New Books in British Studies

Vaudine England, "Fortune's Bazaar: The Making of Hong Kong" (Scribner, 2023)


Listen Later

The legacy of the businessmen who built Hong Kong are all over the city. Bankers work in Chater House—named after Paul Chater, the Armenian businessman behind much of the city’s land reclamation (among many other things). The Kowloon Shangri-La Hotel sits along Mody Road, named after Hormusjee Naorojee Mody, a Parsi immigrant who helped found the University of Hong Kong. And that’s not including figures like Robert Hotung, the half-British, half-Chinese magnate who found more power in his Chinese identity.

The story of Hong Kong is more complicated than what the British or the Chinese might assert–countless migrants, from all over the world, came to Hong Kong to build the city and make their fortunes. Vaudine England’s Fortune's Bazaar: The Making of Hong Kong (Scribner, 2023) tells the stories of these communities of Armenians, Indians, Parsis, Portuguese, Eurasians, and others who sat between the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese majority.

In this interview, Vaudine and I talk about Hong Kong’s story, the city’s early Wild West–or perhaps “Wild East” days—and the communities of men and women that built the city.

Vaudine England has been a journalist in Hong Kong and South East Asia for years. As a historian, she has focused on the diverse personalities and peoples that have gone into making Hong Kong a cosmopolitan Asian metropolis. She is the author of The Quest of Noel Croucher: Hong Kong’s Quiet Philanthropist (Hong Kong University Press: 1998) as well as several privately published works of Hong Kong history and biography.

You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Fortune’s Bazaar. Follow 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/adchoices

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/british-studies

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

New Books in British StudiesBy Marshall Poe

  • 4
  • 4
  • 4
  • 4
  • 4

4

3 ratings


More shows like New Books in British Studies

View all
In Our Time by BBC Radio 4

In Our Time

5,389 Listeners

History Extra podcast by Immediate Media

History Extra podcast

3,193 Listeners

History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps by Peter Adamson

History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps

1,588 Listeners

Jacobin Radio by Jacobin

Jacobin Radio

1,424 Listeners

Best of the Spectator by The Spectator

Best of the Spectator

184 Listeners

The Dig by Daniel Denvir

The Dig

1,543 Listeners

CrowdScience by BBC World Service

CrowdScience

480 Listeners

This Day by Jody Avirgan & Radiotopia

This Day

989 Listeners

The Ancients by History Hit

The Ancients

3,039 Listeners

The Rest Is History by Goalhanger

The Rest Is History

13,053 Listeners

Gone Medieval by History Hit

Gone Medieval

1,758 Listeners

Not Just the Tudors by History Hit

Not Just the Tudors

1,982 Listeners

The Rest Is Politics by Goalhanger

The Rest Is Politics

3,286 Listeners

Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society by History Hit

Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society

1,210 Listeners

Past Present Future by David Runciman

Past Present Future

321 Listeners