If the American portrait of Chinese women swung between vixen and victim, its depiction of Chinese men was equally at odds with itself. In one corner crouched the dastardly Fu Manchu; in the other slouched the huggable Charlie Chan. Fu Manchu was the product of Sax Rohmer, a British author, and represented the apex of “yellow peril” literature, popular in both the United States and the UK in the early twentieth century. But it was Hollywood that turned him into an international sensation.
