I was born in England but was ‘exported’ to Malaya/sia in the 1950s, where my father worked as an engineer. I developed a life-long love for the languages and cultures of the region. I did Chinese Studies at Leeds University and then went to study Chinese literature in China, arriving there in 1976. I have retained a love and fascination for the Far East and have lived and worked in tertiary institutions in Burma, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan. I loved the books on my list because they all added to my knowledge of China but in very different ways.
This is a wonderful memoir about teaching English in a school in a small town on the banks of the Yangtze River in Sichuan. Hessler was the first foreigner to live in the town for several decades, and I loved reading about how he learned more about himself from his students and his own understanding of what it is like to be immersed in a completely new cultural environment.
When Peter Hessler went to China in the late 1990s, he expected to spend a couple of peaceful years teaching English in the town of Fuling on the Yangtze River. But what he experienced - the natural beauty, cultural tension, and complex process of understanding that takes place when one is thrust into a radically different society - surpassed anything he could have imagined. Hessler observes firsthand how major events such as the death of Deng Xiaoping, the return of Hong Kong to the mainland, and the controversial consturction of the Three Gorges Dam have affected even the people of…
This one is a truly eye-opening account of what it was like to do business not only in China but also with the moneymen and investors on Wall Street. I learned a huge amount about the difficulties and trickery he and his business partners faced when trying to invest in China when China opened up for business.
Mr. China tells the rollicking story of a young man who goes to China with the misguided notion that he will help bring the Chinese into the modern world, only to be schooled by the most resourceful and creative operators he would ever meet. Part memoir, part parable, Mr. China is one man's coming-of-age story where he learns to respect and admire the nation he sought to conquer.
Austin Coates found himself appointed as a magistrate in the remote New Territories in colonial Hong Kong in the 1950s. As he knew little, if anything, about the society into which he was plunged, he had to learn quickly.
This is a wonderful book about how he dealt with cases from dealing with cows, watercress beds, squatters, dragons, quarreling wives, or a Buddhist abbot.
Unexpectedly appointed magistrate in a country district in Hong Kong, the author found himself plunged into a Chinese world about which he knew next to nothing and had to learn as fast as possible. This he does, taking the reader with him through the errors, puzzles, and bafflements of sixteen court cases which came into his court.
Whether he is dealing with cows, watercress beds, squatters, dragons, quarrelling wives, or a Buddhist abbot, the author brings his reader into each case as if the reader were the actual judge, and at a given moment the solution comes to the reader…
This is a truly remarkable memoir about an extraordinarily courageous blind political activist and self-taught lawyer who fought for rights and justice for the disabled against insurmountable odds in present-day China.
Parts of the memoir read like a thriller; other parts recount truly shocking and disturbing events. I was hooked from the first page–I don’t think I will ever read a more exciting account of an escape from detention.
“[Chen’s] story is a reminder that the desire for basic human rights . . . arises from the deep well of the human spirit.”―The New York Times Book Review
It was like a scene out of a thriller: One night in April 2012, China’s most famous political activist―a blind, self-taught lawyer―climbed over the wall of his heavily guarded home and escaped. After he turned up at the American embassy in Beijing, high-level negotiations finally led to his release and a new life in the United States.
Chen Guangcheng is a unique figure on the world stage, but his story is…
This is not so much a memoir but a hugely entertaining and informative history of China told through descriptions of twelve imperial feasts. I love Chinese food and its different cuisines and styles, and I have learned so much more here.
For example, what happened to people who were unfortunate or careless enough to touch the threshold when entering the dining hall when the emperor Khubilai Khan was feasting? I loved the fascinating detail. For example, Khubilai Khan had a giant jade wine bowl capable of holding 2,300 liters, and guests were invited to dip their jugs into it.
'A galloping journey through thousands of years of Chinese culinary history . . . a timely reminder that the country's modern cuisine is the delicious fruit of a rich, ancient and perhaps surprisingly multicultural tradition' FUCHSIA DUNLOP, SPECTATOR
'A tasty portrait of a nation' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH
'A splendid introduction to the complex history of China' GUARDIAN
'A terrific read . . . Jonathan Clements writes with erudition and humour' DAILY MAIL
'This book is itself a feast, each chapter a sumptuous course' Frederik L. Schodt, author of My Heart Sutra
'Witty and insightful' Derek Sandhaus, author of Drunk in China…
What was it like to live in China in the mid-1970s? I arrived in Beijing only a few days before the death of Chairman Mao, and this memoir offers an eye-opening and entertaining account of a period when China was one of the most isolated places on earth. This memoir describes the fear-filled atmosphere surrounding Mao’s death and the ensuing struggle to overthrow the infamous ‘Gang of Four.
It paints an illuminating and often humorous picture of life as a postgraduate student of Chinese in Beijing and Shanghai—the intractable Communist Chinese bureaucracy, spending time in factories and on a farm commune ‘learning from the workers and peasants’, accompanying the indomitable Margaret Thatcher on a visit to Fudan University, and playing football for the university.
I come by my interest in history and the years before, during, and after the Second World War honestly. For one thing, both my father and my father-in-law served as pilots in the war, my father a P-38 pilot in North Africa and my father-in-law a B-17 bomber pilot in England. Their histories connect me with a period I think we can still almost reach with our fingertips and one that has had a momentous impact on our lives today. I have taken that interest and passion to discover and write true life stories of the war—focusing on the untold and unheard stories often of the “Average Joe.”
October 24, 1944, is not a day of national remembrance. Yet, more Americans serving in World War II perished on that day than on any other single day of the war.
The narrative of No Average Day proceeds hour by hour and incident by incident while focusing its attention on ordinary individuals—clerks, radio operators, cooks, sailors, machinist mates, riflemen, and pilots and their air crews. All were men who chose to serve their country and soon found themselves in a terrifying and otherworldly place.
No Average Day reveals the vastness of the war as it reaches past the beaches in…
October 24, 1944, is not a day of national remembrance. Yet, more Americans serving in World War II perished on that day than on December 7, 1941, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, or on June 6, 1944, when the Allies stormed the beaches of Normandy, or on any other single day of the war. In its telling of the events of October 24, No Average Day proceeds hour by hour and incident by incident. The book begins with Army Private First-Class Paul Miller's pre-dawn demise in the Sendai #6B Japanese prisoner of war camp. It concludes with the death…
