A Macao Narrative

Austin Coates

• $24.95s paperback (9789622090774) Add to Cart
• hardcover not available

• Published: March 2009
• Subject Listing: Asian Studies, Literature
• Bibliographic information: 160 pp., 5.5 x 8.5 in.
• Territorial rights: North American rights only
• Distributed for: Hong Kong University Press
• Contents

Macao, 40 miles west of Hong Kong, became a place of Portuguese residence between 1555-57. In this short, lively, and affectionate book, Austin Coates explains how and why the Portuguese came to the Far East, and how they peacefully settled in Macao with tacit Chinese goodwill. Macao's golden age, from 1557 to the disastrous collapse of 1641, is vividly reconstructed.

There follows the cuckoo-in-the-nest situation of the late 18th century when the British in Macao were a law unto themselves, until the foundation of Hong Kong and the opening of Shanghai gave wider scope for their energies. Portugal's subsequent struggle to obtain full sovereignty in Macao, and the extraordinary outcome in 1975, brings this account to a close. Special tribute is paid to the risks Macao gallantly undertook in harboring Hong Kong's starving and destitute during World War II.

Austin Coates (1922-97), a senior British civil servant in Hong Kong, Malaya, and Sarawak, left government service at age 40 and pursued a professional writing career. He was widely regarded as the most distinguished English-language author in Hong Kong.

"Easy and enjoyable to read, A Macao Narrative was not conceived for academic purposes, but rather for an intelligent reader who might wish to learn the most important aspects of Macao's history. A first-time reader might well be carried away by the easy flow of the prose, the witty remarks, the elegance of the author's style. The ease with which Austin Coates recounted even the most dramatic events, as if holding a lively conversation, demonstrates that his narrative is, in fact, an exceptional history of the city." - From the Foreword by César Guillén Nuñez