My favourite Chinese author

A cold, wet and windy day today and we got soaked coming out of the supermarket. I was going to share some pictures of a very quiet Tesco's with you, but after viewing them at home I thought that maybe the excitement would be too much on a day like this, and so looked around for something else.

Thought I'd go for a small section of one of my many bookcases and opted for this block of 'Chiang Yee'.

Chiang Yee (1903-1977) was an artist and writer who came to Britain in 1933 and returned to his homeland in 1955. Because he liked to observe without being observed, he named himself 'The Silent Traveller' and wrote a dozen books using that title, mostly concerning places in Britain but a few in the USA and also of Dublin. Mr Chiang's interesting text is illustrated with beautiful Chinese watercolours. It was 'The Silent Traveller in Edinburgh' that first brought him to my attention and I went on to collect all of his books . . . or so I thought! I have 18 and I've just discovered that he wrote 26 and illustrated another 4! Not all 'Silent Travellers', of course, as he wrote a number of children's books - and one of poetry of which I'd never heard until now!

He wrote one or two about China and my extra is the cover of 'A Chinese Childhood'.