One of the best histories I have had the pleasure to read is Frederick Lewis Allen’s Only Yesterday: An Informal History of the 1920s. There are many things to love about this book. Allen wrote his history of the 1920’s in a jaunty, breezy style. When you pick his book up it is hard to […]
Last month the U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on Intelligence held a public hearing on Chinese influence activities and the risks of a global Chinese-led technological regime. I found the prepared statements by Samantha Hoffman and by Peter Mattis to be particularly valuable, and both are good resources for understanding why this issue is […]
Illustration by Craig Stephens (2017)Image Source Two months ago Qiushi, the central “theory” journal of the Communist Party of China, published a speech originally given by Xi Jinping several days after he was named General Secretary of the Communist Party of China. The speech is Xi’s attempt to answer questions that are smack-dab in the […]
The large majority of our fellow-citizens care as much about literature as they care about aeroplanes or the programme of the Legislature. They do not ignore it; they are not quite indifferent to it. But their interest in it is faint and perfunctory; or, if their interest happens to be violent, it is spasmodic. Ask […]
“We must maintain a holistic view of national security. We take the people’s security as our ultimate goal, political security as our fundamental task, and economic security as our foundation.” —Secretary General Xi Jinping, April 2014. Are we ready for what comes next? The news this week is that the United States of America has […]
The opening scene of ‘A Catch of Shadows’ 1998 production of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ (image source) HERMIA: I would my father look’d but with my eyes. THESEUS: Rather your eyes mustwith his judgment look. —A Midsummer’s Night Dream William Buckner has published a small but superb essay over at Quillette under the title “A Girl’s […]
Image Source It is not luxury and pomp that make a king a king. It is when his orders are never disobeyed that he has entered a title such as yours. —Mudrarakshasa 3.99 [c. 300 AD] The always excellent Stella Zhang directed me to a newish paper by political scientists Lee Jones and Zeng Jinhan […]
A snapshot from the reader survey. This is you, folks. TO THE READERS OF THE SCHOLAR’S STAGE— I started The Scholar’s Stage in 2008. n thee pages I have hosted debates on population centric counterinsurgency, ancient Chinese philosophy, antebellum American history, the ideology of the Communist Party of China, modern American culture wars, and just […]
Sir Galahad in stained glass (1910) From Andrew’s Dune Church, Southampton, New York. (image source) That terrible bond, that most salutary of human bonds, those invisible threads of gold and light and blood attaching men sworn to a common endeavor! —Victor Serge, Unforgiving Years (1947) My life’s short course has brought me to many places, […]
This video is a good demonstration of what Chinese teenagers (or in this case, a Taiwanese teenager) mean when they say the 2D world is more ‘meihao’ than the 3D one. I have spent a great deal of time with Chinese teenagers. When I lived in Beijing, I paid no rent: instead I lived in […]