Author: Nicholas Gordon

Nicholas Gordon has an MPhil from Oxford in International Relations and a BA from Harvard. He is a writer, editor and occasional radio host based in Hong Kong.

Podcast
Podcast with Jennifer Lin, author of “Beethoven in Beijing: Stories from the Philadelphia Orchestra’s Historic Journey to China”
14 July 2022
In 1973, the Philadelphia Orchestra boarded a Pan Am 707 plane in Philadelphia for a once-in-a-lifetime journey: a multi-city tour of Maoist China, months after Nixon’s history-making visit. There was drama immediately after they landed in Shanghai. Chinese officials asked for a last-minute change to the program: Beethoven’s Sixth. After protests that the Orchestra didn’t…
Read More Podcast with Jennifer Lin, author of “Beethoven in Beijing: Stories from the Philadelphia Orchestra’s Historic Journey to China”
Podcast
Podcast with Gish Jen, author of “Thank You, Mr Nixon”
7 July 20229 July 2022
Fifty years ago, President Richard Nixon stepped off a plane in Beijing: a visit that changed the course of China, the US, the Cold war and the world. The stories in Gish Jen’s newest story collection, Thank You Mr Nixon, span the fifty-year relationship since then, from a Chinese woman press-ganged into translating for her…
Read More Podcast with Gish Jen, author of “Thank You, Mr Nixon”
Podcast
Podcast with Vauhini Vara, author of “The Immortal King Rao”
30 June 2022
King Rao—one of the protagonists from Vauhini Vara’s novel The Immortal King Rao—is like many of the tech founders we idolize today. King comes from humble beginnings—born into a Dalit family in a coconut grove in India—moves to the U.S., and launches a company that ends up dominating the world.
Read More Podcast with Vauhini Vara, author of “The Immortal King Rao”
Podcast
Podcast with Mick Conefrey, author of “Everest 1922: The Epic Story of the First Attempt on the World’s Highest Mountain”
23 June 2022
It can be hard to think of Everest as unknown anymore. While it’s certainly a challenge to climb the world’s tallest mountain, someone–with enough time and money—has a good chance of making it to the summit. A potential mountaineer can fly into Kathmandu, travel to a well-stocked base camp, be escorted up a well-trodden route…
Read More Podcast with Mick Conefrey, author of “Everest 1922: The Epic Story of the First Attempt on the World’s Highest Mountain”
Podcast
Podcast with James Uden and Daniel Majchrowicz about “Worlds of Knowledge in Women’s Travel Writing”
16 June 202218 June 2022
On 1 February 1936, Begum Hasrat Mohani, famed Indian writer and independence activist, sends the first of several letters to her daughter. She’s traveling on the Hajj, passing through Iran and Iraq on her way to Mecca. Along the way, she writes to her daughter, noting the sights and sounds she experiences on her pilgrimage—and…
Read More Podcast with James Uden and Daniel Majchrowicz about “Worlds of Knowledge in Women’s Travel Writing”
Podcast
Podcast with Shiv Kunal Verma, author of “1965: A Western Sunrise”
9 June 202211 June 2022
The history of India and Pakistan since Partition has been marked by countless skirmishes—and four major wars. The second conflict—the 1965 war between India and Pakistan along the long land border—featured some of the largest tank battles since the Second World War and some of the first skirmishes between the Indian and Pakistani air forces….
Read More Podcast with Shiv Kunal Verma, author of “1965: A Western Sunrise”
Podcast
Podcast with Erin Murphy, author of “Burmese Haze: US Policy and Myanmar’s Opening—and Closing”
2 June 2022
Myanmar—or Burma, if that’s the name you prefer—is one of a small set of countries: nations that, despite natural bounty and a vibrant population, remain underdeveloped due to conflict, economic mismanagement and international isolation.
Read More Podcast with Erin Murphy, author of “Burmese Haze: US Policy and Myanmar’s Opening—and Closing”
Podcast
Podcast with Kerry Brown, co-author of “China Through European Eyes: 800 Years of Cultural and Intellectual Encounter”
26 May 2022
Europeans have been writing about China for centuries–ever since The Travels of Marco Polo described it as a faraway and mystical kingdom. European thinkers like Voltaire and Montesquieu used China to support their own theories of political philosophy, then writers in early modernity tried to explain why China was falling behind—and then, with the rise…
Read More Podcast with Kerry Brown, co-author of “China Through European Eyes: 800 Years of Cultural and Intellectual Encounter”
Podcast
Podcast with Glynne Walley, translator of “Eight Dogs, or ‘Hakkenden’: Part One—An Ill-Considered Jest” by Kyokutei Bakin
19 May 2022
Hakkenden is a classic work of Japanese literature: the story of the eight warriors, born from Princess Fuse and the dog Yatsufusa, has been adapted to manga, movies and anime. And its tropes continue to pop up in Japanese popular culture today.
Read More Podcast with Glynne Walley, translator of “Eight Dogs, or ‘Hakkenden’: Part One—An Ill-Considered Jest” by Kyokutei Bakin
Podcast
Podcast with Abby Seiff, author of “Troubling the Water: A Dying Lake and a Vanishing World in Cambodia”
12 May 2022
Tonlé Sap is one of Southeast Asia’s, if not one of the world’s, natural wonders. Between the dry and wet seasons, the lake expands almost six times in size to cover an area the size of Kuwait. The flows are so strong that the Tonlé Sap river actually reverses course, with water from the lake…
Read More Podcast with Abby Seiff, author of “Troubling the Water: A Dying Lake and a Vanishing World in Cambodia”
Podcast
Podcast with Felipe Fernández-Armesto, author of “Straits: Beyond the Myth of Magellan”
5 May 20225 May 2022
2019 marked the five-hundred year anniversary of the launch of Ferdinand Magellan’s voyage around the world–a milestone marked by commemorative sailings, museum exhibitions, and a joint submission from Spain and Portugal to UNESCO. Two years later, the Philippines marked their own commemoration of Magellan’s voyage: the 500th anniversary of his death at the hands of…
Read More Podcast with Felipe Fernández-Armesto, author of “Straits: Beyond the Myth of Magellan”
Podcast
Podcast with Bede Scott, author of “Too Far From Antibes”
28 April 20225 May 2022
Jean-Luc Guéry is a man down on his luck. Middling journalist, gambling addict, alcoholic. Yet when news of his brother’s murder in Saigon reaches him in France, Guéry drops everything and travels to French Vietnam to investigate.
Read More Podcast with Bede Scott, author of “Too Far From Antibes”
Podcast
Podcast with Harry Verhoeven and Anatol Lieven, editors of “Beyond Liberal Order: States, Societies and Markets in the Global Indian Ocean”
21 April 202223 April 2022
We often neglect the Indian Ocean when we talk about our macro-level models of geopolitics, global economics or grand strategy—often in favor of the Atlantic or the Pacific. Yet the Indian Ocean—along whose coasts live a third of humanity—may be a better vehicle to understand how our world is changing.
Read More Podcast with Harry Verhoeven and Anatol Lieven, editors of “Beyond Liberal Order: States, Societies and Markets in the Global Indian Ocean”
Podcast
Podcast with Karen Cheung, author of “The Impossible City: A Hong Kong Memoir”
14 April 2022
Hong Kong is almost impossible to explain to those not from the city. Too often, the city has had to struggle with shorthand used by those writing about the city from afar—for audiences with little understanding of what the place is actually like.
Read More Podcast with Karen Cheung, author of “The Impossible City: A Hong Kong Memoir”
Podcast
Podcast with Manu S Pillai, author of “False Allies: India’s Maharajahs in the Age of Ravi Varma”
7 April 20229 April 2022
It can be easy to think of the recent history of India—especially for those who aren’t from there—as a straight line, from the Mughal Empire, through the British Empire, to independent India. That, of course, is hugely simplistic, missing the mess of competing polities, interests, and people that made up Indian history over the last…
Read More Podcast with Manu S Pillai, author of “False Allies: India’s Maharajahs in the Age of Ravi Varma”

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