Analysis

Here, King of Pop lived only in his prime

It might be preposterous to say that Michael Jackson easily trumped Elvis Presley and the Beatles, but in the minds of Chinese fans there is little doubt about it. We grew up with the King of Pop, almost. Elvis and the Fab Four, however, reigned before our times.

Not just the generational gap, but they ruled the music world before China opened its door and let in foreign acts of pop culture. Michael Jackson never performed in China, but through a relentless onslaught of cassettes, disks and videotapes his presence has always been palpable and larger than life.

In other words, we got to know Michael Jackson just as most people in the world knew him, not from his live shows, but from his recordings, especially his music videos.

We did not know the boy wonder who started singing and dancing at the tender age of five. Had we been exposed to those videos, millions of Chinese parents would have taken him as a role model and driven their children onto the path of thrilling high notes and dazzlingly dexterous dance steps.

That's why his early hits like ABC and I'll Be There are seldom heard in China, even among hardcore fans.

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A hidden agenda

What's common between the ancient Hebrew rabbinical texts and an iconic Tang Dynasty poem like Wang Wei's Lu Chai (Deer Park)? What makes a series of colophons by Bada Shanren, the late 17th century Chinese ink brush artist, lend themselves to be arranged in the form of a 85-letter constraint on textured gold foil - the sort sometimes used in traditional funerals in South-east Asian cultures - so that they look like a rectangular patch, plotted with letters, equidistant from and apparently unrelated to one another?

The translated poems run vertically and are usually read from right to left, although there are no set rules as to how they might be read. In fact, a student of the translators, Claire Huot and Robert Majzels, read the translated poems backwards and managed to make perfect sense.

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Editors' Picks

Top hotels hit by fall in visitors

Top quality hotels in China are being hit hard by the twin fists of economic downturn and the A(H1N1) flu outbreak.

Anecdotal evidence says in extreme instances occupancy levels have fallen to just three percent of capacity.

As a result, at least one major hotel group canceled its annual international top management get-together, replacing it with an online meeting.

In addition, wages are being slashed, staff are being laid off, the number of cheap interns being hired is increasing, employees are being told to move back into on-site accommodation, menus are being revised and generous expatriate contracts are not being renewed.

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Mutual trust will be key at meeting

Mutual trust will be a key issue at discussions tentatively scheduled for next month between Chinese and United States military forces on updating rules regarding maritime safety, it has emerged ...

Keeping the world's food safe and secure

A study released by IBM last week shows that less than 20 percent of US consumers trust food companies "that develop and sell food products that are safe and healthy for themselves and their families." The study also shows that 60 percent of consumers are concerned about the safety of food they purchase ...

US Treasury holdings quandary

When China's holdings of US Treasuries dipped in April, it was seen as a clear indicator of the nation's uneasy relationship with the world's reserve currency - to sell in the face of a sliding greenback or hold to protect the value of its assets from eroding further ...

US Medical firms capitalize on aging nation

With China's population growing older, wealthier and more interested in Western sports, a burgeoning market has opened up in the country for orthopedic tools and devices. And the American companies that make them are capitalizing on this new demand ...

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While job cuts and dwindling paychecks are generally seen as a byproduct of financial meltdowns, China is thinking out of the box and talking about possibilities to raise household income in the midst of the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression of the last century ...

P&G fights against brand infringement

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