Midnight in Peking Comes to Arlington, VA – Friday April 27th

I’ll be at One More Page Books (I have to say independent American bookstores are very clever with their names!) in Arlington, Virginia on Friday April 27th.

2200 N Westmoreland Street #101 Arlington, VA 22213 Ph. 703-300-9746

PS: I did the Dianne Rehm Show on NPR here today and she is one of the classiest Americans I’ve ever met – it was a blast – here’s the show online or it’ll be repeated in the USA on Sunday.

Chinese Labour Corps Getting Plugs

I noted the other month that the number of books now appearing and scheduled to appear on the role of the Chinese Labour Corps (aka the Coolie Corps) during the First World War was reaching an all time high. It’s also good to see that the Corps and its members are popping up in literature too. See, for instance, Sebastian Barry’s brilliant A Long Long Way book about a group of Irishman in the war which has a lot of mentions of the Chinese working on the battlefields. Admittedly Barry’s book is a few years old but I’ve just discovered it and loved it…

The Australian Book Industry Awards 2012 Shortlist Announced

Brilliant to see the team at Penguin Australia shortlisted in the 2012 Australian Book Industry Awards in the category for International Success of the Year 2012 for their marketing internationally of Midnight in Peking. They’ve done a great job so fingers crossed….the winners are announced on May 18th in Sydney…see the full list of those shortlisted in all categories here.

William Empson Remembered on Marchmont Street

Dear old Bloomsbury…I was there last week and noticed a blue plaque I never had before on Marchmont Street (walked by maybe 3 or 4,000 times!) to William Empson (1906-84), the English literary critic, poet and China Hand. In fact the plaque was only unveiled in June 2011 by Empson’s family, I found out on the internet, so I needn’t feel too foolish. If you don’t know Empson then do look him up (his Wikipedia entry here in probably as good a place as any to start). Or there’s a good essay on Empson by Frank Kermode form the London Review of Books here.

He was an odd sort and I’ve never got very far with his poetry but he pops up regularly in memoirs of 1930s ex-pat China, usually doing or saying something charmingly bonkers. He moved around teaching but his posts were always being disrupted by the Japanese invasion – he’s mostly associated with Peking and Peking University but then taught at the relocated universities in Kunming after the full-scale Japanese invasion.

Midnight in Peking Available on Kindle Now

At last, for everyone who complained to me about how long it took for a Kindle version to be available – here it is on Amazon.com at last….(Amazon.co.uk from May 31st)

A Wee Bit of Chinois Going on and some Opium in Sherlock Holmes 2

Finally got to see the second Guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes flick – Game of Shadows. Early on in the film Holmes (Robet Downey Jr) disguises himself as a Chinese man with a bit of an opium thing (i think he’s posing as a Chinese opium merchant?) apparently going on complete with wispy beard, queue and various opium puffing accouterments. There’s also a reference to an opium traders death in a London newspaper.

After that I rather lost it a bit with the plot I’m afraid….

In case you were wondering there is no point to this post, just thought I’d mention it….

RAS Shanghai – The Missing Catalogue and Diaries of Pang Yuanji Pang and his Modern Art World – April 24

RAS LECTURE

Tuesday 24th April 2012 at 7.00pm

The Tavern, Radisson Blu Plaza Xingguo Hotel 78 Xingguo Road,Shanghai

KATHARINE BURNETT

ON

The Missing Catalogue and Diaries of Pang Yuanji

Pang and his Modern Art World

Wang Zhen (Wang Yiting) – “Pang Yuanji Holding a Rabbit,” 1927, hanging scroll,

ink and color on paper, 136.6cm x 69cm

Pang Yuanji (1864-1949) is well known for the important catalogues of his ancient painting collection that he compiled between 1909 and 1925, especially the Xuzhai Minghua Lu. Less recognized is his patronage of over 20 artists who lived and worked in his home. Less known still are his undertakings in transforming China’s public sphere. Despite Pang’s passion for collecting the Six Orthodox Masters, his own paintings in the literati mode, and his memberships of seemingly conservative painting societies, his activities with political, social, and arts reformers indicate a modernist sensibility. By examining Pang’s activities and network of associations, this lecture will attempt to provide a better understanding of Pang’s contributions toward modernizing China and its art.

Dr. Katharine Burnett is an Associate Professor at the University of California, Davis, where she teaches Chinese art history and culture. Her research considers issues including theory, criticism, connoisseurship, collecting, and display, and spans the late Ming through to the contemporary. Her book, Dimensions of Originality: Essays on Seventeenth-Century Chinese Art Theory and Criticism, is forthcoming summer 2012 from the Chinese University Press, Hong Kong. Her recent article, “Inventing a New ‘Old Tradition’: Chinese Art at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition,”《美術史與觀念史》(2010), and this lecture are aspects of her book in preparation, Pang Yuanji (1864-1949): Artist, Patron, Collector, Dealer.

Entrance: RMB 30.00 (RAS members) and RMB 80.00 (non-members). Those unable to make the donation but wishing to attend may contact us for exemption, prior to the RAS Lecture. Membership applications and membership renewals will be available at this event.  Members will have priority booking until 21th April 2012.

To RSVP:  Please “Reply” to this email or write to

RAS Bookings at: bookings@royalasiaticsociety.org.cn

The Baidu of 1941…The Shanghai Yellow Pages

…was the Shanghai Yellow Pages. Need an address, a supplier, a company, a store – basically the Yellow Pages was Baidu, Taobao, Tencent, Google and Alibaba all rolled into one. Of course I’m of an age that grew up using the Yellow Pages and indeed, when I first started a market research company way back when, the first item we had to get was a complete set of Yellow Pages!! For young people reading this blog Wikipedia actually has an entry to explain to you what a Yellow Pages is!