George Foe’s Shanghai Dialect in 4 Weeks…

Ambitious I’d say….Shanghai Dialect in FOUR Weeks, by George Foe &published by the Chi Ming Book Company of Shanghai, 1940)…

Michael Sheridan’s The Gate to China: A New History of the People’s Republic & Hong Kong

Sheridan’s new book sheds perhaps new light on the PRC-UK-HK relationship and especially Percy Craddock’s role…

The rise of China and the fall of Hong Kong to authoritarian rule are told with unique insight in this new history by Michael Sheridan, drawing on eyewitness reporting over three decades, interviews with key figures and documents from archives in China and the West.

The story sweeps the reader from the earliest days of trade through the Opium Wars of the 19th century to the age of globalisation and the handover of Hong Kong from Britain to China. It ends with the battle for democracy on the city’s streets and the ultimate victory of the Chinese Communist Party.

How did it come to this? We learn from private papers that Margaret Thatcher anguished over the fate of Hong Kong, sought secret American briefings on how to handle China and put her trust in an adviser who was torn between duty and pride. The deal they made with Beijing did not last.

The Chinese side of this history, so often unheard, emerges from memoirs and documents, many new to the foreign reader, revealing how the party’s iron will and negotiating tactics crushed its opponents. Yet the voices of Hong Kong people – eloquent, smart and bold – speak out here for ideals that refuse to die.

Sheridan’s book tells how Hong Kong opened the way for the People’s Republic as it reformed its economy and changed the world, emerging to challenge the West with a new order that raises fundamental questions about progress, identity and freedom. It is critical reading for all who study, trade or deal with China.

And talking of Gloria Swanson – Her Gilded Cage (1922)

Talking of Swanson’s apparent taste for things Chinese the other day, this 1922 portrait of her by Karl Strauss always makes me think of Liangbatou, the Manchu female headress/headwear styles and the background porthole (metalwork or bamboo? I can’t quite tell) perhaps adds to that feeling….

The image is from when Swanson was filming Her Gilded Cage (1922), a silent drama about a dancer seeking love and fame from Paris cabarets to New York society. The film is sadly ‘lost’ but the few remaining still indicate a fairly heavy ‘Orientalist’ touch (see below). IT didn’t get great reviews i’m afraid – more of a fashion show than a movie (like that’s a bad thing!).

The Inaugural Destination Peking Walking Tour

Very nice to see the Destination Peking walking tour get under way – aesthetes, authors, scholars and scoundrels. It’s all been set up by Bespoke Beijing and is hosted by the historian and guide Jeremiah Jenne of Beijing on Foot. There’s plenty of hutongs, history and some exercise but, fear not, it all ends at the former Grand Hotel de Peking (now the Nuo Hotel Beijing) on Chang’an Dajie with a cocktail – Harold Acton’s receipt for the Gloom Chaser, the hottest cocktail in 1936 Peking as featured in Acton’s novel Peonies and Ponies (Harold’s receipe here). If you’re intested in when the next tour is taking place contact Bespoke Beijing. If you can’t get to Beijing (i.e. pretty much everyone who isn’t already there!), the book of course is available online, at good bookshops and from the publisher Blacksmith Books.

Madame Chiang’s Sunglasses, 1940

Nothing to say here – though if anyone knows the brand that’s be excellent to know – but finding Madame Chiang’s (Soong Mayling) sunglasses, as worn here in Chongqing in 1940, very cool….

The 1A Trolleybus – Old Shanghai Signage

The 1A trolleybus would have been one of the most interesting rides in old Shanghai – from the Garden Bridge, along the Bund, up Nanjing Road, Bubbling Well Road, Yu Yuen Road to Keswick Road by Jessfield Park (so, Garden Bridge – Bund – Nanjing East Road – Nanjing West Road – Yuyuan Road – Kaixuan Road by Zhongshan Park)…

Les Fran̤ais de Shanghai (1849-1949) РGuy Brossellet

My thanks to Hugues Martin, prolific and long time blogger at Shanghailander on all things old Shanghai and especially Francophile Shanghai. A post of his from 2006 (! – sorry, must have missed that) alerted me to Guy Brossellet’s Les Francais de Shanghai book (fortunately still available, as here on Amazon). Here also is Hugues’s post on the title….

Das schwierige schöne Leben. Ein deutscher Kaufmann in Shanghai 1906 bis 1952

Yesterday I mentioned Hermann Breuer and his forty years in China with Melchers & Co. Also that Christine Maiwald has written a biography of Breuer. As this book is in German I’m going to post in German but anyone interested can follow the links…the book is available here on Thalia, here on Amazon Germany, while anyone near a Kinokuniya in Asia can get it here.

Hermann W. Breuer (1884 – 1973) ging 1906, mit 22 Jahren, für das Bremer Übersee-Haus Melchers & Co. als Kaufmann nach Shanghai und empfand sich bald als »Sohn des Reiches der Mitte«. Seine Geschichte steht exemplarisch für das schwierige schöne Leben der deutschen Kaufleute in der internationalen Handelsmetropole Shanghai während der ersten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts. Sie beginnt in einer Zeit kolonialer Ansprüche und endet mit dem Neubeginn des deutsch-chinesischen Austauschs, den Breuer als Vorsitzender des Ostasiatischen Vereins Bremen mit prägte. Unterhaltsam und mit großer Kenntnis wird erzählt vom Reisen und Alltagsleben in China, von Fahrten mit der Transsibirischen Eisenbahn und auf Ozeandampfern, von neuen Kommunikationsmitteln, von Briten, Amerikanern und Chinesen, die Breuer im Job, in Clubs, beim Sport begegneten. Mut und Nächstenliebe bewies Breuer angesichts der Kriege und Umbrüche in China, des deutschen Nationalsozialismus in Shanghai, der Probleme russischer und jüdischer Flüchtlinge. Inspiriert von Briefen und Fotografien im Familienbestand durchforschte die Autorin Archive in Deutschland und China, sprach mit letzten Zeitzeugen. Sie lässt die Leser teilhaben am detektivischen Zusammenfügen von Puzzlesteinchen zur Lebensgeschichte eines sympathischen Menschen. Erzählt mit Empathie, Humor und Sinn für die Details des Alltags, ist diese Biografie eine echte Entdeckung.