The Other China 再訪陶淵明 In this celebration of the northern autumn of 2025, the Beijing artist Lao Shu plucks virtual chrysanthemums at the imagined home of Tao Yuanming, China’s most famous poet-recluse.… Read

The Other America 明河可望不可親
願得乘槎一問津   The Other China has been a feature of my work since the frustrated Restoration, or Counter-Reform years, of the Chinese party-state in 1989-1992. More recently, I have noted that during the Xi Jinping era Official China has strained to impose uniformity on the Chinese world, be it in the People’s Republic or internationally.… Read

The Tower of Reading 念樓中秋   The Fifteenth Day of the Eighth Month of the lunar calendar, a day that in 2025 falls on the 6th of October, marks the Mid Autumn Festival 中秋節.… Read

Contra Trump 國魂 ‘We certainly made a mess of the Mandate of Heaven.’ — Gore Vidal, 2008 The 4th of October 2025 marks the centenary of Gore Vidal’s birth. We mark the occasion with a comment on Vidal by Ross Barkan and an essay on the ‘American prophet’ published by Will Lloyd in New Statesman.… Read

Contra Trump 豬八戒照鏡子 … the festival takes place on the seventh anniversary of Washington Post reporter Jamal Khashoggi being murdered by Saudi government officials on October 2, 2018. In 2021, President Joe Biden found Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s personal security detail Rapid Intervention Force responsible for killing Khashoggi, but the Saudi royal court has continued to deny involvement.… Read

This is the sixty-sixth chapter in Other People’s Thoughts, a China Heritage series inspired by a compilation of quotations put together by Simon Leys (Pierre Ryckmans), one of our Ancestors, during his reading life.… Read