The Silent Traveller in Edinburgh by Chiang Yee was a purchase from a second-hand bookshop in Morningside, Edinburgh, in fact they had two copies of it, a modern paperback reprint and a reprint hardback from 1954 which was in really great condition and not much dearer than the paperback. The book was originally published in 1948. He dedicated The Silent Traveller in Edinburgh – TO THE SPIRITS OF THE MAGNOLIA IN THE ROYAL BOTANIC GARDEN – obviously one of his favourite places.

What a lovely volume this is, it’s a really interesting read and has lots of charming illustrations painted by the author himself. Chiang Yee was one of those multi-talented people, he was born in China where he rose to the position of magistrate before moving to London in 1933 where he was an academic, he was also a poet, artist, calligrapher and in this book he mentions that he had previously designed sets for a ballet. He wrote a whole series of these ‘Silent Traveller’ books on various places including London, the Lake District, Oxford and Boston.

Apart from travelling around Edinburgh (a place he obviously knew well) and commenting on the culture and people, he also compared Scotland and the Scots with the Chinese, saying the two countries were very similar culturally and the scenery reminded him of China too. In reading this book I got a glimpse into Edinburgh of the past (not so different from nowadays) and also a peek at China of the 1930s. Yee was a Confucian and he writes about that too. It seemed to rain a lot whenever he was in Edinburgh and as he enjoyed rain it was never a problem for him.

He was very well read in British literature and mentions that Robert Burns is known all over China – but Shakespeare isn’t. The author also says: ‘I can make any Scotsman smile when I say that I read a number of Scott’s novels in Chinese translations before I could read English.’

He noticed that one difference between the English and Scots is that the English can never pronounce anything that they perceive to be foreign. ‘Oh dear me, by the way, do you know this author? His name is very difficult for me to pronounce.’ – remarked one person to Chiang Yee, the name was actually the author’s although he didn’t admit to it.

At various times he was inspired to write poems that he included in the book and these are written in Chinese characters too. Despite wartime paper shortages his books were kept in print throughout the war. I’m not sure if this was because they were so popular or because he knew people in high places, or maybe a combination of both those things. Chiang Yee moved to the US in 1955 where he became Emeritus Professor of Chinese at Columbia University.

As a Glaswegian I just wish that he had written a similar book about Glasgow. He does mention that every time he went to Glasgow he would meet men who told him of their experiences working in China, usually in some sort of engineering/shipbuilding capacity. Yee seems to have spent most of his time in Edinburgh staying in hotels, I can’t help thinking that if he had been based in Glasgow he would have had been invited to stay in umpteen peoples’ homes, there would have been fights to offer him hospitality!

I’m going to look for his Lake District book next. Have you read any of his books?

If you want to see what the book illustrations are like you can see some of them here.

I read this one for the Read Scotland 2017 Challenge – it’s my second Scottish read of the year.