The Blind Man and the Elephant

Last semester, by way of another reading (Translingual Practices by Lydia Liu) I learned of the book "Chinese Characteristics", written in 1890 by Arthur Henderson Smith, an American missionary who spent 54 years in China, starting in 1872. As luck would have it, the University of Minnesota Library happens to have a copy of the book in the closed stacks.

In the chapter of Lydia Liu's Translingual Practices titled "Translating National Character: Lu Xun and Arthur Smith", Liu writes that Chinese Characteristics was the book that introduced the idea of national character to Lu Xun. Beyond that, it was also extremely popular among missionaries and other Westerns travelling to or residing in China. It remained a best selling book on the topic of China till the 1920s. Besides the original English, it was also translated into Chinese, Japanese and several European languages.

The influence of Smith's work extended to politics as well. It has been stated that Smith was partly responsible for the Boxer Indemnity payments being directed towards the founding of Qinghua University and funding Chinese students to study in the United States, as a result of a meeting he had with President Roosevelt.
However, all of Smith's work was heavily influenced, and in fact driven by, his Western values and missionary ideologies. This can be clearly seen in his foreword to "The Uplift of China"

"The problem of China is to a large extent the problem of the world. Even to those who hither-to have taken but slight interest in "world-politics," it is becoming dimly discernible that in Eastern Asia the Occident has greater and more difficult questions than it has ever yet settled, or even faced. War, diplomacy, commerce, industrial expansion, governmental reforms, have all had or are having their part in the unprecedented alinement of the Far East, but it is the inevitable weakness of each and all of them that they never settle anything, while they tend to unsettle everything. Those who recognize that moral and spiritual forces ultimately rule the world, will increasingly feel that the West owes it to the East to pay back a part of its age-long debt by helping to lay the foundations of an Oriental Christian civilization."

I am personally fascinated by Chinese Characteristics for several reasons. While Smith's writings smack of racism and orientalism. In Liu's chapter she tackles this by deconstructing the racial generalization and assumptions inherent in the language Smith uses. However, It's quite interesting to see the style and form of scholarship on China from over a hundred years ago. Many of Smith's observations are not of the "yellow peril" anti-Chinese variety. While he clearly looks down on the Chinese as a people, he seems to genuinely care about them and their well being (as a good missionary probably should). Therefore, while he tends to be very critical about some things, he will praise others. At times he will even mention aspects of Chinese culture that he feels the West could learn from.

Below I will include some quotes from the book that caught my attention, several of which are related to nationalism or politics. Please note they do not represent my views:

"Money and food are twin foci of the Chinese ellipse, and it is about them as centres that the whole social life of the people revolves." (p. 195)

"In China there is always a social war, and everyone is too accustomed to its sickening effects to give them more than a momentary attention." (p. 196)

"The question is often raised whether the Chinese have any patriotism, and it is not a question which could be answered in a word. There is undoubtedly a strong national feeling, especially among the literary classes, and to this feeling much of the hostility exhibited to foreigners and their inventions is to be traced." (p. 111)

(The response of some of Smith's Chinese friends, after he attempts to start a political discussion with them) "Listen to me, my friend! Why should you trouble your heart and fatigue your head by all these vain surmises? The mandarins have to attend the affairs of state; they are paid for it. Let them earn their moeny, then. But don't let us torment ourselves about what does not concern us. We should be great fools to want political business for nothing." (p. 113)

"But that any considerable body of Chinese are actuated by a desire to serve their country, because it is their counbtry aside from the prospect of emolument, is a proposition that will require much more proof than has yet been offered to secure its acceptance by anyone who knows the Chinese. It need not be remarked that a Chinese might be patriotic without taking much interest in the fortunes of a Tartar Dynasty like the present, but there is the best reason to think that, whatever the dynasty might happen to be, the feeling of the mass of the nation would be the same as it is now--a feeling of profound indifference." (p. 112)

"There are two quite different aspects in which the politeness of the Chinese, and of Oriental peoples generally, may be viewed--the one of appreciation, the other of criticism. The Anglo-Saxon, as we are fond of reminding ourselves, has, no doubt, many virtues, and among them is to be found a very large percentage of fortiter in re, but a very small percentage of suaviter in modo. When, therefore, we come to the Orient, and find the vast populations of the immense Asiatic continent so greatly our superiors in the art of lubricating the friction which is sure to arise in the intercourse of man with man, we are filled with that admiration which is the tribute of those who cannot do a thing to those wo can do it easily and well. The most bigoted critic of the Chinese is forced to admit that they have brought the practice of politeness to a pitch of perfection which is not only unknown in Western lands, but , previous to experience, is unthought of and almost unimaginable." (p. 35)