Julia Lovell and Opium at Asia House – Thursday 15th September

Julia Lovell is talking about her new book, The Opium War, at London’s Asia House on September 15th. Should be well worth listening to and attending to details as below. There was a good Q&A with Julia in Time Out Hong Kong recently also worth reading.

Beginning with the drama of the war itself, Julia Lovell explores its causes and consequences, and through this larger narrative, interweaves the curious stories of opium’s promoters and attackers. The Opium War is both the story of modern China—starting from its first encounter with the West—and an analysis of the country’s contemporary self-image. It explores how China’s national myths mould its interaction with the outside world, how public memory is spun to suit the present, and how delusion and prejudice have bedevilled its relationship with the modern West.

Julia Lovell teaches modern Chinese history at Birckbeck College, University of London. She is the author of The Great Wall: China Against the World and The Politics of Cultural Capital: China’s Search for a Nobel Prize in Literature. She writes for the Guardian, Independent and The Times Literary Supplement.

You can read the excellent Isabel Hilton’s review of Julia’s book in The Guardian here

£10/£8 concessions
Asia House Friends : £6

You can book via the website here