The artist and academic Donna Seto discusses her new book Chinatown Vancouver: An Illustrated History (House of Anansi Press, 2025), with Joseph Planta.
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Chinatown Vancouver: An Illustrated History by Donna Seto (House of Anansi Press, 2025).
Click to buy this book from Amazon.ca: Chinatown Vancouver |
Text of the introduction by Joseph Planta:
I am Planta: On the Line, in Vancouver, British Columbia, at TheCommentary.ca. Donna Seto’s art has gained quite a following online in recent years. The artist’s vivid illustrations of Vancouver’s Chinatown shared on Instagram and other social media made her a popular follow, and now the author of a new collection Chinatown Vancouver: An Illustrated History. It’s a must-have for any Vancouverite’s bookshelf or coffee table, as it has important history of Chinatown, coloured by stories of the lives of proprietors of businesses there, as well as those various groups who erected buildings some over a hundred years ago that still stand, and that are not just the living history of a community. Donna’s illustrations make history come alive as we see buildings as they are, as well as they once were. For example, a lively nightclub or watering hole when Chinatown was known for its neon up and down Pender or Hastings streets, comes alive once more as Donna fills in the gaps in memory as to places that are important to Vancouver’s cultural and social history. The book also has wonderfully researched archival photos that add to an important history not just of Chinatown but Vancouver itself. Donna Seto is a writer, self-taught artist, and occasional academic. She grew up accompanying her parents on regular ventures through Vancouver’s Chinatown when it was different, perhaps a little more livelier or busier. They’d buy groceries, ate dim sum, purchased newspapers, and visited her grandmother. Donna has a PhD in politics and international relations. There are events this weekend: Saturday afternoon, 24 May 2025 at the Central Branch of the Vancouver Public Library, where Donna will be in conversation with Andy Yan, and Sunday afternoon, 25 May 2025 at the Chinatown Storytelling Centre. The website for more is at www.donnaseto.ca. The book is published by House of Anansi Press. We spoke this past Friday. Please welcome to the Planta: On the Line program, Donna Seto; Dr. Seto, good morning.
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