A Japanese bookstore that was frequented by famous Chinese authors such as Lu Xun and Guo Moruo in early 20th-century Shanghai is thriving once more as a center of cultural exchange after being reborn in Tianjin, a port city southeast of Beijing.
The original Uchiyama Shoten bookstore, founded in 1917 by Kanzo Uchiyama (1885-1959), was known as a salon for Chinese intellectuals and a space where they could also interact with visiting Japanese, even when the two countries edged toward war in the 1930s.
Now two bookshops, opened in 2021 and last year by a Chinese company, bear the Uchiyama Shoten name with the blessing of Uchiyama's descendants and are recreating the old salon atmosphere by becoming spaces for both conversation and Sino-Japanese cultural encounters.