Chinese history is brought to vivid life by the “quintessential New Yorker narrator” and author of The Soong Sisters, who lived in China from 1935 to 1941 (The New York Times). Chiang Kai-Shek: As the head of the Nationalist Party, Chiang led the Republic of China for over two decades from 1927 through the Japanese invasion, World War II, and the civil war that ended with a Communist victory in 1949. After defeat, he retreated with his government to Taiwan, where he continued to lead as president of the exiled Republic of China. Published in 1955, this in-depth biography by legendary New Yorker writer Emily Hahn examines Chiang’s childhood in southern China, his relationship with revolutionary Sun Yat-Sen, his rise to power, and his battles with the Japanese Imperial Army and Communist forces led by Mao Zedong, as well as chronicling his marriage to the glamorous, American-educated Soong May-ling (the youngest of the influential siblings portrayed in Hahn’s The Soong Sisters), who converted her husband to Christianity and helped him enact social reforms. Casting a critical eye on Sino-American relations, Hahn sheds new light on a complex leader, who was one of the most important global political figures of the last century. “[Hahn] writes . . . with an impassioned warmth . . . colorful reading . . . An irreparable past is echoed in the forlorn note sounded here.” —Kirkus Reviews China Only Yesterday, 1850–1950: With an insider’s knowledge of Chinese culture and politics, Hahn delivers a sharply observant book that illuminates a century of China’s tumultuous history. Her “absorbing” history begins with the Treaty of Nanking, which gave Western powers access to five of China’s eastern ports, and covers the British colonization of Hong Kong, the rise of the tea trade, the Opium Wars, the arrival of Christian missionaries, the Boxer Rebellion, the revolutionary movement led by Sun Yat-Sen, the overthrow of the Ch’ing Dynasty, the escalating tensions between the Communist and Nationalist parties, and the Japanese invasion on the eve of World War II—which Hahn experienced firsthand (Kirkus Reviews). The final chapters cover the civil war, which ended with Chairman Mao’s formation of the People’s Republic of China and Chiang Kai-shek’s retreat to Taiwan. “[An] observant, satisfying book.” —Kirkus Reviews

A candid, rollicking literary travelogue from a pioneering New Yorker writer, an intrepid heroine who documented China in the years before World War II. Deemed scandalous at the time of its publication in 1944, Emily Hahn’s now classic memoir of her years in China remains remarkable for her insights into a tumultuous period and her frankness about her personal exploits. A proud feminist and fearless traveler, she set out for China in 1935 and stayed through the early years of the Second Sino-Japanese War, wandering, carousing, living, loving—and writing. Many of the pieces in China to Me were first published as the work of a roving reporter in the New Yorker. All are shot through with riveting and humanizing detail. During her travels from Nanjing to Shanghai, Chongqing, and Hong Kong, where she lived until the Japanese invasion in 1941, Hahn embarks upon an affair with lauded Chinese poet Shao Xunmei; gets a pet gibbon and names him Mr. Mills; establishes a close bond with the women who would become the subjects of her bestselling book The Soong Sisters; battles an acquired addiction to opium; and has a child with Charles Boxer, a married British intelligence officer. In this unflinching glimpse of a vanished world, Hahn examines not so much the thorny complications of political blocs and party conflict, but the ordinary—or extraordinary—people caught up in the swells of history. At heart, China to Me is a self-portrait of a fascinating woman ahead of her time.

A fascinating journey through 100 years of Chinese history, beginning with the historic Treaty of Nanking and ending with Mao Tse-tung’s creation of the Chinese People’s Republic, by the the acclaimed New Yorker correspondent who lived in China from 1935 to 1941 For centuries, China’s code of behavior was incomprehensible to Westerners whom the Chinese viewed as irredeemable barbarians. Presenting historical events with an immediacy that makes you feel as if you were there, Hahn takes readers through isolationist China’s difficult and often costly adaptations to the invasions of Western “foreign devils”, —from the Treaty of Nanking in 1842, which gave the West access to five 5 of China’s eastern ports, to the British colonization of Hong Kong, the rise of the tea trade, the Opium Wars, the arrival of Christian missionaries, and the Boxer Rebellion. Hahn also illuminates the revolutionary movement led by Sun Yat-sen, the overthrow of the Ch’ing Dynasty, the escalating tensions between the Communist and Nationalist parties, and the Japanese invasion on the eve of World War II—which Hahn witnessed firsthand. The final chapters cover the civil war, which ended with Chairman Mao’s formation of the People’s Republic of China and Chiang Kai-shek’s retreat to Taiwan. With an insider’s knowledge of Chinese culture and the politics, Hahn delivers a sharply observant book that illuminates an unforgettable era in China’s tumultuous past.

On the eve of WWII, the foreign-controlled port of Shanghai was the rendezvous for the twentieth century's most outlandish adventurers, all under the watchful eye of the fabulously wealthy Sir Victor Sassoon. Emily "Mickey" Hahn was a legendary New Yorker journalist whose vivid writing played a crucial role in opening Western eyes to the realities of life in China. At the height of the Depression, Hahn arrived in Shanghai after a disappointing affair with an alcoholic Hollywood screenwriter, convinced she will never love again. After checking in to Sassoon's glamorous Cathay Hotel, Hahn is absorbed into the social swirl of the expats drawn to pre-war China, among them Ernest Hemingway, Martha Gellhorn, Harold Acton, and a colourful gangster named Morris "Two-Gun" Cohen. But when she meets Zau Sinmay, a Chinese poet from an illustrious family, she discovers the real Shanghai through his eyes: the city of rich colonials, triple agents, opium-smokers, displaced Chinese peasants, and increasingly desperate White Russian and Jewish refugees—a place her innate curiosity will lead her to explore first hand. Danger lurks on the horizon, though, as the brutal Japanese occupation destroys the seductive world of pre-war Shanghai, paving the way for Mao Tse-tung's Communists rise to power.

Memoirs of an exotic, unconventional life in Asia and Great Britain in the 1930s and 1940s, from a colorful, prolific New Yorker writer ahead of her time. China to Me: A proud feminist and fearless traveler, Emily Hahn set out for China in 1935 and stayed through the early years of the Second Sino-Japanese War, wandering, carousing, living, loving—and writing. During her travels from Nanjing to Shanghai, Chongqing, and Hong Kong, where she lived through the Japanese invasion in 1941, Hahn embarks upon an affair with lauded Chinese poet Shao Xunmei; gets a pet gibbon and names him Mr. Mills; establishes a close bond with the women who would become the subjects of her bestselling book The Soong Sisters; battles an acquired addiction to opium; and has a child with Charles Boxer, a married British intelligence officer. Deemed scandalous at the time of its publication in 1944, Hahn’s now classic memoir remains remarkable for her insights into a tumultuous period and frankness about her personal exploits. “The keen prose is suffused with an intellectual freedom and freshness of perspective that vivify the concerns of a long-gone world.” —Publishers Weekly Hong Kong Holiday: The same day they attacked Pearl Harbor, the Japanese invaded the British colony of Hong Kong, which they would occupy until their surrender in 1945. Emily Hahn was living there with her newborn daughter. The baby’s father, Charles Boxer, the local head of British army intelligence, was imprisoned in a POW camp. With sharp observations and incisive wit, Hahn gives a vivid picture of her time in the oppressed city—from daily life in the bazaars, beauty shops, restaurants, and opium dens to the crowded hospitals and internment camps—until she fled the city in 1943 with her daughter. England to Me: Following the end of the Second World War, Hahn married Charles Boxer—fortunately reports of his beheading by the Japanese had been greatly exaggerated—and they returned to his inherited estate in the English countryside. From Southampton to London, Hahn offers a fascinating portrait of a postwar country in flux, as well as her own struggles to adjust to a more sedate English country life after her harrowing but exciting years in the Far East.

Jewish Wayfarers in Modern China focuses on the many extraordinary contacts between East and West in China during the 20th century. Through a collection of short biographies situated in the context of Chinese and Western history, it offers a panoramic view of China as experienced by many different persons of Jewish origins during their sojourn in the Middle Kingdom. The book offers a journey across vast reaches of space and back through time. Our impressions of visits to China have often been biased by sensational journalism, Hollywood films and literary entertainment that have distorted the reality of this vast country. Jewish Wayfarers in Modern China offers the reality of life in twentieth century China through the carefully-researched biographies of a variety of typical and less typical Western visitors to the Middle Kingdom.

An introduction to the cuisine of China with colorful illustrations of Chinese dishes accompanied by a spiral bound recipe book

Although there have been many discussions about challenges faced by individuals going through East to West migrations, there are few literary accounts about those moving from the West to the East. Yet these migrations are becoming more frequent now due to advances in technology and the fact that a writer’s work can now involve an increasingly global audience. One way of expressing these challenges is through writing memoirs. Xenotropism and the Awakening of Literary Expatriatism through Writing Memoirs exemplifies the craft of memoirs written while living in a foreign country and explains how this is different from writing from home. The book is a theoretical analysis of xenotropism based on the work of three prominent writers in China’s history: Emily Hahn, Nien Cheng and Qiu Xiaolong. The author explores the relationship between xenotropism (turning towards foreign ideals and practices), its complexities and challenges, and the writing of a memoir and its impact on mental health. This discourse will contribute to new knowledge in the field of creative writing and Asian studies by illustrating how xenotropism or ‘turning towards foreign ideals and practices’ results in both personal and artistic development and builds an understanding and acceptance of different cultures within an individual. These processes of change and understanding, in turn, facilitate the writing of a memoir, which is a cathartic process having a positive effect on one’s mental state. Readers interested in creative writing or Asian literary studies will be able to understand the creative process behind writing memoirs from a combination of personal, research-based, literary and theoretical perspectives.

In Intoxicating Shanghai, Paul Bevan explores the work of a number of Chinese modernist figures in the fields of literature and the visual arts, with an emphasis on the literary group the New-sensationists and its equivalents in the Shanghai art world, examining the work of these figures as it appeared in pictorial magazines. It undertakes a detailed examination into the significance of the pictorial magazine as a medium for the dissemination of literature and art during the 1930s. The research locates the work of these artists and writers within the context of wider literary and art production in Shanghai, focusing on art, literature, cinema, music, and dance hall culture, with a specific emphasis on 1934 – ‘The Year of the Magazine’.