Cultural historian Cheng Pei-kai gives us a glimpse into the life of Tang dynasty poet Bai Juyi, whose later years were leisurely spent as a carefree and frivolous official often writing about the blazing heat of summer.
Culture
Culture
Former director of the Singapore Art Museum Kwok Kian Chow shares his thoughts on reencountering the works of Chinese artist Zeng Fanzhi at the Museum of Art Pudong, Shanghai.
Culture
Shivaji Das and Yolanda Yu, an interracial couple and the authors of Rebels, Traitors, Peacemakers: True Stories of Love and Conflict in Indian-Chinese Relationships, share their thoughts and findings of their time collecting stories on the lives of Indian-Chinese couples.
Culture
Seemingly surrounded by Sagittarians, Taiwanese art historian Chiang Hsun muses about the different Sagittarian characters he has come across, from a would-be politician and an unconcerned husband, to a fashionista and artist, along with the famous Sagittarians in history such as Stalin, Disney and Yang Hucheng.
Culture
Art historian Chiang Hsun shares his memories of former Taiwan politician Cheng Shu-min, who had passed away in July 2023. Shu-min had the true heart of an Arian woman, driven towards success and poised against woes in her private life and political career.
Culture
Singaporean writer Low Pooi Fong leaves watching Kelvin Tong’s film Year of No Significance rather disappointed — a film that was to have given voice to the Chinese-educated in Singapore in the late 1970s was not true enough to life. For audiences who were among the Chinese-educated in Singapore or who knew of those who led those lives, perhaps the story was just not hard-hitting enough. Might it take another film for this wealth of material to be mined as it deserves?
Culture
Lee Guan Kin, a Nanyang University (Nantah) graduate herself, was happy to see a local film made about the life and times of a Nantah graduate in the year 1979, when “Chinese” elements seemed to be fading from society. But she worries that the grey life depicted may miss the true plot: Nantah graduates with grit and spirit went on to become prominent people in society, not in spite of their education and upbringing, but because of it.
Society
Rather than a consequence of China’s cultural diplomacy, Mandarin learning in Brunei is motivated by immediate concerns of academic success and enhancing worldviews through a different language and culture.
History
Henry Kissinger passed away recently at the age of 100. Declassified records of talks between Kissinger and Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai in 1971 revealed the attitudes of both towards each other, and towards Japan — which was not always complimentary.