveler brought a good name to the family'

And yet, as we see in this collection, they travelled.

Dong Li's collection the orange tree is also a history of China and it certainly doesn't shy away from the devastation included in that history. 'Tell our Daughters' certainly stands out in that regard, which focuses on the Japanese invasion and was gruesome. Of course, violence is also included in the titular poem The Orange Tree, which focuses on a family and the horror that formation of history can unleash.

I'm not going to lie, if the introduction hadn't told me that this story was being told from the point of view of a child, I genuinely would not have realised that.

The formatting was really different and I would love to get my hands on a paperback!

[Harvee Lau · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading the short book of poetry that deals with Chinese history and the personal life of the poet.

It's a book that should be read many times, as there are nuances to catch, and history to ponder over.

I liked the way the poet melds the old with the new, people from the ancient times with events and people from the present and the near past.

His repetition of certain lines in reference to different personalities in history, from abbots and emperors to Tang dynasty poets, carry the depth of history and its poignancy:
"... (abbott hanshan), (tang dynasty poet zhang ji) has been dead for a long time."

I will be returning to the poet's words again and again.

[Andy Oram · Rating 5 out of 5]

This short book leaps from one style to another, page to page. Li's achievement is impressive when taken in total. Fluent in many languages, he has an unusual and somewhat mesmorizing English style. Some of his passages have terse, straightforward sentences conveying the history of his family, sometimes in a style that makes me think of the Tao Te Ching. Other passages consist of fragmentary, isolated words.

Li takes on war and massacres. He can employ nature imagery, lyricism ("Genealogy begins to pray / In the new vernacular"), and intriguing word jumbles ("drifteddream" and "ghostlitblack").

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Orange Tree was a powerful book of poetry that takes you across time and place through the ravages of wartime China, what it means to grow up in such an environment and its long-lasting effects even over generations. Some of the language and descriptions are beautiful, raw, and heartbreaking; some of the images are compelling, gruesome and vibrant - there are many contrasts as you read one piece to the next. This might be the kind of book where the printed version might be better as it was hard for me to tell if my electronic/Kindle version had formatting issues (spacing) or if this was the same in the hard copy. This certainly wasn't an easy read and I think, as a reader, you need to be ready for content that is brutal and devastating, but it's definitely an important and poignant perspective that needs to be shared, understood and remembered.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the University of Chicago Press for the e-ARC.

[Dominique Absalom · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautiful collection. I don't think I've read a collection like this before; what an exciting combination of themes and weaving of narratives. It's always so difficult to talk about poetry and why it's good because it's so subjective, but this many should experience it. The portrayal of family and history is decadent, sorrowful, and enlightening in the grasp of Li. I really can't say much more than, see for yourself.

Thank you to Netgalley and the University of Chicago Press for the advance copy of "The Orange Tree" in exchange for an honest review.

[Emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to Netgalley and University of Chicago Press for the advance copy of "The Orange Tree" in exchange for an honest review.

I enjoyed every poem in this collection, all were beautiful reflections on humanity, loss, and survival. The poems look back to the chaos of the past and find moments of stillness and beauty. Having at least a general knowledge of Chinese history will help you understand some of the context but I think even someone who doesn't can still enjoy these poems, because they are rooted in the experiences of normal people living through these difficult historical eras and events.

Trigger Warning: This collection touches on heavy topics like suicide, rape, and has instances of graphic violence.

[Matt Linder · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve always considered myself someone who just doesn’t get poetry. I try and try and try but it either goes over my head or I just end up not liking it. That’s not the case with “ The Orange Tree”. I both understood and enjoyed it. What a unique way to tell a story. This could very well be the next big book in Poetry. 5 stars.

[Shannon (That's So Poe)]

DNF (Did Not Finish) @ 30%

The politics and family history underlying this poetry collection were fascinating, but the rhythm and style of the poems themselves weren't working for me. Still worth giving a try for other readers, though, since poetry style preference is very personal.

Content Warnings:
war, famine, death of a family member

[Mike Reiff · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a stunning work of poetry. Dong Li gives us a set of poems, linked like chapters, that span Chinese history, varied viewpoints, in some pieces that are spare and brutal and some that are more mysterious and evocative. The layout of pages and typographical shifts is excellent and the overall experience is grand and often unsettling as the subject matter should be. Brilliant book.

[Eliana · Rating 3 out of 5]

The writing and styling of this book is beyond moving. There is power and emotion in these words. Still, the story was at times hard to follow, jumping around as the child's focus moved. I think this was intentional, but for me as a reader it sometimes created a comprehension challenge and detracted from my ability to follow the feeling of the poems.

[cait · Rating 4 out of 5]

i love when poetry doesn’t have a fixed order in how to read it. like you could read across the page like a novel or you can read left column then right and vice versa. it is a beautiful way to interact with language and feeling.

[Nora · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s okay. Not super impressed.

[anon · Rating 2 out of 5]

BORING!

[Morgan Radley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of those poetry collections that will probably never be popular but really should.

[Iara Moure · Rating 2 out of 5]

Estuvo bueno, pero fue tedioso. Fue interesante leer poemas en forma histórica, sobre lo que pasó en asia y demas, pero devuelta, fue tedioso de leer.

[Hilary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I confess: even after reading more poetry these past couple of years, some part of poetry has always eluded me. Slippery, as if comprehension is just beyond my grasp. Dong Li’s THE ORANGE TREE reminded me that there are different ways of knowing and understanding; that a text can speak to me in emotions, familiarity. In bridges.

In THE ORANGE TREE, “[t]ime rolls out a scroll of a few strokes / Spring and autumn slant to history.” At its center: a family orchard garden, where each generation plants their own orange tree and come together under the shade, a gathering that bridges generations. But these reunions are torn apart: by war, imperialism, famine. Yet: “The Chinese choose to live. / Life passes onto life, name onto name.” Narrative, firstly, creates the bridges across time, a joining of the dead and the alive on the page, but there is also bridges in language itself. Words stick together (“drifteddream,” “anguishednight, “longingrivergrieflake”), as if alone, they are inadequate to carry the burden of tying together years of grief and violence. Even our narrator, under the weight of history, finds the space between time squeezed to almost nothing. They ask: “You are dying. / Am I dead or dying. / Is death the only family”?

Part of THE ORANGE TREE’s familiarity for me is in the Chinese history, of course, but it is also in these bridges. The way language is appended together reminds me of the Chinese language itself; the meeting at bridges, the crossing of bridges, brings to mind Chinese myths and tales I grew up listening to. But most of all, bridges of time speak to the diasporic part of me; the feeling of being far yet close, how language and writing has helped me build bridges across seemingly-impenetrable rivers.

[Thank you to the publisher for the gifted copy]

[Jeanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I usually don't read poetry but this intrigued me as I am interested in Chinese history. This volume is beautifully written and while it's hard to read at times, it is quite enlightening for the Western audience. My favorite poem was The Orange Tree although all were excellent. I'm glad that I had the chance to read this collection.