“Later Chinese Bronzes for the Scholar’s Studio” by Paul Bromberg
Most people “collect” stuff, but Paul Bromberg is a “collector”, the difference being that he proceeds with intent and purpose, focusing on a relatively narrow group of objects.
“Outlaws of the Sea: Maritime Piracy in Modern China” by Robert J Antony
Pirates and piracy seem to be about as universal as death and taxes, and Chinese and Western piracy bear much in common, from violence and hardship, to oppression from the authorities as both cause and consequence, as well as a certain amount of popular romanticism. In Outlaws of the Sea, Robert J Antony provides an…
Podcast with Peter Hessler, author of “Other Rivers: A Chinese Education”
In 2019, journalist and writer Peter Hessler traveled with his family to China. He’d gotten a gig as a teacher of writing—nonfiction writing in particular—in what he’d hoped would be a sequel to his 2001 book River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze. But plans changed—radically. At the very end of 2019, the COVID-19 virus…
“Nanhai I Shipwreck and the Maritime Silk Road”: an exhibition at the Hong Kong Heritage Discovery Centre, Kowloon Park
Nánhǎi 南海, the South Sea, took on a new dimension for the Chinese after the capital Kaifeng fell to the Jurchen in 1127, precluding contacts north of the Yellow River. The retreating Southern Song dynasty (1127-1274) had to turn to the South China Sea, as it is now universally called, to provide a new outlet…
“Homeseeking” by Karissa Chen
Karissa Chen’s debut novel, Homeseeking, a sweeping family saga set across eight decades, is informed in part by her grandfather’s story. In her author’s note, she writes that she became interested in Chinese exiles in Taiwan a couple decades ago, just after her grandfather’s death. One of the images from her grandfather’s belongings was a…
Podcast with Juan José Rivas Moreno, author of “The Capital Market of Manila and the Pacific Trade, 1668-1838: Institutions and Trade during the First Globalization”
Many authors have written about the Manila Galleons, the massive ships that took goods back and forth between Acapulco and Manila, ferrying silver one way, and Chinese-made goods the other. But how did the Galleons actually work? Who paid for them? How did buyers and sellers negotiate with each other? Who set the rules? Why…
Podcast with Paul French, author of “Her Lotus Year: China, the Roaring Twenties, and the Making of Wallis Simpson”
When defenders of the British royal family scrounged around for dirt on Wallis Simpson, the divorced US-born fiancée of King Edward VIII, they often highlighted her year spent in China—often sharing scurrilous, and poorly-sourced, if not entirely unfounded, details of her time there.
Podcast review: “The Mongols: Terror of the Steppe” from the “Fall of Civilizations” podcast
Books can be the subjects of podcasts, podcasts can spawn books, but only rarely does a podcast itself rise to be a possible stand-in for a book. Paul Cooper’s recent two-part podcast “The Mongols: Terror of the Steppe” is one of these.
“Steamships across the Pacific: Maritime Journeys between Mexico, China, and Japan, 1867–1914” by Ruth Mandujano López
Ruth Mandujano López starts her book Steamships across the Pacific with, as seems almost de rigueur now for almost any book about Latin American-Asian relations, with the history of the Manila Galleon, but for her, this is a point of comparison and departure.
Podcast with Caroline Alexander, author of “Skies of Thunder: The Deadly World War II Mission Over the Roof of the World”
During the Second World War, FDR promised thousands of tons of US material to Chiang Kai Shek in order to keep China in the war and keep Japan distracted. But how would the US get it there? The only land route had been cut off by the Japanese invasion, leaving only one other option: air.
New Book Announcement: “Sunset At Lion Rock: A Novel” by Matthew Wong Foreman
A letter from a nephew to his uncle who died before he was born. It serves as a window into parts of a Eurasian child’s life which his family can never know, documenting his attempt to navigate racial confusion, religious trauma, the meaning of friendship, and the struggle for self-discovery in a shifting culture on…
“The Capital Market of Manila and the Pacific Trade, 1668-1838: Institutions and Trade during the First Globalization” by Juan José Rivas Moreno
Much has already been written about the Manila Galleon, the system of annual commercial sailings between Manila and Acapulco that dominated trans-Pacific trade for two and a half centuries from the latter part of the 16th-century until the early 19th, a development which is often taken to mark the beginning of “globalization”. Juan José Rivas…
“Great Game On” by Geoff Raby
At a time when much of what passes for international commentary has the depth and nuance of a tweet, Geoff Raby’s Great Game On is something of a relief. The former Australian Ambassador to China keeps his politics largely to himself, but doesn’t have much time for mainstream Western (read “American” for the most part)…
“The Worlds of Victor Sassoon: Bombay, London, Shanghai, 1918-1941” by Rosemary Wakeman
The Sassoon family was and remains legendary in global business and social history, with Victor Sassoon as its most iconic figure. He embodied the spirit of the cosmopolitan elite in the early 20th century, maintaining residences and businesses across the major financial centers of his time, dividing his life between Bombay, London, and Shanghai. As…
“The Origins of Chinese Civilisation” at the Hong Kong Palace Museum
The recently-opened exhibition at Hong Kong’s Palace Museum, “The Origins of Chinese Civilisation”, has a serious purpose, but one suspects that most visitors focus on the objects, as well they might.
