China’s Grand Canal is full for the first time in decades
Is that a good thing?
WHEN KUBLAI KHAN tired of spending winters at his pleasure-dome in Xanadu, the Mongol overlord of China, who ruled during the 13th century, built a new capital in what is now Beijing. In order to feed the city, he launched a decade-long hydrological project, extending the Grand Canal, which already snaked through much of eastern China. The oldest sections of the waterway had been constructed centuries before. Kublai Khan was hardly the first ruler to demand that China’s waters do his bidding.
This article appeared in the China section of the print edition under the headline “Taming the waters”
From the May 14th 2022 edition
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