Asian Review of Books

When we think about modern trade, we tend to think about the sea: port cities and large ships carrying goods back and forth. It’s a story that tends to put Europe at the center, as the pinnacle of shipping and maritime technology.Jagjeet Lally’s India and the Silk Roads: The History of a Trading World (Hurst, 2021) corrects this narrative. For Jagjeet, the way we talk about globalization misses the continued land trade that happened throughout Central Asia, with India as a hub. Traders traveled through today’s India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and elsewhere, sharing commodities and goods, culture and information, under both Indian and British rulers.In this interview, Jagjeet and I talk about the Indian caravan trade, and the routes traders took as they transported goods, cultures and ideas across Central Asia. We’ll also talk about what we miss in the way we talk about globalization in the present.Jagjeet is Associate Professor in the History of Early Modern and Modern India at University College London, where he is also Co-Director of the Centre for the Study of South Asia and the Indian Ocean World.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of India and the Silk Roads. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

We think we know the history of China’s opening to the outside world. Maoist China was closed off, until Deng Xiaoping decided to reform the economy and open up to international trade, leading to the economic powerhouse we see today.Except Deng’s opening was built upon an existing foundation of international trade, as shown by Professor Jason Kelly’s Market Maoists: The Communist Origins of China’s Capitalist Ascent (Harvard University Press, 2021)Jason M. Kelly is a historian of modern China with interests in Chinese foreign relations during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, commerce and diplomacy, U.S.-China relations, and East Asian international history. He is currently an assistant professor in the Strategy & Policy Department at the U.S. Naval War College and an associate in research at the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University.The views he expressed in this interview are his own, and not those of the U.S. Naval War College.We’re joined in this interview by fellow NBN host Sarah Bramao-Ramos. Sarah is a PHD candidate at Harvard University that studies Qing China and, like Jason, is a graduate associate at the Fairbank Center.Today, the three of us talk about trade policy in Maoist China, and what that means for our understanding of the country’s attitude towards both the capitalist and socialist worlds. We also discuss what this history may mean for how we understand China’s attitude towards trade today.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

Edison Hark, the star of The Good Asian (Image Comics: 2021), the new comic series written by Pornsak Pichetshote and illustrated by Alexandre Tefenkgi, never signed up to investigate a murder in Chinatown. As the only Chinese-American law enforcement officer in the United States, he travels to San Francisco in 1936 to help find a Chinese maid who has run away from the household of the man who raised him. But he stumbles upon a crime scene that harkens back to an old crime legend: a hitman for the old Tongs, back for revenge.But while The Good Asian tells a thrilling noir story of crime, detectives and investigations, it also tells the story of the Chinese community, who at the time were still under scrutiny under laws like the Chinese Exclusion Act. The comic grapples with ideas of racial prejudice, respectability politics, and identity.In this interview, Pornsak and I talk about the setting and genre of The Good Asian, and what it means to star a Chinese-American lead in such a well-known genre.Pornsak Pichetshote was a Thai-American rising star editor at DC’s Vertigo imprint where he worked on such comics perennials as The Sandman and Swamp Thing. He left Vertigo to become an executive in DC Entertainment’s media team, where he started and oversaw DC TV’s department. He is also the writer of Infidel, also for Image Comics, which was his first work as a writer. He can be followed on Twitter at @real_pornsak, and on Instagram at @real_psak.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Good Asian. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

It’s a common tale: a gunman out for revenge in the American West, whose six-shooter leaves a trail of bodies behind him. But The Thousand Crimes of Ming Tsu (Little, Brown and Company, 2021), the debut novel from Tom Lin, takes a novel twist on the genre by having its gunman be Ming Tsu: a Chinese man, orphaned in the United States, out on a journey to murder those who press-ganged him to work on the railroads.But The Thousand Crimes of Ming Tsu is more than that, as it delves into the supernatural, the mystical, and the philosophical as Ming continues his journey across the American West.In this interview, Tom and I talk about the setting of The Thousand Crimes of Ming Tsu, and his choices around its characters. We’ll also talk about using a Chinese-American main character in a Western-type story: a traditionally “American” genre.Tom Lin was born in China and immigrated to the United States when he was four. A graduate of Pomona College, he is currently in the PhD program at the University of California, Davis.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Thousand Crimes of Ming Tsu. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

Russia’s position between Europe and Asia has led to differing conceptions of “what Russia is” to its leaders. Russia’s vast holdings east of the Urals have often inspired those who led Russia to look eastward for national glory, whether through trade, soft power, or outright force. Yet these Russian “pivots to Asia” often ended soon after they began, with outcomes far more limited than what those who launched them hoped to achieve.Chris Miller’s We Shall Be Masters: Russian Pivots to East Asia from Peter the Great to Putin (Harvard University Press, 2021) studies many attempts to chart an Asian policy—from bold imperial dreams of a thriving Russian Far East to Soviet efforts to inspire the developing world through soft power—and why all these policies ended up disappointing their drafters.In this interview, Chris and I talk about Russia’s engagement with the Far East, stretching from its initial forays on the Pacific Coast of North America through to the present day. We talk about why “pivots to Asia” are so hard: both for the Russians, and perhaps for other great powers considering the same policy.Chris Miller is an assistant professor of international history at The Fletcher School at Tufts University and co-director of the school's Russia and Eurasia Program. He is the author of Putinomics: Power and Money in Resurgent Russia (University of North Carolina Press, 2018) and The Struggle to Save the Soviet Economy (University of North Carolina Press, 2016). He has previously served as the associate director of the Brady-Johnson Program in Grand Strategy at Yale, a lecturer at the New Economic School in Moscow, a visiting researcher at the Carnegie Moscow Center, a research associate at the Brookings Institution, and as a fellow at the German Marshall Fund's Transatlantic Academy. He can be followed on Twitter at @crmiller1.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of We Shall Be Masters. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

On January 10th, 1795, a very tired caravan arrives in Beijing. The travelers have journeyed from Canton on an accelerated schedule through harsh terrain in order to make it to the capital in time for the Qianlong Emperor’s sixtieth anniversary of his reign. The group is led by two Dutchmen: Isaac Titsingh and Andreas Everardus van Braam Houckgeest, who are there to represent the interests of the Dutch Republic at the imperial court. It’s a momentous occasion, especially after the disastrous British Embassy from George Macartney two years earlier.Little did they know that their embassy would be the last by Westerners in the traditional Chinese court. Their journey is the subject of Professor Tonio Andrade’s The Last Embassy: The Dutch Mission of 1795 and the Forgotten History of Western Encounters with China (Princeton University Press, 2021), published earlier this year: a rich and readable volume that tells the story of an event long-neglected by history and historians.In this interview, Tonio and I talk about the Dutch Embassy, its protagonists and the nature of the imperial court. We discuss the perilous and rushed journey the ambassadors made to Beijing, and what their experience tells us about the nature of diplomacy.Tonio Andrade is professor of Chinese and global history at Emory University. His books include The Gunpowder Age: China, Military Innovation, and the Rise of the West in World History (Princeton University Press, 2017), Lost Colony: The Untold Story of China's First Great Victory over the West (Princeton University Press, 2011), and How Taiwan Became Chinese: Dutch, Spanish, and Han Colonization in the Seventeenth Century (Columbia University Press, 2007).You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Last Embassy. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

Borders are “important”: they define, in legal terms, who we are, our identity, and our rights. Except borders are rarely imposed with any thought to the people actually living there. And once a border is imposed, it can radically change the lives of those who live alongside it, dividing communities forever more.India’s border, imposed by colonial authorities and disputed by successor governments, makes this clear. Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India (Context / Melville House, 2021) sees author Suchitra Vijayan travel along India’s vast land border to meet the people who live there, and investigates how lives have been affected by geopolitics, colonialism, state violence, ethnic strife, and corruption.In this interview, Suchitra and I talk about India’s border regions: with Afghanistan, China, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Myanmar. We talk about the lives of those that live in these borderlands, and why she chose to call this book a “People’s History”.Suchitra Vijayan is the founder and executive director of the Polis Project, a hybrid research and journalism organization. A barrister by training, she previously worked for the United Nations war crimes tribunals in Yugoslavia and Rwanda before co-founding the Resettlement Legal Aid Project in Cairo, which gives legal aid to Iraqi refugees. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, GQ, The Boston Review, The Hindu and Foreign Policy.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Midnight’s Borders. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

Most of our understanding of the Mongol Empire begins and ends with Chinggis Khan and his sweep across Asia. His name is now included among conquerors whose efforts burn bright and burn out quick: Alexander the Great, Napoleon, and so on.Except the story doesn’t end with Chinggis’s death. As Professor Marie Favereau notes in The Horde: How the Mongols Changed the World (Harvard University Press: 2021), the empire that he built continued to shape, incubate and grow the political cultures it conquered. Even as the empire formally splintered, the ties that bound together the Mongols continued to play a critical role in the growth of new identities and cultures.More information can be found in Marie’s article for Quillete: How the (Much Maligned) Mongol Horde Helped Create Russian Civilization.In this interview Marie and I talk about the empire the Mongols built: how it grew, what it covered, and how it changed. We discuss how the Mongols changed those they ruled and those they bordered against, and the geopolitical system they built.Marie Favereau is Associate Professor of History at Paris Nanterre University. She has been a member of the French Institute of Oriental Archaeology in Cairo, a visiting scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study, and a research associate at the University of Oxford for the major project Nomadic Empires. Her books include The Golden Horde and the Mamluk Sultanate (published in French) and the graphic novel Gengis Khan.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Horde. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

It can be easy to forget amongst the glistening skyscrapers, bustling streets and neon lights, but the Pearl River Delta used to be a haven for banditry and piracy. As the authority of Imperial China waned, pirate fleets based out of Guangdong Province roamed the waves, raiding traders and taking captives.One of these captives, and later pirates was Cheng Yat Sou—the “wife of Cheng Yat”—who rose from humble beginnings to eventually bring together the competing pirate fleets into a confederation.She is also the star of Larry Feign’s first novel The Flower Boat Girl (Top Floor Books, 2021). Larry starts the story of the pirate queen from her abduction by Cheng Yat, and writes of how she gains a foothold among the pirate fleets. More information—and a sample chapter—can be found on the book’s website.Larry and I talk about Cheng Yat Sou, early-nineteenth century China, and pirate fleets. We also talk about how Larry wrote the book, and what he learned from being one of Hong Kong’s most prominent cartoonists.Larry Feign is an award-winning artist and writer based in Hong Kong. He is well known for his long-running daily political comic strip “Lily Wong”, which satirized life in Hong Kong before and after the handover to China until he retired the cartoon in 2007. Feign’s work has appeared in Time, The Economist, the New York Times, The Atlantic, and other publications around the world. He also directed animated cartoons for Walt Disney Television and Cartoon Network. He is a MacDowell Fellow and three-time recipient of Amnesty International Human Rights Press Awards.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Flower Boat Girl. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review

We can sometimes forget that “India”—or the idea of a single unified entity—is not a very old concept. Indian history is complicated and convoluted: different societies, polities and cultures rise and fall, ebb and flow, as the political makeup of South Asia changes.Namit Arora, author of Indians: A Brief History of a Civilization (Penguin Viking, 2021), details some of these changing cultures. From the early Harappans, to the Buddhist centers of Nagarjunakonda and Nalanda, and ending at Varanasi, Arora takes his readers on a journey through South Asia’s rich and diverse history.Namit Arora chose a life of reading and writing after cutting short his career in the Internet industry. Raised in the Hindi belt of India, he lived in Louisiana, the San Francisco Bay Area and Western Europe, and travelled in scores of countries before returning to India over two decades later in 2013. He is the author of The Lottery of Birth (Three Essays Collective: 2017), a collection of essays, and the novel Love and Loathing in Silicon Valley (Speaking Tiger Publishing Pvt Ltd: 2019). More details here.In this interview, Namit and I talk about the many different cultures featured in his book Indians. We share the stories of some of India’s illustrious foreign visitors, and what it was like for Namit to research these lost histories.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Indians. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review