Two 19th century Chinese School paintings of the Canton Factories

two, sadly non-attirbuted, reverse paintings on glass in the Chinese School featuring the Canton Factories…

Welcome the Year of the Dragon II…

Welcome the Year of the Dragon….so here’s a silver and mother of pearl inkstand by silversmiths Luen Hing of Shanghai, c.1920s, centred by a four-toed dragon flanked by inkwells mounted with pearls and with insect motifs….

Welcome the Year of the Dragon I…

It’s a dragon year, so here’s a dragon embossed name card holder, c.1920, made by silversmiths Tuck Chang & Co of Shanghai…

The Collection of Mel Jacoby’s Never Seen Before Photo Archive – A Danger Share – Now Available

Bill Lascher’s collection of US foreign corespondent in Asia Mel Jacoby’s (mostly never seen before) photos of China, HK, Macao, and the Philippines in the 1930s & the outbreak of war are truly incredible. A significant new treasure trove for historians. And Blacksmith Books have done a great job of publishing them – now avalable from Blacksmith’s website & Hong Kong bookshops….. click here

Royal Asiatic Society China – “The Father of China’s Pinyin System: Zhou Youguang” by Mark O’Neill – February 7 2024

WHAT: “The Father of China’s Pinyin System: Zhou Youguang”, an RASBJ online event with author Mark O’Neill and moderator David Moser

WHEN: Feb. 7 Wednesday. 7:00-8:00 PM Beijing Time

ABOUT THE EVENT: Mark O’Neill’s latest book is about Zhou Youguang (周有光), the scholar who invented Pinyin, a system of romanisation for Chinese characters. At the age of 111, Zhou died in January 2017 after an extraordinary life. He had been a banker in Shanghai, New York and London. He’d supplied food and textiles for soldiers and civilians during WWII. After 1949 he was a linguist. He lived through Maoist-era political campaigns and spent 28 months in a labour camp. He wrote 49 books and, in the last 20 years of his life, was one of China’s few intellectuals willing to openly express his sometimes critical views.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER: Mark O’Neill has lived in Asia since 1978 and has written 14 books on Chinese history and society. Born in London, England, O’Neill was educated at Marlborough College and New College, Oxford and worked in Washington D.C., Manchester and Belfast before moving to Asia.

ABOUT THE MODERATOR: David Moser holds a Master’s and a Ph.D. in Chinese Studies from the University of Michigan, with a major in Chinese Linguistics and Philosophy. He is currently Associate Professor at Beijing Capital Normal University. Moser is author of “A Billion Voices: China’s Search for a Common Language”, published by Penguin.

HOW MUCH: Free for RASBJ members. RMB 50 for members of partner RAS branches in London, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Seoul. RMB 100 for non-members. Interested in becoming an RASBJ member? Please sign up at https://rasbj.org/membership

HOW TO JOIN THE EVENT: Please click “Register” or “I Will Attend” (here) and follow the instructions. You may find paying via Alipay easier than by Wechat; credit cards are also accepted. 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.

Note for members of partner RAS branches: Please register at least 72 hours in advance to allow time for membership verification. Please check your spam folder to ensure you see all RASBJ emails.

HOW TO PURCHASE THE BOOK IN BEIJING: RASBJ has available a limited number of hard copies; regrets if supply is insufficient to fill demand. If you’re interested, please email communications@rasbj.org (If you’re outside of Beijing, books can be ordered via https://www.mybookone.com.hk. However, RASBJ is not responsible for their delivery.)

Tan Hechang’s The Killing Wind

Tan Hecheng’s The Killing Wind: A Chinese County’s Descent into Madness during the Cultural Revolution (Oxford University Press)…

A spasm of extreme radicalism that rocked China to its foundations in the mid- to late 1960s, the Cultural Revolution has generated a vast literature. Much of it, however, is at a birds-eye level, and we have very few detailed accounts of how it worked on the ground. Long after the event, Tan Hecheng, now a retired Chinese writer and editor, was sent to Daoxian, Mao’s home county, to report on the official investigation into the massacre that took place there during the Cultural Revolution.

In The Killing Wind, Tan recounts how over the course of 66 days in 1967, over 9,000 Chinese “class enemies” were massacred in the Daoxian, in the Hunan Province. The killings were unprovoked and carried out with incredible, stomach-churning brutality, which is documented here in excruciating detail. But although this could easily be just a compendium of horrors, it’s also a meditation on memory, moral culpability, and the failure of the Chinese government to come to terms with the crimes of the Maoist era. Tan interweaves the story of his research with the recollections of survivors and reflections on the long-term consequences of the Cultural Revolution. Akin to Jan Gross’s Neighbors, about the Holocaust in a Polish town, The Killing Wind likewise paints a single episode in extraordinary detail in order to make a broader argument about the long term consequences flowing from one of the twentieth century’s greatest human tragedies.

Shanghai Bund Panorama, Early 1920s, WAB Leach

A panorama of the Shanghai Bund taken from Pudong (probably) by William Arthur Blackburn Leach, probably early 1920s and who usually used either a ‘3A Graflex’ or a ‘Thornton Pickard Special Ruby’ camera.

Leach was born in Norwich in 1872 where he attended a local grammar school, later becoming an apprentice carpenter and engineer. In 1902 after he had qualified, he went to China where he obtained a position in the Public Works Department of the Shanghai Municipal Council. He spent his working life in Shanghai until he left in 1926. More on Leach here courtesy of Lay’s Auctioneers.

Sketch of the Old Hong Kong Club

A sketch of the old Hong Kong club on Statue Square (artist and date unknown) – and a photograph of the original building, now long replaced by a rather ugul high rise.