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Year Of The Gorilla, Jonathan Tel

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

This is a selection from Jonathan Tel’s forthcoming collection of short stories, The Beijing of Possibilities, to be published this summer by Other Press. Tel is the author of Freud’s Alphabet and the story collection Arafat’s Elephant. His stories have appeared in The New Yorker and Granta. Drawn to “writing fiction set in places whose inhabitants believe themselves to be at the center of the world,” Tel first visted China in 1988 and has particular affinity for Beijing.

It’s been a while since the Monkey King set out on his Journey to the West. With his Fiery-Gazing Golden-Eyes he infallibly …

China To Me

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

We’ve added a new blog to our daily reading–Evan Osnos’s dispatches at The New Yorker. Currently blogging from Vietnam, Osnos posted a few thoughts on Friday about Vietnam’s lengthy relationship with China (“Long After We Left“) and a few days earlier the delightfully-titled “From Karenina to Cyrus,” which in one short vignette traces the intellectual influences from West to East over the past few generations.

In his first post to the blog, Osnos mentioned a favorite China watcher here atChina Beat, Emily Hahn. Osnos writes, “I like to imagine what she would have made of this blog. Upon arriving in …

Chatting With Wen

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

One of the topics we raised in China in 2008 was the changing relationship between the Chinese leadership and regular people over the past years. Last weekChina Digital Times pointed to another example of this changing relationship–Wen Jiabao answering netizens’ questions online. We’ve run a few related pieces at the site before, such as Nicolai Volland’s “Boss Hu and the Press” and Richard Kraus’s “Preserving the Premier’s Calligraphy at Beichuan Middle School.”

Wolf Totem Revisited (Yet Again)

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

I know that this site has run more than its fair share of commentaries on Wolf Totem already, including both a negative review and a piece defending the novel. I’ve even done one piece about it already myself, which took the form of a wrap-up look at the widely varied responses it generated in different quarters. It might seem that enough is enough, but I can’t resist slipping in one more short post, due to a new award that this work is up for that some people who thought it shouldn’t have gotten earlier prizes might be rooting for it …

Commentators On Clinton On China

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Following Hillary Clinton’s visit to Asia, there have been a range of commentaries on her new approach to China. Clinton’s downplay of that standard gambit of Sino-American relations, human rights, has pleased some commentators and maddened others. Here’s a selection of five ways of looking at her China visit:

1) A Missed Opportunity, Merle Goldman at the Boston Globe:

The Charter 08 episode in China reveals widespread dissatisfaction with China’s authoritarian market economy, including those who are the supposed beneficiaries of China’s political model. Their participation in the Charter 08 movement may be attributed not only to worsening economic conditions …

Regarding The Guantanamo Uyghurs, James Millward

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

I never thought I’d see “Free the Uighurs” on the editorial pages of major U.S. newspapers, but there it was last Thursday in the Washington Post (Editorial, February 19, 2009, p. A14) and Monday in the Los Angeles Times (Editorial, Feb. 23, 2009). Of course, the editorial was not discussing Uyghurs in China, but the seventeen Uyghur detainees at Guantanamo, whom a federal appeals court ruled could be brought to the U.S. only by an act of the executive branch, not the courts. The Post urged the Obama administration to do the right thing by these men, whom the Bush …

James Hevia On Summer Palace Relics

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

With disputes relating to looted Chinese objects in the news, we asked Professor James Hevia of the University of Chicago, author of an important book called English Lessons, which includes analysis of foreign military actions in China from the 1860s through the post-Boxer occupation of 1900-1901 and was cited in our earlier post on the topic, if he had any thoughts on the subject to share with our readers. Already quoted briefly in a useful Christian Science Monitor article on the issue, here’s what he had wrote in response to our query:

The recent announcement by Christie’s of yet another …

In Case You Missed It: Passion Of The Mao, Jeremiah Jenne

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Passion of the Mao is the quirky documentary produced by Lee Feigon based on his book Mao: A Reinterpretation. There’s some things to like about the film. I appreciated the irreverence, and there were a number of chuckle-worthy jokes and sly references as well as several precipitous descents into banal toilet and body humor. (Some of which, for awhile, are also pretty chuckle-worthy.) Mao’s writings are referenced throughout the film, though Mr. Feigon’s choice to have them read using a voiceover that recalled the worst of the Fu Manchu films from early Hollywood is odd. Mr. Feigon also gives prominence …

Around The Web…

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

In case you are interested in reading more from writers we’ve referenced recently or on topics we’ve been tracking lately, here are a few recommendations from this week.

The New York Times ran a set of commentaries yesterday on “what the Chinese want from Obama,” including commentaries by Michael Meyer and Daniel Bell(links to their previous pieces at China Beat).

Meyer writes about Clinton’s visit to China, and the power she has to shift discussions in China (and the U.S.) about China’s desire for an “American lifestyle”:

Yet as modernizing Chinese cities emulate America’s car-friendly designs — and often employ …

Self-Promotion Saturday

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

You can find a new interview with Jeff Wasserstrom at Shanghai City Weekend, in anticipation of the Shanghai International Literary Festival. You can find interviews with many other authors, including James Fallows and Cecelia Chang. There’s also an interview with Wang Gang, the author of the very interesting-sounding novel English (about which CB was previously unaware). Here is a short excerpt from the interview with Wasserstrom (much more at City Weekend):

CW: What’s one question you’d like to be asked at SILF? I’d love it if someone asked me: “If you could bring back to life, for a day, two …

Fascinatin’ Facts

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Harper’s has just put its famous “index” feature online and it is (thrill of thrills) searchable. Of course, this has spawned a host of postings around the web about what the index has covered over the years. Among those are a few China watchers.

Shanghaiist notes that there has been only one substantive mention of “Shanghai” in the twenty-five years of the index (there are two hits for the word “Shanghai,” but one is for Shanghai Tang).

Tim Johnson did a search for “China” and shares some of the entries from the past three years, with the source of the …

Time Machine: Dear Us Presidential Candidates…, Robert A. Kapp

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

February, 2009: we are in the early days of a new Administration, and the Internet and print media bulge with messages of advice to the new President and the new Secretary of State about how to deal with China. Some of the missives are Olympian. Others are avuncular. They serve multiple purposes, and seek to reach multiple audiences.

Reading them, I was reminded of one of my own exercises of a similar nature, in the fall of the year 2000. Eight long years; so much has happened. Then, we were only a couple of months beyond the huge political battle …

Punks At Kinko’S, Pierre Fuller

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Microfilm is deadly. Deadly for the eyes, the brain and, as I recently learned here on a research jaunt to Beijing, the stomach. So when a CD booklet on the bar of a Haidian district livehouse caught my weary eye I thought I’d found a good wall ornament for the apartment and a better image to set my evenings eyes on. The only problem was the insert – a black & white sketch of a mass of punks tossing Molotovs at a grinning Mao – wasn’t big enough. I was thinking poster size, so I took it to the first …

Debating The Summer Palace

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

While scholars, like James Hevia in English Lessons, have revised historical views of the impacts of Western imperialism in China during the nineteenth century, China’s government is arguing for a revision of its own. Earlier this week, the New York Times reported that the Chinese government has been pressing for relics stolen from the Summer Palace—about to go up for auction at Christie’s—be returned to China:

The two Qing dynasty bronze animal heads, one depicting a rabbit and the other a rat, are believed to have been part of a set comprising 12 animals from the Chinese zodiac that were …

The Jas For Free: Revolution!

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Last spring, we reported from the annual AAS meeting on President Elizabeth Perry‘s inspiring address (“Reclaiming the Chinese Revolution“). For a short period of time, the address is available for free PDF download and we strongly encourage you to grab a copy while you can. [Link will take you to the issue and from there you can select the format in which you wish to view Perry’s piece.] The address begins:

REVOLUTIONS ARE UNPOPULAR THESE days, among Western politicians and scholars alike.We put our faith in liberal institutions such as markets and courts of law, looking to “democratic transitions” rather …

Readings Around The Net

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

1. Rebecca MacKinnon has a great new article at First Monday (“peer-reviewed journal on the internet”) called “China’s Censorship 2.0: How Companies Censor Bloggers.” It is required reading for all those tracking China’s web developments.

2. David Flumenbaum has produced a great reader that tracks the developments of and reactions to the CCTV fire in Beijing. It includes videos and excerpts from news reports.

3. If you haven’t yet read chinaSMACK, you can catch a clever recap of their 2008 postings here.

A week ago, we ran Lauri Paltemaa’s reflection on democracy movements and anniversaries in China this year. Here’s …

A Year Of Telling Tales

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

“Tales from Taiwan” also celebrated its first birthday recently. Since our inaugural posting on January 14, 2008, Peter Zarrow, Jennifer Liu, Yong Chen, and I have been contributing pieces about various aspects of Taiwanese culture. In terms of readership, here is a bit of numerology provided courtesy of the China Beat‘s web wizards:

The general page for “Tales” received 1,297 views as of February 5, totaling approximately 500 fewer than the tenth-most viewed post for the China Beat (Five Sites for Lesson Plans and Teaching Materials on China; 1,775 views).

Our Taiwan top five reads as follows:

1. The KMT …

Bill Powell (1919-2008)

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Stephen MacKinnon is a Professor of History at Arizona State University whose most recent book (reviewed by Nicole Barnes on China Beat last August) is Wuhan 1938. He has an abiding interest, as this post shows, in the history of Western journalists in China–an interest that led to publication of earlier books such asAgnes Smedley. He sent us this piece from India, but our PRC-based readers might like to know that they can catch him live at the Shanghai International Literary Festival on March 22, where he will give a talk at M on the Bund on “Intrigue and Romance …

Clinton Plans Visit To China

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

In just a week, Hilary Clinton will be in China for her first visit as U.S. Secretary of State. What will inform the visit? Here are a few readings that discuss it…

1. Surprise! Many China watchers were caught short by the news that Clinton is headed to China for a visit. The tour has been put together at the last moment, with an as-yet unclear agenda, as discussed by Ian Johnson at WSJ…

2. For an updated analysis of Clinton’s likely goals during her Asia stops, see FEER’s report. One highlight from their analysis of the China visit:

The …

China In The U.S. Annual Threat Assessment

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

News agencies have been reporting widely on the content of the U.S. intelligence community’s annual threat assessment, delivered Thursday by Dennis Blair (director of U.S. national intelligence) and peppered with language that hearkens back to the Bush era (of a whole four weeks ago, but, still, anyone else tired of references to the U.S. as the “Homeland”?). News stories have focused on the primacy given to the economic crisis in the report and the analysis of threats in the Middle East and what the report calls an “arc of instabilty” from South Asia through the Middle East. However, the report …

For Book Lovers And China Enthusiasts…

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Tis the season of book festivals, at least around here. A number of China Beatcontributors will be speaking at events in the coming months. Here is a list of readings to add to your calendars:

1. The Man Hong Kong International Literary Festival. Scroll through their program to find panels with Xujun Eberlein (Saturday, March 14, 10 a.m., and again on Sunday, March 15, 3 p.m.) and Jeffrey Wasserstrom (Monday, March 16, 4 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. and Tuesday, March 17, 7:30 p.m.), as well as many other commentators and analysts (like Rebecca MacKinnon) and writers (like Zhu Wen) whose …

Obama Recommendations: Vi

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Paul French is the Shanghai-based author of Carl Crow, a Tough Old China Handand keeps the blog China Rhyming, as well as acting as publishing and marketing director at Access Asia. French’s next book, Through the Looking Glass: China’s Foreign Journalists from the Opium Wars to Mao, will be published June 1 by Hong Kong University Press.

Obama claims to be a break with the past by which, in a very American way of defining the past, he seems to mean the last few years. Instructive as some recent China books may be, perhaps the President would care to go …

China’S Water Woes: Past, Present, And Future, Ken Pomeranz

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The Chinese droughts have just begun to move onto the front pages of the world’s newspapers, but the droughts are just the latest sign of much more dire warnings of water woes in China. Some China experts are talking about this (see, for instance, today’s event at the Wilson Center on “Temperatures Rising: Climate Change, Water, and the Himalayas“), but, in China Beat fashion, we’re hoping to encourage many more people to do a little more reading and talking about it too, so we invited Ken Pomeranz to reflect on the present news and suggest a few further readings for …

Happy 牛Year!, Christopher C. Heselton

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

On January 25, 2009, Lunar New Year’s Eve, millions of Chinese watched Zhao Benshan’s comedic stylings on the Spring Festival Gala, but for many, when they turned to check the inbox of their cell phone, they found it full of dozens of unread text messages. No, they weren’t advertising cut-rate travel packages to the latest tourist paradise – for the most part at least. They were messages from friends, family, significant-others, co-workers, and acquaintances congratulating the recipient on the “Happy 牛Year!” (a play upon “niu,” the Chinese word for ox or cow, sounding similar to the English word “new,” of …

Recommendations For Obama: V

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

We asked China watchers from a variety of backgrounds to answer the question “What should Obama be reading about China?” While we’ve already run four installments (I, II, III, and IV), new suggestions continue to arrive. For a few of the cinematic variety, read on… Jan Berris is Vice-President of the National Committee on United States-China Relations and has worked with the committee since 1971.

I suggest that President Obama recover from the lousy week he just had by chilling out in his private movie theater and watching the following movies. None will give him a complete, or even, necessarily, …

When The Past Catches Up, Lauri Paltemaa

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

In December, the Chinese Communist Party celebrated the 30 years anniversary of reforming and opening up policy that became possible in the now almost legendary 3rd plenum of the 11th Central Committee where Deng Xiaoping defeated his “Whateverist” (read Maoist) rivals in the Party leadership. This coming March, however, we will celebrate another thirty-year anniversary of one of the key policies in reforms. It was then, on March 30, 1979, that Deng Xiaoping announced that the Party would continue to uphold the “four cardinal principles” of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong thought, proletarian dictatorship, party leadership, and socialism. This laid the …

Starbucks In China: A Top Five List

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Starbucks has been a glowing beacon of capitalism-on-Chinese-soil (some might say…) for years now, and many took glee in the opening of a Starbucks outlet at the Forbidden City as quiet proof of communism’s impending demise (though the outlet is now closed). Here, a top five list of articles that together tell the story of Starbucks’ development in China from international interloper to home-grown coffeehouse. Read on for more.

1. China is major potential market for Starbucks: “Starbucks Soars in China” (Asia Times Online, June 15, 2006):

In Starbucks’ headquarters in Seattle, a group of company executives meet regularly, but …

Obama Recommendations: Iv, Kate Merkel-Hess

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The search terms “Obama China” have brought a lot of readers to China Beat over the past two months. We are by no means the only ones experiencing an Obama-related reader boost (though we are the second hit on Google, right behind the BBC for a search of “Obama China”!), nor the only ones getting an Obama-related content surge. If you are looking for smart commentary on the recent Obama administration’s China snafus, for instance, check out James Fallows’s analysis from last week (hat tip: kuluyi). Those interested in live (as in right now) discussion of Sino-American relations under Obama …

"Big Pants" Unveiled

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Alex Pasternak has written a couple pieces for China Beat in the past (such as “Beijing’s Olympic Forecast“), and so we were interested in his piece published a few weeks ago at The National, “Strange Loop: Is Rem Koolhaas’s gravity-defying Beijing monument the world’s most important building?“

Here is a snippet from the article, well worth reading in full:

It was only after the design emerged in public that the nicknames surfaced, and they were starkly devoid of any references to traditional Chinese culture. At the beginning, wei fang, meaning condemned building, was one oft-heard option. Later, “twisted doughnut”, “drunken …

Obama Recommendations: Iii, Kate Merkel-Hess

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

We aren’t the only ones with advice in regards to China for President Obama of late. For instance, Rebecca MacKinnon recently recommended to the President that he make sure to communicate with regular Chinese folks, as well as government leaders.

Meanwhile, book recommendations to kick off the new year are cropping up elsewhere as well — Jeff Wasserstrom, for instance, listed some of his favorites atFar Eastern Economic Review.

Here are a few more responses to our question, “What Should Obama Be Reading About China?” If you haven’t been following this feature, check out the first andsecond installments.

Howard French …