All things old China - books, anecdotes, stories, podcasts, factoids & ramblings from the author Paul French
Heads up…Zhang Yueran’s Cocoon in translation (By Jeremy Tiang) out Oct 4 from World Edition books – a quite amazing novel blurbed by Yan Lianke & Ian McEwan (has he ever blurbed a Chinese novel before?) “Cocoon is a stupendous novel, a beautiful & formidable achievement on the grandest scale” oh, & me!
WHAT: An online talk by author Adam Brookes on his book Fragile Cargo: the World War II race to save the treasures of China’s Forbidden City, moderated by Paul French, followed by Q&A (online)
WHEN: Sept. 7, 2022 Wednesday from 8:00-9:00 PM Beijing time
MORE ABOUT THE EVENT: RASBJ is thrilled to feature author Adam Brookes discussing his hot new book Fragile Cargo: the World War II race to save the treasures of China’s Forbidden City . The talk will be moderated by Paul French, author of “Midnight in Peking”. For a taste of things to come, here’s an interview Paul did with Adam for the China-Britain Business Focus. Many of you have attended RASBJ’s numerous events focused on the Forbidden City – and now’s your chance to hear one of the most rollicking tales of all.
Here’s how the publisher described this book: “1924: Two days before Christmas, a small and clandestine group of professors, curators, and historians made their way through the enormous gates and towering vermillion walls of Peking’s Forbidden City, for centuries the home to the Chinese emperors…. [For years}, Japanese pilots [had been] bombing Shanghai. In the increasingly vulnerable city of Peking, the Palace Museum’s curator made a difficult and monumental decision: to safeguard the treasures, they would need to be evacuated…. What followed was an unbelievable and perilous journey through a vast country facing tremendous upheaval and conditions as varied as icy winter storms to boiling heatwaves. Now, the full story is finally revealed and the men and women who helped saved China’s precious cultural history are given their due in this unforgettable book.“
MEMBERS ONLY: This online event is free and exclusively for members of RASBJ and RAS branches. If you wish to join the RASBJ to attend this event, please sign up for membership at https://rasbj.org/membership/ at least 72 hours before the event.
HOW TO JOIN THE EVENT: Please click “Register” or “I Will Attend” and follow the instructions. After successful registration you’ll receive a confirmation email with a link to join the event. If you seem not to have received it, please check your spam folder.
Members of partner RAS branches: Please register at least 72 hours in advance to allow time for membership verification. You’ll receive two emails from us, the first confirming receipt of your registration request and the second confirming your registration, with a link to join the event. Please check your spam folder to ensure you see all RASBJ emails.
Out now Adam Brookes’s terrific Fragile Cargo. Here’s my Q&A with Adam for the China-Britain Business Council’s Focus magazine…click here…
The design team at the South China Morning Post Weekend Magazine always do such a great & original job with my long reads. Really fantastic, every time. This time a scandalous tale of passion, violence & death that rocked the Italian community of 1920s Beijing – click here
How things comes around….ten years ago I posted on the floor plan for the 1910 Nanyang Industrial Exposition – here. 2010 was the year of the Shanghai Expo, which got some excited but was a heritage and preservation disaster for the city as cadres took advantage of the hype and central government support to bulldoze vast swathes of the city, especially Yangpu (including much of the city’s neglected industrial architectural heritage), Tilanqiao (including a lot of the former Jewish ghetto) and Hongkou, (particularly key unique parts of the former Japanese Concession).
Anyway, a big thanks to a teacher from Nanjing Tech University who read the post and sent me some pictures of some remaining animal head sculptures that remain on the grounds of the Uni and probably (though someone out there may know better) orignally came from the USA.
Apparently they were marked as a Chinese mythical creatures. There also remains a cement parasol- covered rest/seating area (below too)…
Ornate silversmithing is a craft that once proliferated in Shanghai but has all but disappeared a long time past now. Perhaps the best known local silversmith of the late nineteenth/early twentieth century was Tuck Chang, sometimes referred to as the ‘Wang Hing of Shanghai’ (Wang Hing was a notable silversmith and antiques dealer in Canton/Guangzhou earlier on) and often marked “TC”. The firm was in operation from roughly 1890 to 1915. Though other silversmiths existed at the same time, such as Luen Wo, Yat Sen, Sing Fat (mostly run by Cantonese craftsman and merchants who had moved to Shanghai after learning the trade in Canton) and others, TC was the best known among the foreign community.
Tuck Chang employed a team of silversmiths catering mostly to the Shanghailander and tourist trade with silver trophies, tea sets and high quality gift items (such as the silver spoon and box pictured below). The company was Chinese but being based in Shanghai was very aware of European trends and tastes incorporating elements of the Beaux Arts, Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau styles, though often combining these with Chinese traditional motifs – classic Shanghai hai-pai brought to silversmithing.
Some examples of Tuck Chang’s work below (the internet will yield many dozens of examples)…
(there are two other posts on Shanghai silversmiths that may interest readers – on Zeewo here and on Luen Wo here)
Chinese toilet box embossed with chrysanthemums, foliage & an insect – Tuck Chang – c.1900
For over 50 years from the late 1890s there was a Kowloon Hotel on Hankow Road in Hong Kong. More surprising to find a Kowloon Hotel on Harold Road, Cliftonville, Margate in Kent in the 1920s and 1930s. Managed by a CF Grandy, who I can only assume was returned from Hong Kong and thought he’d name his new establishment after a Hong Kong icon of the time…though I can find no trace of a CF Grandy in Hong Kong at any point. I can’t find a house number for the property on Harold Road but any Margate people care to wander along the street and speculate i’d love to locate it more precisely?
An interview with Paul Bevan, Anne Witchard, and Da Zheng on Chiang Yee and His Circle: Chinese Artistic and Intellectual Life in Britain, 1930–1950. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2022. Click here.
