Fortune’s Bazaar: The Making of Hong Kong

Journalist England (The Quest of Noel Croucher) takes a fresh look at Hong Kong’s history by focusing on the “in-between people,” or Hong Kongers whose roots don’t go back to colonial Britain or mainland China. The British, seeking a trade station on the eastern coast of China, claimed Hong Kong in 1841, and China officially ceded the island in the Treaty of Nanking in 1842. Like other port cities, Hong Kong attracted people from around the world; early settlers included Parsis, a Zoroastrian “tribal group” from India that traces its roots back to Persia; Macanese; Malays; Filipinos; Japanese; Portuguese; and Jews from Venice and Baghdad. England profiles prominent members of these and other ethnic groups, contending that colonialism in Hong Kong was more collaboration than conquest: “Most Hong Kongers were collaborators because they chose to come to Hong Kong, they were self-selected.” Nevertheless, Hong Kong’s diversity didn’t spare it from racial, ethnic, and class tensions, including the Strike of 1925, which “brought British rule perilously close to the edge of economic collapse.” Since 1997, when Britain handed Hong Kong back to the Chinese, efforts by the Chinese government to curtail Hong Kongers’ freedoms have been met with fierce protests, including the 2014 Occupy movement. Extensively researched and accessibly written, this is a winning portrait of Hong Kong’s vibrant mosaic. Agent: Doug Young, PEW Literary. (May)