Building Hong Kong

by Jan Morris

A history of the city derived from its architecture from Manchu days through to the exciting 90s. Hong Kong's ever changing cityscape is breathtaking, not only for its nocturnal glitter as seen from the heights of Victoria Peak but for the architectural diversity of its shimmering towers of commerce. This remarkable sweep of history is captured in stunning photography, and supported with a lively and evocative essay by historian and travel writer Jan Morris.

124 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Jan Morris was a British historian, author and travel writer. Morris was educated at Lancing College, West Sussex, and Christ Church, Oxford, but is Welsh by heritage and adoption. Before 1970 Morris published under her assigned birth name, "James ", and is known particularly for the Pax Britannica trilogy, a history of the British Empire, and for portraits of cities, notably Oxford, Venice, Trieste, Hong Kong, and New York City, and also wrote about Wales, Spanish history, and culture.

In 1949 Jan Morris married Elizabeth Tuckniss, the daughter of a tea planter. Morris and Tuckniss had five children together, including the poet and musician Twm Morys. One of their children died in infancy. As Morris documented in her memoir Conundrum, she began taking oestrogens to feminise her body in 1964. In 1972, she had sex reassignment surgery in Morocco. Sex reassignment surgeon Georges Burou did the surgery, since doctors in Britain refused to allow the procedure unless Morris and Tuckniss divorced, something Morris was not prepared to do at the time. They divorced later, but remained together and later got a civil union. On May, 14th, 2008, Morris and Tuckniss remarried each other. Morris lived mostly in Wales, where her parents were from.

Reviews

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

Written in 1988, before Venice, this book is much less irritating. Perhaps I’m more involved, having just arrived in HK in 1988 and lived and worked there for 8 years, so I could relate to her descriptions and often to many of her opinions. British herself, she is rather too opinionated, however, and is snide about the British occupation particularly prior to WW2. She rotates a history chapter with a concurrent chapter, which leads to some redundancy. There is rather too much about the horrors of the past, including scandals and sewage arrangements, and details about earlier governors most of whom were outright snobs, racists and dictators whereas I was more interested in HK as it is in recent history. Interestingly, racism diminished a lot after the dreadful Japanese occupancy, in which both Chinese and expats suffered. Her recurrent theme is that HK is all about making money from earliest times; still is, or was until 2020, but in the last 30 years cultural life also prospered: some of my best musical experiences have been in the Cultural Centre. She says very little about education, the odd reference to the Universities, nothing at all about he growth of the school system and its even cruel structure at that time. Designed to provide an English speaking civil service of bright but conforming staff: all children were taught in English in examination dominated schools comprising five “bands” of ability yet all took the same curriculum and exams: you had to be bright and conformist to stand that. Bands 3 and below stood no chance of success: a perfect system for a colony, it would have fitted her thesis of British domination very well. She also rightly says the well-educated young (Bands 1 and 2 students university educated) are a new generation for HK. But well after that the youth in the Umbrella Revolution were a newer phenomenon, which promised well – but that was too much for the Chinese Govt and they were gaoled. She does try to predict the future post Handover but she pontificates too much and understandably does not anticipate the breaking of the Basic Law and just how much China has become rich and middle class but without espousing democracy. My experience of China in 1990 was of a dysfunctional system, corrupt and most people poor, with HK a shining example of how it could be done. Now China has overtaken HK in all but human rights and has destroyed an emerging and intelligent near-democracy, making it just another Chinese city. Morris is on China’s side as it was then: she sees the founding of HK as a disgrace morally, but the truth is HK developed to the great benefit of its citizens that would not be the case had Britain not taken over. Post Morris’s visit until 1997 say it was an excellently developing place but post-Handover the Chinese just couldn’t leave well alone until they took over completely and ruthlessly (Morris would seem to approve that).