Bio

There are a number of issues that are close to my heart. One is justice for and fair treatment of asylum seekers and refugees. I was a regular visitor to asylum seekers in the Villawood Immigration Detention Centre in Sydney from 2001-2005. I am still stay in touch with a number of the people I got to know there. Most of them are now Australian citizens. This issue has inspired me to write short stories, a novel The Infernal Optimist, essays and plays, Seeking Djira and Halal el Mashakel, the latter of which was published in the Currency Press anthology Staging Asylum.

China

China is another very big topic for me. I studied Asian History at Brown University, after which I continued my study of the Chinese language in Taiwan. I lived in Hong Kong and Beijing as well. My first trip to mainland China was in 1979. Several of my books are about or inspired by China: The Shortest History of China, of course, as well as the memoir The Monkey and the Dragon, and the novels A Most Immoral Woman and The Empress Lover and Beijing. I also do literary and film translation from Chinese. Among the films I’ve subtitled are Chen Kaige’s Farewell My Concubine, Zhang Yimou’s Hero and Wong Kar Wai’s The Grandmaster. I’m an associate of the Australian Centre on China in the World at the Australian National University and a co-editor of the China Story Yearbook.