But a storm has come to which there is no end. There has been no bargain made, no good understanding. The winds of change sweep over the Uyghurs in the name of progress. They struggle to make their voices heard.
A visitor traveling to Hotan and the countryside today would still see donkey carts, women wearing headscarves, men in their traditional four-cornered dopa caps, but Mehrigul’s farm at the end of the poplar-lined lane might now belong to a family of Han Chinese.
Acknowledgments
This book about the Uyghur people was made possible by the late Tom Wilson. Tom believed that travel to other countries was about meeting people and gaining an understanding of how they lived, rather than being an onlooker at established sites. Tom’s World Craft Tours centered on visiting craftsmen and their families and watching them at work. Over the years he became a welcomed guest in many homes and shared this with a few who were privileged to travel with him, including me. Thank you, Tom, and thanks to Abdul, our Uyghur guide, who gave voice to the people we met in the countryside near the city of Hotan.
I wrote my novel with the help and support of my writers’ group—Laurie Calkhoven, Bethany Hegedus, and Kekla Magoon—who were with me every Thursday from the first rough draft through to the final revision. Just showing up was important; you gave so much more. I was lucky to have Ellen Howard, Liza Ketchum, the late Norma Fox Mazer, and Tim Wynne-Jones expect, and demand, the best of me while I earned my MFA degree from Vermont College of Fine Arts.
My deepest thanks to my agent, Marietta Zacker, who believed in me and my writing and found the perfect home for my novel. I am forever grateful to my editor, Dinah Stevenson, who cared about my story and helped to make every word in it the right one.
When I questioned my right to author a novel about a Uyghur girl living in Hotan, I sought the counsel of the Uyghur American Association in Washington, D.C. Henryk Szadziewski, manager of the Uyghur Human Rights Project, and Amy Reger, senior researcher, offered encouragement and guidance. They also introduced me to Mamatjan Juma, editor and international broadcaster at Radio Free Asia in Washington, D.C. He undertook the job of reading the manuscript and pointing out where the facts in my story veered too far from the truth. I am eternally grateful to him for keeping the story true to the spirit of the Uyghur people. Any errors or fictional liberties that remain, of course, are mine.
I wish to acknowledge Dr. Rachel Harris, ethnomusicologist at the University of London, for giving permission to use her English translations of the Uyghur songs.
And nothing would have been accomplished without the love and support of Bill.
About the Author
JOSANNE LAVALLEY traveled across the Taklamakan Desert to the Hotan region of China, where she spent time among the Uyghur. The recipient of an MFA in writing children's books from Vermont College, Ms. LaValley lives in New York City. The Vine Basket is her first novel.
The Vine Basket Page 16
