Uchiyama Shoten, or Neishan Bookshop, founded by Uchiyama Kanzo in the period of Republic of China, reopens in Tianjin on Saturday. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Uchiyama bookstore, founded by Japanese Kanzo Uchiyama in Shanghai in 1917, reopened in the North China municipality Tianjin on Saturday.

The bookstore is famous in China as it was one of the favorite hangouts of Chinese revolutionaries of the day. Lu Xun, Guo Moruo and other left-wing intellectuals were frequent patrons and friends with the owner.

When Lu was being hunted by agents of the then-Kuomintang government, he sometimes hid in the bookstore and was protected by the owner and his wife.

The bookstore was shut down by the Kuomintang government in 1947.

Tianjin Publishing and Media Group was authorized by the Uchiyama family to open bookshops with the brand name in China. After two-year preparation the first store reopened.

Yang Hongjie, Party chief and president of firm, said the reopening of the bookshop is aimed at marking the 100th anniversary of the founding of CPC. "We met with the bookstore's current runners in 2019 and they expressed the family's sincere willingness to reopen the bookshop in China."

Uchiyama Magaki and Uchiyama Shin, the third and fourth president of the Tokyo-based bookshop, sent congratulatory videos on the reopening of the bookshop in Tianjin in fluent Chinese. Because of the coronavirus pandemic, they were unable to come to the opening.

"The pandemic has never blocked Tianjin friends and publishers' sincere support to help our family to realize our dream – reopening the store in China," said Uchiyama Shin.

Zhou said his father Zhou Haiying had a strong wish to reopen the bookstore in Shanghai and he with his father had been in close contacts with Shanghai Municipal Publicity Department to express their wishes to reopen the bookshop before he passed away in 2011.

"Thanks to our efforts, the old bookshop was renovated and a memorial was set up at the original place, however, the fact that the bookshop could be reopened in Tianjin surprised us," he said.

Guo showed a recent publication detailing the history of his father, and said: "Some research records on my father indicate his friend Uchiyama Kanzo made great achievements in protecting the CPC members during the dark times in Shanghai and Uchiyama's sincere support to boost Sino-Japanese friendship in the 1950s."

Uchiyama Shin said he expressed his family's dream to help the bookstore return to China in 2015 when Zhao Qi, a journalist of Tianjin TV, shot a documentary on the bookshop.

A number of descendants of renowned revolutionaries also congratulated the bookstore.

Zhou Lingfei, the grandson of Lu Xun said: "Uchiyama Kanzo was the best friend of my grandfather Lu Xun and during his stay in Shanghai, he had frequent visits and close friendship with the Uchiyama Kanzo's family and the bookstore… his last letter was to Uchiyama Kanzo and the last day's dairy in his life was a memory at the bookshop."

Through Zhao, his family contacted Tianjin Municipal Publicity Department and achieved a shot in arm in "realizing their dream."

Zhao, now the general manger of the bookstore, said: "The new store will center on cultural exchanges and communications, succeeding its heritage and tradition."

It has a collection of 20,000 copies of books and nearly 70 percent of them are leading books written by Japanese, either written in Japanese or having been translated in Chinese, on a variety of fields, he said.

Shimizu Fumio, envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary, embassy of Japan in China, said: "We are impressed by the Chinese people's enthusiasm towars the reopening of the Uchiyama Shoten. Next year marks the 50th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Japan; we expect the Uchiyama Shoten will become a great link to boost ties between China and Japan."

Zhao also said he expects the Uchiyama Shoten to reopen in Shanghai soon.