Hi Laszlo, what places in China haven’t you been to yet that you’d like to visit?
Hi Laszlo, what places in China haven’t you been to yet that you’d like to visit? I've always thought about going traveling to that part of the world, but obviously the pandemic has made that difficult to do, but once everything is safer, I definitely am planning on making that trip. I'm sure you've been all over China, but I have to imagine there's some places that even you haven't been to yet?
Do you listen to other podcasts while you work on the CHP.
I find that podcasts are great for passing the time while driving, exercising, etc, but I'm a little bit torn on listening to podcasts while studying/researching. I find it hard to concentrate when I'm hearing words from the podcast, as I'm also trying to read words for my studies. I'm curious to know if you have a similar feeling!
History or mythology first?
Hello Lazlo, My method of study is usually to start at the beginning of beginnings. To build a basic mythological knowledge of a culture, and then move onto the earliest recorded history. As with most cultures I've studied, one usually precedes and anticipates the other. I.e. reading Mesopotamian archeology or history prior to diving into the biblical stories. Having recently read Chinese Mythology: An Introduction by Anne Burrills, I see now that Chinese history and mythology are not so linear. As you speak about in your first podcast on the Three Soveriegns and Five Emporers, the origin story of Pangu 盘古 was written down fairly recently and as with other chinese myths, is not the only creation myth and may have come from one of the many peoples that made up China's early cultural geography. This question is very subjective I'm sure, but could you be so kind as to recommend a direction or method of study that you have found useful to gain a "from the ground up" perspective of Chinese History and Mythology. My undergraduate was in 20th century Chinese history. As such I'm looking to fill the holes in an efficient manner. Thank you Paul
Jonathan Spence
Hi Laszlo, I noticed that the China scholar Jonathan Spence passed away recently. He's got quite a resume, I see, from reading the article in Yale News. Though I don't currently have any of his books, I recognize "The Search for Modern China," and "The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci" sounds really intriguing. Apparently, at Yale he was The Guy if you wanted to learn about China, and his lectures were SRO. Anyway, I'm sure you're acquainted with his work and may have mentioned him in past episodes of the CHP. Any chance you'll be doing a piece on him? I'd love to know more.
WW II: The Good Things Chiang Kai-shek Tried to Do
Howdy Lazlo. Now that I am retired, I took the opportunity to read Barbara Tuchman's book "Stillwell and the American Experience in China" about US-China "cooperation" during WWII that was sitting on my bookshelf for the last 40+ years. Although it was a very interesting albeit long read, I have to say Tuchman didn't waste much ink discussing Chiang's good side. This is not surprising since although she knew what Chiang did (which often appeared venial and duplicitous), she could only speculate on his reasons. You can only research what is available. When writing her book in the 1960's Chiang was still alive and his private papers were not accessible. Apparently, his cronies in the know saw no up-side in opening their mouths at the time. So, she had to rely on American sources which mostly viewed the G-mo as two-faced and unreliable. I have to believe that Chiang too had his side of the story about the US-Sino relationship and maybe thought likewise of the Americans. Now that more sources have become accessible to historians, can you recommend a couple of more current books that give a more even-handed and nuanced view? Perhaps, Chiang was really that bad, who knows. Many thanks and keep up your good work! Wayne
Sources for President's Bio
Quick question this time Laszlo: Im noticing, like many china watchers these days, a shortage of biographies on Xi Jingping. Ill be looking into Elizabeth economy's recent book in the near future. Besides pre-2014 HK street publications and the party's edition of 'Governance of China', theres not alot out there. Are we still waiting? Or are there some good credible biographies out there? Paul
Missing episodes?
Hi Laszlo, I just subscribed today. Sorry to start by asking a boring technical issue question. I'm trying to organize all the episodes in a more or less chronological order and I notice the numbering suggests many episodes are missing. For example I don't know how to find episodes 140-149, or episodes 2, 5, 8-10. Would they have been available if I opted for a yearly rather than monthly subscription or something like that?