Jan Morris called Britain's handling of the 1997 handover of Hong Kong "sufficiently stylish". I think that's meant to be faint praise.Funnily enough, that's the exact phrase I'd use to describe her book. But my praise isn't faint.Morris has a lot of love for word-play and a lot of love for Hong Kong. The prose is luxurious and the history enlightening.A powerful strain of colonial nostalgia pervades the book. Morris never lets us forget, though, Britain's exploitative history with China, and that's definitely to her credit.Reading it now, this attitude of the British expatriate in Hong Kong seems impossibly distant. Almost unrelatable. In 2013, with Shenzhen looming large in the north, it's hard to imagine Hong Kong as a European outpost. For me, though, that was part of the fun of this book -- it's an interesting relic. I recommend "Hong Kong" for people who live there. It will definitely strengthen your sense of place, and will help you appreciate the historical moment that you find yourself in one of the world's great, complicated cities.
Is there any better travel writer than Jan Morris?Reading the first chapters of this book before I travelled to Hong Kong was exciting - all the sights and sounds I could anticipate... and all that history I was absorbing before I walked those streets.But then reading the middle of it while I was there was even better. I was in Hong Kong through work, and was at many meetings discussing HK's history, and how the Scots had influenced and moulded it. Although there is little in JM's book on this precise subject, there are plenty references to Jardines et al. The final chapters were read on my return. I had thought that once I was back I would want to abandon the book and move on to something else, but she draws you in and keeps you reading. This book is wonderful. It gives you a real sense of the place, and was perhaps particularly interesting to read about the lead up to The Handover in the context of Scotland's forthcoming referendum - we are a country on the brink of deciding whether or not we will become independent.
What do You think about Hong Kong (1997)?
This book is a mix of history and some contemporary portraits of colonial Hong Kong. The book focuses almost exclusively on British personages and mundane colonial details and really never gets around to exploring the Chineseness. I was really disappointed by this. The book is also dated, curiously fixates on arcane and somewhat random details and quotes and does not shed much light on the actual people of Hong Kong (aside from the aristocracy and business elites). Barely got through it on my trip to Hong Kong and was constantly wishing I had a different book. A more balanced and nuanced history would make for a better travel read.
—Jeffrey
I wanted very much to like this book because I adore the author, but it just wasn't a hit for me. It's a bad sign when I find myself reading the New York Times health page to get my reading fix, instead of opening my current book. The best thing about this book was also the worst thing: too much detail. In certain places the level of detail was exciting, bringing the feel of Hong Kong right into my head. In far more places it made my mind wander, and was quite effective at putting me to sleep at night.
—Laura
