Wednesday, December 25, 2019
Saturday, November 9, 2019
Book Review - 近代中國史綱(下) (A Short History of Modern China, Vol. 2)
Vol. 2 covers the period from the
establishment of the Nationalist Party under Sun Yat-sen’s leadership in 1912,
through the brief Yuan Shikai autocratic reign, then the Warlords Era, the
Japanese invasion and occupation of China, right up to the establishment of the
People’s Republic of China in 1949.
Having gone through annihilating tumults
of the 1800s that various foreign powers incited to gain control over Chinese
territories and reap economic concessions, by 1912, China was already a very
sick nation with deep internal wounds. European aggression showed brief signs
of let-up with the outbreak of First World War, but Japan and Russia
immediately jumped at the chance to encroach on Chinese territories and seize other
privileges. After declaring war on Germany, Japan seized the moment to impose
its so-called “Twenty-One Demands” (i.e. territorial and economic concessions)
on China.
Yuan Shikai was never a believer in Sun
Yat-sen’s Three Principles of the People (i.e. democracy) and was always
looking for a chance to become the emperor, even at the cost of selling out to
Japan. When his schemes were debunked, other factions rose against him. Thus
began the Warlords Era which lasted until the establishment of the Communist
Party in 1920 and beyond.
In 1919, at the Paris Peace Conference,
the major Allied Powers approved the transfer of Germany’s concessions in
Shandong Province to Japan instead of reverting them back to China, and this
ignited the nationalist and anti-imperialist May Fourth student movement, which
demanded the government to abstain from signing the Paris Treaty and to refute
Japan’s Twenty-One Demands.
From 1925, the year Sun died from sickness,
China became the battlefield between Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist Party and
Mao Tse-tung’s Communist Party and the remnant warlords. Chiang was repeatedly
criticized for his dictatorial ways within his own Party, while Mao firmly
believed that using armed force was the only solution to end his contest with Chiang.
In 1937, Japan, who had already seized and
occupied Manchuria in 1932 and had tried to take over five northern Chinese
provinces, started an all-out war with China (known as the Second Sino-Japanese
War) in Shanghai and Nanjing, using some flimsy excuse. In December that year, Japanese
soldiers subjected Nanjing to a brutal massacre and mass rape for six days.
This bloody war lasted until Japan was defeated by the Allied Forces in 1945.
Meanwhile, Russia was eyeing Outer Mongolia and Xinjiang, and sought to continue
its influence on the Communist Party.
After this war, China was again plunged
into civil war until the Communist Party finally won out in 1949 and set up the
People’s Republic of China, forcing Chiang and his Nationalist Party to flee to
Taiwan. Unfortunately, both Mao and Chiang imposed despotic rule and inflicted more sufferings on those under their rule.
These two Volumes of Modern China history
are a result of painstaking research by the author, which was supported, apart
from Chinese-language sources, by research materials found at the University of
Hawaii East-West Centre, Harvard University East Asia Centre and Columbia
University East Asian National Resource Center. But the author has also stated
that the books are not an academician’s work and are meant for a general
readership.
Both volumes chronicle a mind-boggling
amount of historical account minutiae. They have helped me understand a lot
better Modern China's history. I’m glad that I’ve read the books. This Volume warrants 4.5 stars.
Friday, October 18, 2019
Book Review - "The Count of Monte Cristo" by Alexandre Dumas, pere
Whew,
I finally finished reading this much acclaimed French classic. While satisfied
that I can now count myself among its readers, I do have mixed feelings about
this epic story of one man embarking on a revenge trajectory after being dealt
a harsh blow of egregious frame-up which entails fourteen years of imprisonment
and the loss of his betrothed.
The
novel is one large web of intricate and inter-linking plots, apparently woven
with much care and passion and sprinkled with suspenseful and emotional moments.
My investment in the convoluted plots did not wane throughout the novel,
although some major twists lean a bit towards fantasy and some of the minor turns
appear unnecessary. Still, I loved the author’s beautiful descriptions of
scenery in various parts of France, and his occasional insights on human nature
spelled out in the narrator’s witty observations. I especially like the moral message
that a person who exacts retribution and hurts the innocent in the process will
end up with more pain than satisfaction.
As
much as the portrayal of the key characters enabled me to have a good grasp of the
motives and reasons behind their actions and reactions, I found that they still
neatly fall into either one of two distinct categories - good and bad – with
very little nuance. The good stay good, the bad stay bad, throughout. But I guess that's one way of looking at human nature.
All
in all, this was an enjoyable read and I am giving it 3.4 stars, rounded down.
Thursday, August 29, 2019
Book Birthday Giveaway Entry Ends August 31!
Oct. 1, 2019 Update: The winners were notified and signed copies of the book were put in the mail to them on Sept. 26, 2019.
Please use the contact form (on the right) to enter your name and address for a lucky draw on September 1, 2019.
Deadline for entries is 5:00 pm Pacific Time on Saturday, August 31, 2019. Good Luck!
Tuesday, August 27, 2019
Li Xiangjun and "The Peach Blossom Fan"
As
I previously mentioned, Li Xiangjun 李香君 (1624 – 1653) is one of the three leading characters of my upcoming
novel. She was among the Eight Beauties of Qinhuai 秦淮八艷 and the subject
of Ming scholar Hou Fangyu’s 侯方域’s
literary essay titled Biography of Lady
Li 李姬傳.
The premises where Li used to reside and ply
her trade as a courtesan (she was a celebrated kunqu opera singer) were called Villa of Alluring Fragrance 媚香樓, which was located along the banks of the
Qinhuai River, a glitzy pleasure district of Nanjing in the late-Ming dynasty. The
above photographs show the reconstructed building at No. 38, Bank Note Vault
Street, Qinhuai, Nanjing 南京秦淮區鈔庫街三十八号.
If
you have read Kong Shangren’s 孔尚任’s iconic
historical play The Peach Blossom Fan 桃花扇, you would already be familiar with the real-life heroine Li
Xiangjun. This classical play is a dramatized narrative based on Hou’s essay Biography of Lady Li and is a poetic weaving
of the tragic love affair between Hou and Li with the collapse of the Ming
dynasty.
I’ve recently stumbled across a poem
written by renowned writer and philosopher Lin Yutang 林語堂 (1895 – 1976), which gives a reflective and laudatory description
of Li Xiangjun’s character, with gibes targeting men in general. He inscribed this
poem on a scroll portrait of Li Xiangjun that he had privately commissioned.
林語堂之”為香君題詩”:-
香君一個娘子,血染桃花扇子,
義氣照耀千古,羞煞鬚眉漢子。
香君一個娘子,性格是個蠻子,
懸在齋中壁上,教我知所觀止。
如今天下男子,誰復是個蠻子,
大家朝秦暮楚,成個什麼樣子。
當今這個天下,都是騙子販子,
我思古代美人,不至出甚亂子。
My Translation:
Lin Yutang’s Ode to Xiangjun:-
Xiangjun
is a woman, her blood spilt on the peach blossom fan.
Her
moral virtue lights up history, and shames the macho men.
Xiangjun
is a woman, and she has grit aplenty.
I
have her painting hung on the wall, to teach me humility.
Take
a look at all the men, is there any with intrepidity?
They’re
all wishy-washy; what have become of them!
The
world these days, is filled with crooks and shams.
I
can’t go wrong admiring, beauties in a distant time-span.
Monday, August 5, 2019
Book Review - "The Family Romanov" by Candace Fleming
A
breezy and concise historical account of Russia’s last imperial reign of Tsar Nicholas
II, this non-fiction history book reads a lot like a novel.
Like
with many other similar stretches of history, when viewed in retrospect, the
course of events would seem to be so natural and predictable that it makes one
wonder, had things been handled with more compassion and less hubris by those
in power, if the odds of averting tragedies and disasters could’ve increased.
The Family Romanov gives an
intimate account of the lives of the Romanov family members, namely, Nicholas,
his wife Alexandra, and their four daughters, Olga, Tatiana, Marie and
Anastasia and one son-and-heir Alexei. The account starts with the 1884
courtship between teenagers Nicholas and Alix of Hesse (who was Queen
Victoria’s granddaughter), and carries us through to the tragic end of the
whole family in July 1918.
Juxtaposing
narratives of the opulent, hedonistic lifestyle of the Imperial family side by
side with anecdotes of the peasant class’s everyday scourge of abject poverty, oppression
and despair, the author presents a poignant picture of two diametrically
opposite worlds, worlds inhabited by two classes that are distinguished by
birth and destiny. Exaggerated sense of entitlement and obtuseness of the
privileged ruling class becomes the cause of its own ultimate undoing.
I’m
just puzzled as to why the French-educated Romanovs had not learned from the
downfall of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette.
It
is interesting to note that it was not until July 2007 that the remains of
Alexei and of one of his sisters were finally found. (The remains of the other
five family members had been uncovered in 1991.)
I’m
giving this well-researched book 4 full stars.
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