Wallis arrived in Shanghai in late 1924 as the Second Zhili–Fengtian War raged close by. She dined, garden partied, went to the races and shopped but she could not have failed to notice the precautions taken in the International Settlement, not least by the Americans… here US sailors search cars entering the Settlement; the US Company of the Shanghai Volunteers guards the borders of the Settlement; US, as well as Royal Navy and French Navy ships line the Huangpu River; US sailors on guard in Shanghai…
How inspired was Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor by her year in China? Well just consider these two images of her from the later 1930s – a decade after her China sojourn and still regularly wearing qipao/cheongsam-inspired dresses (even if designed by Mainbocher!)… Sketch by Cecil Beaton, 1937; sorry, not sure who took the pic, but such full length portraits of Wallis are relatively rare)….
New edition of Jeffrey Wasserstrom’s Vigil on Hong Kong with additional materials from Amy Hawkins & Kris Cheng – from Brixton Ink – joins this week must read pile….
On spring weekends in the Western Hills around Peking Wallis would wander and see those temples still in use, such as the Black Dragon Temple, here with monks celebrating the Devil Dance and westing masks/costumes to chase out evil spirits; a ritual that took place every spring and here photographed in the 1920s by JT McGarvey for National Geographic
Next Thursday i’ll be at the great Books on the Rise in Richmond with Anne Sebba talking Wallis Simpson & her adventures in 1920s China, the gossip & scandal but also the truth behind her time in HK, Shanghai & Beijing….and its influence on her style…
I’d never heard of this book – Ma Wei Slope (Macmillan: 1944) – a palace intrigue novel set in the Tang Dynasty by Keith West. The detective novel features a rather drunken Li Po (Li Bo, the poet), palace girl Winter Cherry, her lover Ah Lai, and rows between the emperor and farmers. It got broadly good reviews in 1944 and this copy below is a later republication by Penguin in their trademark cover. I’m afraid I know nothing of the author, Keith West – one newspaper declared ‘he knows China…’, but quite how Iam not aware?
Until Andrew West (no relation) sent me the following:
“Keith West, the Oxford trained schoolmaster, who travelled extensively in the Yunnan and South China regions and whose hobbies have been collecting Chinese bronzes and embroideries” (China Monthly vol. 6, 1944, p. 30)
This edition of Penguin Plays (produced mostly for schools and amateur dramatic groups who needed script and play ideas). Hsiung Shih-I’s Lady Precious Stream (1934) was included in this 1958 edition. I’ve blogged about Hsiung before – friend of Chiang Yee, Belsize Park resident, playwright. You can listen to my BBC radio documentary on Hsiung and the other Hampstead Chinese of the 1930s here, there’s also Diana Yeh’s excellent book on Hsiung, The Happy Hsiungs (HKUP/RAS China) and Da Zheng’s A Glorious Showmanif you want more on Hsiung.
