More Than One Child: A Life Behind the One-Child Policy I read Shen Yang’s More Than One Child for my Chinese book club. It is an important book, not least because it bears witness to a chapter of recent Chinese history whose human consequences are easily obscured by statistics. Shen was an unauthorised second daughter,… Continue reading My review of ‘More than One Child

Under Alcina’s Spell Opera! It is not every day that one gets to see one, let alone a fabulous production such as Handel’s Alcina at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. I hadn’t realised until afterwards that the opera was written for this very place, where it premiered in 1735. The theatre has burned… Continue reading Opera alcina

Helen Wing, an accomplished poet, is a great friend of mine. I often envy the way flowers seem to blossom effortlessly under her pen. Here’s her latest poem, Ars Politica, published in Index, a magazine dedicated to promoting freedom of expression. Please take a look. It’s beautiful but also quietly forceful, weaving together nature, politics… Continue reading Helen wing

The New Tech Arms Race Trump downplays warnings about the risks of AI, citing the rivalry with China. The competition between the world’s two superpowers is real, but surely that is not a reason to dismiss concerns about slowing down AI development. I am no tech expert, but I do wonder whether China is pouring… Continue reading AI Race

Strawberry Hill House Flower Festival When my great friend Sara, a successful artist, invited me to the Strawberry Hill House Flower Festival with her family, I happily accepted. Flower festival? We have book festivals, food festivals and even beer festivals, so why not a festival devoted to flowers? There was, of course, the added pleasure… Continue reading Flower Festival

The True Believer I found the images of Trump and his supporters at the Republican midterm convention in Dallas frightening: large crowds waving American flags, chanting and cheering their president. Do they not see the soaring oil prices, the chaos and suffering his policies have helped cause in other parts of the world, or the… Continue reading Mass movement

RIP He Yong, a Chinese Rock Star I was saddened to hear of the death of He Yong (何勇, 1969–2026), one of the defining figures of China’s 1990s rock scene and an early pioneer of Chinese punk. He was one of the celebrated “Moyan Three” (魔岩三杰), alongside Dou Wei (窦唯) and Zhang Chu (张楚). Back… Continue reading RIP He Yong

We Met in Beijing Last night, I attended a lovely reading by Anthony Tao from his poetry collection We Met in Beijing, held at the charming Electric Elephant Café near Elephant and Castle. The collection combines confessional poetry with a “poetics of witness”. Personal poems about friends, bars and everyday life gradually form a portrait… Continue reading Poem evening

RIP Gloria Steinem. In 1957, a London doctor who helped her obtain an illegal abortion asked her to promise him two things. One was: “You must do what you want to do with your life.” She did exactly that. In doing so, she helped transform the lives of generations of women, inspiring them to claim… Continue reading RIP G Steinem

I’ve never developed green fingers. I grew up in my mother’s residential compound in Nanjing, a crowded urban jungle with few green spaces. My grandma used to grow pots of jasmine, gardenia and spring onions on our tiny-weeny balcony. Now I live in a house with a large garden. I struggle to maintain it, with… Continue reading Plant displays