(Literary) accounts of foreigners living in China

"Mr China" by Tim Clissold if you are interested in stories of doing business in China, especially in the 90's. I have always wanted to read some about and by Edgar Snow. Still on my to do list. -RJ

Peter Hessler's first book, "River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze" is recommended. Also "Iron and Silk" by Mark Salzman. Both are well-written and insightful accounts by Americans who spent time in China teaching English, the first one being in the 90's and other during the 80's, just after China opened up. As mentioned Hessler's "Oracle Bones" is good, less personal and a more general analysis of China. A recent book that is also excellent is "Chinese Lessons" by John Pomfret, written by a journalist who spent years in China starting in the early 80's as a student.

What a great topic. Oracle Bones, by Peter Hessler - my favourite parts are when he talks about anti-US demonstrations after the Chinese embassy in Belgrade was bombed (Dont' eat McDonald's! Don't eat Kentucky!) and his letters from students. Very realistic picture of life in China. Think he has a few other books on China as well but haven't looked at them.

oooh, and Jan Wong's Red China Blues. Canadian (ethnic Chinese) who moves to China in the seventies as a true believer Maoist, lives through most of cultural revolution and becomes disenchanted with it, later returns to China as a foreign correspondent and happens to see the Tiananmen m*ss*cre first hand. She had a later book called Jan Wong's China which was mostly a collection of her articles from the Globe.

also, Looking for Chengdu: A Woman's Adventures in China by Hill Gates. An anthropologist comes to Chengdu to study lives of women in China. I picked up this book just because it was about the area I was moving to. Scholarly book with a distinct feminist slant and some great interviews with local women plus lots of anecdotes about the foreigner experience, esp. cultural-academia situations. I have to say, from this book I expected life in China to be quite a bit more rustic than my own experience has been.

I love "Foreign Babes in Beijing" by Rachel DeWoskin, a graduate of Columbia University who goes to Beijing to do PR work and is asked to star in a soap opera and play the white femme fatale. It is a true story, hilarious, insightful, and explains meanings of many Chinese words. A great read. Also "Gweilo" by Martin Booth who recounts his adventures growing up in Hong Kong, stumbling on opium dens, being pulled by rickshaw to school, a great read about Hong Kong in the early days.

Hello Joachim. RJBerki's comment jogged my memory. If you don't mind travelling further back in time, Edgar Snow's "Red Star Over China" is considered to be something of a classic on the early days of the PRC. I know that this book has been criticized -- bitterly -- by writers like Jung Chang, who hate Mao, but I'm sure CPOD users have enough education to enjoy this book for what it is: A very stirring, even captivating, PERSONAL account of the PRC's early days, written by an American who understood -- and also shared -- the ideals of the "Great Helmsman". Worth reading; it's the book that turned my late father into a "Communist" and a "student activist" in Singapore the mid-60s (we'll not dwell on the fact that my father depended happily on dividends from the family business throughout his life; guess he was an "Italian-style" communist!".

I stopped reading "Red China Blues". I am convinced that one cannot "understand" China from the perspective of a totally naive westener, especially not the topics addressed in this books, and certainly not when the author follows a clear political agenda. That book does not help entering China with open eyes and it does not provide you with cultural or situational background. It might help, though, if you are desperately looking for a new geopolitical rival.

Anybody heard of "China Road" by Rob Gifford? It's a travelogue from a very knowledgable writer. Gives a personal, but also quite balanced view of China and some of the issues such a huge country faces

Can anyone suggest a Chinese book for a newbie/elementary stage learner?

wei1xiao4: I had looked at "Foreign Babes in Beijing" by Rachel DeWoskin in bookshops in China, but it didn't appeal to me that very much. auntie68: I was trying to find an online version of Edgar Snow's Red Star over China, but only managed to find some (interesting) wikipedia entries and this: Da Shan playing Snow in some 2007(?) screen play adaptation.

By the way, if anyone knows how to get a hold of DVD's of this old soap opera I would love to buy them. Sounds like a job for Bazaa!