YCW London Book Club: Kingdom of Characters

YCW London Book Club: Kingdom of Characters

Discussing Kingdom of Characters: The Language Revolution That Made China Modern, by Jing Tsu.

By Young China Watchers

Date and time

Starts on Thursday, May 16 · 6pm GMT+1

Location

Old China Hand

8 Tysoe Street London EC1R 4RQ United Kingdom

About this event

  • 2 hours
  • Date: Thursday 16th May 2024
  • Arrival time: 6:00pm
  • Book Club start time: 6:15pm
  • Venue: Old China Hand, 8 Tysoe St, London EC1R 4RQ


Join the London Young China Watchers community for the launch of our next Book Club for 2024. This month's pick is Kingdom of Characters: The Language Revolution That Made China Modern, by Jing Tsu. Don’t worry if you don’t manage to finish it by 16th May - if you’re interested, we would love to see you there! The Club is very relaxed and welcomes new and existing YCW members.

Please don’t hesitate to get in touch if you have any questions.


ABOUT THE BOOK

Kingdom of Characters: The Language Revolution That Made China Modern, by Jing Tsu.

A PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST

A riveting, masterfully researched account of the bold innovators who adapted the Chinese language to the modern world, transforming China into a superpower in the process

What does it take to reinvent the world's oldest living language?

China today is one of the world's most powerful nations, yet just a century ago it was a crumbling empire with literacy reserved for the elite few, left behind in the wake of Western technology. InKingdom of Characters, Jing Tsu shows that China's most daunting challenge was a linguistic one: to make the formidable Chinese language - a 2,200-year-old writing system that was daunting to natives and foreigners alike - accessible to a globalized, digital world.

Kingdom of Charactersfollows the bold innovators who adapted the Chinese script - and the value-system it represents - to the technological advances that would shape the twentieth century and beyond, from the telegram to the typewriter to the smartphone. From the exiled reformer who risked death to advocate for Mandarin as a national language to the imprisoned computer engineer who devised input codes for Chinese characters on the lid of a teacup, generations of scholars, missionaries, librarians, politicians, inventors, nationalists and revolutionaries alike understood the urgency of their task and its world-shaping consequences.

With larger-than-life characters and a thrilling narrative,Kingdom of Charactersoffers an astonishingly original perspective on one of the twentieth century's most dramatic transformations.

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Young China Watchers

Young China Watchers (YCW) is a dynamic group of China-focused young professionals. Through regular roundtables and talks with senior figures in the China academic, policy and business communities, it provides a chance for engaged individuals to interact and discuss the most pressing issues emerging from China today. Through our growing global network, we seek to foster the next generation of China thought-leaders.

YCW runs an open membership policy, keen to attract all China-engaged, knowledgeable and policy-interested individuals. Our purpose is to nurture a new community of people focused on and alert to China’s growing importance in international affairs.