City of Lingering Splendour: A Frank Account of Old Peking's Exotic Pleasures [Paperback]

John Blofeld (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 2001

In his early twenties, John Blofeld spent what he describes as "three exquisitely happy years" in Peking during the era of the last emperor, when the breathtaking greatness of China's ancient traditions was still everywhere evident. Arriving in 1934, he found a city imbued with the atmosphere of the recent imperial past and haunted by the powerful spirit of the late Dowager Empress Tzu Hsi. He entered a world of magnificent palaces and temples of the Forbidden City, of lotus-covered lakes and lush pleasure-gardens, of bustling bazaars and peaceful bathhouses, and of "flower houses" with their beautiful young courtesans versed in the arts of pleasing men. With a novelists' command of detail and dialogue, Blofeld vividly re-creates the magic of these years and conveys to the reader his appreciation and nostalgia for a way of life long vanished.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

John Blofeld (1913–1987) was a world-renowned scholar and writer who devoted his life to the study of Eastern religion, especially Taoism and Buddhism.

Product Details

• Paperback: 280 pages
• Publisher: Shambhala (May 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1570626375
• ISBN-13: 978-1570626371
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.6 x 8.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,210,959 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Gentle Masterpiece of Lingering Splendour, July 30, 2002

By 

James Paris "Tarnmoor" (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: City of Lingering Splendour: A Frank Account of Old Peking's Exotic Pleasures (Paperback)

I had no idea when I picked up this book that I had such a pleasant experience in store for me. Beginning in 1934, a young man in his twenties spends "three exquisitely happy years" in a China at the edge of the abyss. Japan had already invaded Manchuria and made no secrets of its intentions of further conquest. The shaky Chinese Republic was ruled out of Nanking; and Peking was still full of memories of the old Dowager Empress, the last of her line.

The streets of Peking were full of Confucian scholars, aging palace eunuchs, adepts of Taoism and Buddhism, starving White Russian refugees, 14-year-old opium addicts, and gentle courtesans and flute girls. Blofeld threw himself headfirst into this world which was on the point of being snuffed out forever. Most memorable are the White Russian hermaphrodite Shura and the Rasputin-like Father Vassily; the decorous Buddhist scholar Dr Chang; Yang Taoshih, the Taoist sage, and his friend known only as the Peach Garden Hermit; the lovely courtesan Jade Flute; and the mysterious Pao, who elopes with a young girl intended for a Japanese colonel.

After Blofeld leaves for a trip to England, the Japanese finally invade. There are two bittersweet chapters at the end where Blofeld revisits the scenes of his youth after 1945. His fragile Peking of the 1930s is now poised between a growingly thuggish Kuomintang secret police and the great unknown of Mao Tse-tung's Eighth Route Army.

Blofeld's Dr Chang says it all: "Decay is inherent in all things, as Shakyamuni Buddha bade us always remember. Death swallows all that has been born; rebirth or re-creation follow in their turn, as spring follows winter. Things rise and wane in unceasing flux."

CITY OF LINGERING SPLENDOUR is recommended to all sentient beings who were ever young once and are now faced with a confused welter of possibilities, none of which seem particularly appetizing.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ah - the good old days and the good old writers., April 26, 2001

By 

jim (Sydney) - See all my reviews

This review is from: City of Lingering Splendour: A Frank Account of Old Peking's Exotic Pleasures (Paperback)

This is the most sensitive, respectful and intelligent book I have read on traditional Chinese culture. The writing is terrific, on a par with Peter Fleming's, though more from the heart.

It records the author's love affair with the city before WW2 (and includes a return to Beijing after it). While meeting many of its remaining Daoist, Confucianist, Bhuddist and literary leaders and exploring its temples, nightlife and food, we get a last sympathetic, philosophical, tragic glimpse of the splendour decaying under the Republic. Before it vanished under the Maoists.

If you thought there was little more to pre-War China than footbinding, Dowager Empresses, opium and Shanghain greed and degeneracy, this book will even the score a little.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Time Travel !, March 6, 2003

By 

the wizard of uz (Studio City, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: City of Lingering Splendour: A Frank Account of Old Peking's Exotic Pleasures (Paperback)

If the name John Blofeld means anything to you, you've probably been consulting the I Ching. Blofeld wrote a popular translation to the Chinese oracle at a time when the only other version available in English was Richard Wilhelm's groundbreaking but somewhat turgid text.

"City of Lingering Splendor" is an autobiographical travelogue, one of the best ever written. Dedicated to ' the hermits, scholars, youths and courtesans who inspired these pages ' it's a love letter to Peking and the breathtaking greatness of an ancient civilisation at its twilight, about to be extinguished.

While remote jungles still offer anthropologists the chance to chew the fat with stone age peoples, the romantics among us are simply out of luck. Until someone invents a working time machine, Ancient Egypt is gone forever along with Homer's Greece and Imperial Rome.

But in 1934 it was still possible to travel back in time. Back to Old China, to a culture that had remained virtually untouched for thousands of years---and chew Peking Duck with Taoist sages. . .

Wonderful reading.