Bernardine's Shanghai Salon: The Story of the Doyenne of Old China
About this ebook
Yet from the night of their wedding, Bernardine’s new husband did not live up to his promises. Instead of feeling sorry for herself or leaving Shanghai, Bernardine decided to make a place for herself. Like other Jewish women before her, she started a salon in her home, drawing famous names from the world of politics, the arts, and the intelligentsia. She introduced Emily Hahn, the charismatic opium-smoking writer for The New Yorker, to the flamboyant hotelier Sir Victor Sassoon and legendary poet Sinmay Zau. And when Hollywood stars Anna May Wong, Charlie Chaplin, and Claudette Colbert passed through Shanghai, Bernardine organized gatherings to introduce them to their Shanghai contemporaries.
When Bernardine’s salon could not accommodate all who wanted to attend, she founded the International Arts Theater to produce avant-garde plays, ballets, lectures, and visual arts exhibits, often pushing audiences beyond their comfort zones. As civil war brewed and World War II soon followed, Bernardine’s devotion to the arts and the people of Shanghai brought joy to the city just before it would change forever.
About the author
Susan Blumberg-Kason is the author of Good Chinese Wife: A Love Affair with China Gone Wrong and co-editor of Hong Kong Noir. She is a regular contributor to the Asian Review of Books and her work has appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books, World Literature Today, PopMatters, and the South China Morning Post. She is a graduate of Goucher College, where she earned a BA in political science. She spent her junior year abroad at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and returned to the same university a few years later to study for an MPhil in government and public administration. She became interested in 1930s Shanghai when she was in the city in the mid-1990s for her thesis research. Susan now lives with her family in the Chicago suburbs.
