Battle of the Booker – Arts & Entertainment

Julia Lovell begins her story of the 1839-42 First Opium War with a telling anecdote. In November 2010, David Cameron arrived at a function in Beijing. There, a Chinese official asked him to take off his Remembrance Day poppy, incensed that it provoked memories of China’s humiliation at the hands of Britain.

The Importance of Living is Harvard-educated, Nobel Prize for Literature-nominated writer Lin Yutang’s life philosophy on everything from flower arranging to smoking. Part insight into the Chinese-Western culture clash, part Alain de Botton-type popular philosophy, it is a pleasure to browse thanks to Lin’s highly readable style.

Explore the mysteries and treasures of prerevolutionary Beijing with Derek Sandhaus's colorful Tales of Old Peking. He delivers an informative and entertaining historical collage that includes riveting first-hand accounts dating back to the early nineteenth century as well as Western representations of the city occasionally colored by "Yellow Peril" paranoia and Orientalist fantasy.

Didn't exactly learn the history of Sichuan (or even China) in school? Do like they did in the days before schools were big business and give yourself an education with this reading list.