Midnight in Peking – The Curtain Raiser – Next Tuesday – And You’re Invited

The Midnight in Peking roadshow starts here basically. I’m spending most of my time from now till Christmas roaming around Australia and Asia promoting my new book but before we get going there needs to be a celebration, and that celebration needs to be in Peking. And so it is coming to pass – next Tuesday night 23rd August between 6 and 8 with an invite only cocktail party and launch (with books available for one night only before they disappear once again until the official August 29th launch) at the Beijing Bookworm. I’ve got some tickets for China Rhyming readers who might happen to be in Beijing next Tuesday and would care to come along – great if you can – just email on paul@accessasia.co.uk and I’ll sort it out.

Drinks – Canapes – Books – Old Peking – Murder…the perfect evening!!

Seymour Topping on the Chinese Civil War

when I flick through the index of my book Through the Looking Glass, a history of foreign correspondents in China up to 1949, I think Seymour Topping holds the distinction of being the only one with an entry who’s still alive. I believe he is 90 years young this year. Topping’s reporting on the Chinese Civil between 1945 and 1949 for AP was excellent and some of it is included in the recently published collection of his reporting, On the Front Lines of the Cold War: An American Correspondents Journal From the Chinese Civil War to the Cuban Missile Crisis and Vietnam.

Topping, a graduate of the Missouri University School of Journalism that sent so many young writers China’s way (after  Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism had rejected him) had just left the army where he had served as an infantry officer in the Philippines and described himself as “very green” when he arrived in post-war Nationalist China. He first went to northern China for the International News Service for the princely sum of $50 a month and in 1948 joined AP in Nanjing where he was the first correspondent to report the fall of the city to Communist forces in 1949 and described Chiang as a “beaten man”. After the Communist occupation of Nanjing, Topping continued to report from the city for six months.

The Old Marco Polo Did He/Didn’t He Thing Again

The did he/didn’t he debate is back again around Marco Polo. This time Professor Daniele Petrella of the University of Naples, studying in Japan, has told the Italian history magazine Focus Storia that there are too many inconsistencies in Polo’s account of Kublai Khan’s attempted invasions of Japan in 1274 and 1281. Could an eye witness get so many things wrong? Here’s the Daily Mail on the story or, for those of you who could have had a chat with Marco himself, the Corriere della Serra version. Me? I’m not getting involved in that debate – the did he/didn’t he debate can get really nasty! Remember the Marco was a Croat debate just recently and how messy that turned (if not then click here).

Studley Avenue and Park Follow Up

Referring to my previous post back in July on the early days of Wayside Park (now Huoshan Park) and its previous designation as Studley Park. It was also mentioned at the time that there was a Studley Avenue in the area too, yet nobody I knew (and I do know the sort of people who would know this sort of thing!) had ever come across a Studley Avenue in Shanghai. So back to the old maps – but with no joy. However, thanks to Tess Johnston of the Old China Hand Press, author of numerous books on Shanghai architecture and all round avid researcher, who tracked it down in the Shanghai Directory for 1938.

Studley Avenue was clearly a small street, if not really a lane – being identified as ‘Baikal Road “near” McGregor Road’ – the use of the term “near” in the old Shanghai directories invariably indicates to me that it was less than a clearly marked road and usually just a lane or small cross street. However, a number of westerners were listed as residing on the street in 1938 and there was also a police post. Studley Avenue was on the southern fringes of the old Jewish Ghetto in Hongkou (Hongkew).

However, it seems that either Studley Avenue has gone in redevelopment or that the lane that was listed as Studley Avenue is now no longer listed as a separate road, even with a new name. Baikal Road is now Huimin Road running east to west and McGregor Road is now Lintong Road running north to south. The Baikal/McGregor junction had been redeveloped on three out of four corners and a stroll along both Baikal and McGregor now reveals a lot of lanes but nothing that stands out as possibly Studley Avenue I’m afraid.

Anyway, posted below some shots of the junction now and also a few glimpses of some of the still decent architecture that exists along Lintong Road – obviously this whole area is being pecked away at so hopefully some proper photographer will get down to these lanes and capture them before they’re “harmonised”.

The Huimin (Baikal)/Lintong (McGregor) junction

Huimin (Baikal) looking west

Lintong (McGregor) looking south

Remaining interesting architectural features on Lintong Road

good quality, but threatened, properties lying back from Lintong on what may have been once referred to as Studley Avenue

The same old story – supposedly preserved properties where the roofs have been damaged allowing for severe internal disrepair and ruin leading ultimately to their being bulldozed.

An Early Heads Up – Midnight in Peking Events – Australia and Asia

Obviously I’ll post more details (probably more than you’ll ever want or need!) on these events related to the Asia/Australia launch of my new book Midnight in Peking as well as and other events I’m slated to do around the region in late August and September closer to the dates, but here’s an early heads up, including forthcoming trips to the Melbourne Writers Festival and Brisbane Writers Festival down under,  those of who like to plan ahead…

Tuesday, August 23 – Beijing – The Bookworm

Friday, September 2 – Melbourne Writers Festival – The Morning Read – ACMI The Cube

Saturday, September 4 – Melbourne Writers Festival – The Art of Non-Fiction – The Wheeler Centre

Sunday, September 4 – Melbourne Writers Festival – In Conversation With Paul French – ACMI Studio 1

Friday September 9 – Brisbane Writers Festival – A Scandalous Past – State Library of Queensland

Sunday September 11 – Brisbane Writers Festival – Living in China – State Library of Queensland

Tuesday September 14 – Beijing – Time Out Beijing Midnight in Peking Walk

Wednesday September 14 – Beijing – The Bookworm

Sunday September 18 – Shanghai – Shanghai Launch – The Glamour Bar, M on the Bund

Monday September 19 – Hong Kong – Bookazine

Thursday September 22 – Hong Kong – The Royal Geographic Society (Hong Kong)

China Summer Reading…or at Least Some Reading Ideas from China Folk

Time Out Beijing asked a bunch of China related people what they thought you should be reading this summer. I was one of them admittedly. Refreshingly nobody really “log rolled” (publishing industry term for writers who recommend books from their mates or from their publishers to curry favour rather than offer a proper recommendation) and most chose books with either no, or only a passing, reference to China thankfully rather than doing the ‘look how well read I am’ thing that can be a tad vomit inducing.

Here’s the list from me, Robert Bickers, Isabel Hilton, Jean Kwok, Sheng Keyi and Wang Xiaofang – click here

Interestingly Isabel picked Julia Lovell’s forthcoming book on the Opium Wars – Drugs, Dreams and the Making of China. I only just got a copy and travel has meant I’ve only had the briefest of flicks through it so far, but it looks like a winner. I expect I’ll be blogging repeatedly on the book as I find time to get stuck into it.

Hong Names

Yvette Ho Madany  is a Shanghainese who loves her city’s history, architecture and unexplored corners. Her book, Shanghai Story Walks, is a delightful series of rambles through the former French Concession and the International Settlement and very nice for either the Shanghailander looking for a weekend’s route or the more discerning tourist. Yvette sparked of a conversation among a few old Shanghai trivia and history buffs about the old Hong names, the Chinese names foreign companies were known by originally back in the Qing Dynasty but that last for a long time (till ’49) and were often to be found on buildings, roads and ships even. Hong names were once pretty universal and pretty well known but we know of no single source that lists them all for the researcher so we’ve pooled together a few in the hope that you, dear reader, can contribute others and that we can pull a decent list together. Some are in Mandarin and other in Cantonese – where I know both I’ve given them.

So here’s what we’ve got:

Bao Long – EAC (meaning “Magnificent treasure”)

Chaou Foong (or Chaofoong) – Jenner Hogg & Co.

Da Bei – Great Northern Telegraph (meaning “Great North”)

Ewo – Jardine Matheson (meaning “Happy Harmony”, the name was taken from the earlier Ewo hong run by the famous comprador Howqua)

Jie Cheng – Jebson & Co. (meaning “Rewarding Success”)

Jin Kee – Gibb, Livingstone & Co.

Kungping – Probst Hanbury & Co.

Sun Cheong (alternatively Sun Cheong or Shen Chang) – General Electric (meaning “Caution and Prosperity”)

Taikoo (or Da Gu) – Butterfield & Swire (chosen by John Swire himself and meaning “Great and Ancient”)

Any contributions to the list most welcome….either stick them on the comments or email me (paul@accessasia.co.uk)

And We’re Back….

London never disappoints…Boris biking, Limehouse Chinatown resurrecting, Thames riverside rainbows, Marylebone posh slumming, Covent Garden pavement drinking, a tad too much rose wine perhaps…and a summer of rioting! That was my break! But now back to work.

Apologies in advance as I’m in full book launch mode at the moment and the machine that is Penguin requires vast amounts of my time…thankfully! And that also means that they’ll be a few more than the usual self -promotional postings on this site in the next month or two as I head down to Oz and then around Asia promoting Midnight in Peking. But fear not on two counts:

1) I will include lots of other posts on the usual stuff Shanghai related and China Rhyming usual;

2) if you like this site even a little bit you’re going to love Midnight in Peking – if you have even a passing interest in 1930s China, foreigners up to no good, opium scented scandals, underworld sex and unsolved murders then this autumn you’re basically going to be reading ME.

And if you’re in Australia you can pre-order now on Booktopia and read a Q&A on the book here.