11
CHINA IN THE EYES OF THE FRENCH INTELLECTUALS
JEAN CHESNEAUX
The following lecture, given originally in Canberra, was presented there as the "Morrison Lecture" for the year 1987, as a contribution to the memory of that remarkable person, G. Morrison, who crossed Australia on foot and China on foot at the end of the nineteenth century, so as to win the most influential position (at that time) of permanent correspondent in Peking for the London Times for a quarter of a century.
In Hong Kong, the name George Morrison, if not forgotten, is certainly less prominent than in Canberra, where the Morrison Lecture has been every year an important event for the last fifty years. May I consider these remarks on the lasting impact China has made for three centuries on French intellectuals, as a kind of unofficial “Victor Segalen Lecture". Victor Segalen, an equally remarkable person, a traveller, a navy officer, an anthropologist, a poet, an archaeologist, visited Hong Kong several times in the early years of this century, between his travels in Eastern Polynesia and his archaeological expeditions in northern China.
May I add a personal footnote, before beginning the lecture. I am all the more happy to pay tribute to Victor Segalen, in the present circumstances, for it seems that, at least in France, very few persons have actually extended their intellectual work, cultural interests and actual movements, both to the South Pacific and to China. Being another such person, the name of Victor Segalen is for me a very appropriate reference.
* This is the 1987 George Ernest Morrison Lecture delivered originally at the Australian National University, and, with slight amendment, to the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society on 27th February, 1987. It is reprinted with the permission of the Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University. Professor Jean Chesneaux is a sinologist of international repute, and author of, among many books and articles, The Chinese Labour Movement, 1919-1927 (Stanford, 1968), Secret Societies in China in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (London, 1971), and China from the 1911 Revolution to Liberation (New York, 1977, with Francoise la Barbier and Marie-Claire Bergere).
11
CHINA IN THE EYES OF THE FRENCH INTELLECTUALS
JEAN CHESNEAUX
The following lecture, given originally in Canberra, was pre- sented there as the "Morrison Lecture" for the year 1987, as a contribution to the memory of that remarkable person, G. Morri- son, who crossed Australia on foot and China on foot at the end of the nineteenth century, so as to win the most influential position (at that time) of permanent correspondent in Peking for the Lon- don Times for a quarter of a century.
In Hong Kong, the name George Morrison, if not forgotten, is certainly less prominent than in Canberra, where the Morrison Lecture has been every year an important event for the last fifty years. May I consider these remarks on the lasting impact China has made for three centuries on French intellectuals, as a kind of unofficial “Victor Segalen Lecture". Victor Segalen, an equally remarkable person, a traveller, a navy officer, an anthropologist, a poet, an archaeologist, visited Hong Kong several times in the early years of this century, between his travels in Eastern Polyne- sia and his archaeological expeditions in northern China.
May I add a personal footnote, before beginning the lecture. I am all the more happy to pay tribute to Victor Segalen, in the present circumstances, for it seems that, at least in France, very few persons have actually extended their intellectual work, cultur- al interests and actual movements, both to the South Pacific and to China. Being another such person, the name of Victor Segalen is for me a very appropriate reference.
* This is the 1987 George Ernest Morrison Lecture delivered originally at the Australian National University, and, with slight amendment, to the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society on 27th February, 1987. It is reprinted with the permission of the Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National Univer- sity. Professor Jean Chesneaux is a sinologist of international repute, and author of, among many books and articles, The Chinese Labour Movement, 1919-1927 (Stanford, 1968), Secret Societies in China in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centu- ries (London, 1971), and China from the 1911 Revolution to Liberation (New York, 1977, with Francoise la Barbier and Marie-Claire Bergere).
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