- Paperback: 336 pages
- Publisher: Avon (May 10 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0060934816
- ISBN-13: 978-0060934811
- Product Dimensions: 20.4 x 13.8 x 2.2 cm
- Shipping Weight: 295 g
- Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #358,610 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
For a good, spicy read about colonial Asia's most decadent city, this is the book. Stella Dong, a second-generation Chinese-American living in New York, tells the story of Old Shanghai in racy style: readers expecting tales of drugs, prostitution, and gang warfare will not be disappointed. Her scholarship is sound, however, and at the end of each chapter she provides bibliographies of drier, more academic studies for those wishing to delve deeper.
The Treaty of Nanking that ended the First Opium War between Britain and China in 1842 granted trading concessions in Shanghai to the European powers. The international currents shaping the city over the next hundred years were complex: British merchants, Chinese warlords, Russian emigrés, Sephardic Jews, and German spies exploited its extraterritorial status to make Shanghai a hotbed of greed, vice, and intrigue. Opium was crucial to the city's extraordinary wealth and lawlessness, though Dong also relates the rise of its criminal gangs to the development of coastal steamships and consequent loss of inland-transportation jobs. Foreign participation in the opium trade was not confined to the British: the role of the French Concession in Shanghai is described in well-researched detail. The flamboyant personalities that prospered in the city's unfettered environment come alive, characters like Pockmarked Huang, who combined the post of police chief in the French Concession with leadership of the Green Gang. Dong explores Shanghai's political significance both as the source of Chiang Kai-shek's fortunes and as a center of Communist revolutionary activity. As the city again becomes the leading commercial metropolis of a dynamic national economy, Shanghai 1842-1949 successfully documents its unique role in the development of modern China. --John Stevenson --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
In its heyday, Shanghai was known by many names--the emperor's ugly daughter, Sodom and Gomorrah of the Far East and whore of Asia. In her first book, Dong, a journalist and second-generation Chinese-American, has filled her often-absorbing history of the city with vivid details that leave little doubt as to how Shanghai earned its reputation. She also offers tidbits on colorful local personalities, such as the Chinese warlord who never left home without his enormous lacquered teak coffin, the radical American feminist who was indirectly responsible for the end of Mao Zedong's second marriage and the wealthy Chinese businessman whose two younger daughters married Chiang Kai-shek and Sun Yat-sen. Although the city was inhabited by 250,000 Chinese when the British invaded in 1842, it wasn't long before the nationals were serving the foreigners, who were making Shanghai one of the world's wealthiest business centers. Banking and manufacturing were the respectable professions, but it was opium--controlled largely by foreigners but used largely by Chinese--that built modern Shanghai. The arrogance and excess of foreigners, who set up their own courts, lived lavishly and excluded the Chinese from governing bodies and private clubs, created the uneven balance of power and economics that helped pave the way for Communism. Dong skillfully packs her narrative with all of the city's "sordid pleasures and exploitation," offering an account that is at once informative and entertaining. (Mar.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
In Shanghai's prime, no city in the Orient, or the world for that matter, could compare with it. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
In Shanghai's prime, no city in the Orient, or the world for that matter, could compare with it. Read the first page
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Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
A good introduction to an extraordinary subject,
By
This review is from: Shanghai: The Rise and Fall of a Decadent City (Paperback)
Stella Dong's "Shanghai," is a good introduction to a fascinating subject and provides a tremendous amount of material in a coherent and interesting fashion. The author is perhaps not the world's greatest writer, but I didn't find the book sensationalist, unbalanced, or overly repetitive as other critics have done.Stella is not an academic, but she takes a whack at everyone and I think that she was fair and balanced in her criticisms. I read Peter Lowe's survey of the British in the Far East before undertaking this volume, and Stella is basically on line with Mr. Lowe's renowned academic work. Colonialism is not a pretty story and it seemed to be at its worst in the Far East. The only other area that I have studied which is on a par for fascination and ugliness would be the colonial period of the West Indies. (Anyone like Niall Ferguson who tries to sell you the virtues of Empire is really disingenuous.) In terms of organization Stella's chapters are long, but she stays true to her chronological order and I enjoyed how she waited till the 1920s segment before describing the "Bund." That was smart. I was amazed at the diversity of the reviews of this book. The academics hated it but most of the general readers loved it. I believe that the reason for this is the book is neither fish nor fowl; too long and complicated to be a simple read, but yet not well organized upon academic lines. Perhaps the topic is too hip or political to go down easy with some of the readers. In any case, other than for one of the initial chapters on political events, she held my attention and fascination right through to the bitter end. Go for it!!! Comment Comment | Permalink
4.0 out of 5 stars
Solid History of a Sinful City,
By crazyforgems (Wellesley, MA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Shanghai: The Rise and Fall of a Decadent City (Paperback)
Stella Dong's "Shanghai 1842-1949: The Rise and Fall of a Decadent City" is a thorough overview of China's most notorious city during its most notorious era.As Dong's text explains, Shanghai rose to prominence in the late 19th century as a treaty port. Several nations-Britain, US, and France- had gained special status through a series of treaties and thus were allowed to conduct business as if the city were their own. And there were plenty of businesses to conduct--from the importing of opium to the exporting of tea and other goods. Each colonial group lived in its own area complete with its own customs and social hierarchies. Likewise, with the increased affluence of the city, a wealthy Chinese class also emerged, though once again it tended to live and socialize only within its own boundaries. With so many people making so much money and so few (legal) rules to follow, Shanghai eventually became a swinging city of sin. By the 1920's, the city became synonmous with sex, opium, jazz, brothels, and pleasure in just about any form. As Dong notes, while the sinners broke all legal rules, they still followed the social stratification of the city: the british patronized British brothels, the Chinese went to Chinese brothels and so on. Of course, with the invasion by Japan and then the fall to the Communists, the good times ended in Shanghai and most of the colonials left. I felt that Dong could have kept the reader more abreast of Chinese history in the earlier parts of the book to make the latter events (e.g., why the country was so open to communism when a city like Shanghai was not) more understandable. In addition, she introduces certain colorful Shanghai characaters-the writer Emily Hahn for instance-and then loses them.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Evocative and highly readable,
By ronnie karl (Milton, MA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Shanghai: The Rise and Fall of a Decadent City (Paperback)
Stella Dong has brought a vanished world back to life. I was fascinated by her account of Shanghai in its earlier incarnation. They say that Shanghai today has returned to what it was-the "Paris of the East." But having visited Shanghai many times over the last fifteen years, the city seems to becoming a generic version of any 21st century modern metrolis. Pre-war Shanghai with its glamour, intrigue and style was something special. Save your money-instead of buying a ticket to Shanghai, read this book.
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