Jewish Wayfarers in Modern China

Tragedy and Splendor

By (author) Matthias Messmer

Publication date:

29 March 2012

Length of book:

272 pages

Publisher

Lexington Books

Dimensions:

237x161mm
6x9"

ISBN-13: 9780739169384

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.

Preface and Acknowledgments

Names and Orthography

Introduction: Individuals, Biographies and Lifeworlds

Chapter 1. The Long Established: Jewish Old China Hands

I. Descendants: Jews with Sephardi Roots

II. Russian Jews Originating from the Czarist Empire

Chapter 2. Jewish Travelers: Temporarily and Voluntarily in China

I. Journalists

II. Couriers, Emissaries and Advisors

III. Adventurers and Lone Wolves

IV. Diplomats

V. Research Travelers and Travel Authors

VI. Physicians

VII. Independents and Freelancers

Chapter 3. Refugees Driven from Europe to the Far East

Chapter 4. “Foreign Experts” and Supporters of Mao’s Revolution

Endnotes

Bibliography

Jews in China doesn't sound like an obvious topic at first blush but Messmer has compiled an extensive, admirable, and fascinating collection of vignettes of a displaced people surviving and living through the most tumultuous time in China's history.