China and the West

Maugham, W. Somerset. East of Suez : a play in seven scenes. (New York, N.Y. : George H. Doran, 1922). [Erstaufführung His Majesty's Theatre, London, 2 September 1922].
Scene I
"In all the shops two or three Chinamen are seated. Some read newspapers through great horn spectacles; some smoke water pipes. The street is crowded. Here is an itinerant cook with his two chests, in one of which is burning charcoal: he serves out bowls of rice and condiments to the passers-by who want food. There is a barber with the utensils of his trade. A coolie, seated on a stool, is having his head shaved. Chinese walk to and fro.
Some are coolies and wear blue cotton in various stages of raggedness; some in black gowns and caps and black shoes are merchants and clerks. There is a beggar, gaunt and thin, with an untidy mop of bristly hair, in tatters of indescribable filthiness. He stops at one of the shops and begins a long wail. For a time no one takes any notice of him, but presently on a word from the fat shopkeeper an assistant gives him a few cash and he wanders on. Coolies, half naked, hurry by, bearing great bales on their yokes. They utter little sharp cries for people to get out of their way. Peking carts with their blue hoods rumble noisily along. Rickshaws pass rapidly in both directions, and the rickshaw boys shout for the crowd to make way. In the rickshaws are grave Chinese. Some are dressed in white ducks after the European fashion; in other rickshaws are Chinese women in long smocks and wide trousers or Manchu ladies, with their faces painted like masks, in embroidered silks. Women of various sorts stroll about the street or enter the shops. You see them chaffering for various articles.
A water-carrier passes along with a creaking barrow, slopping the water as he goes; an old blind woman, a masseuse, advances slowly, striking wooden clappers to proclaim her calling. A musician stands on the curb and plays a tuneless melody on a one-stringed fiddle. From the distance comes the muffled sound of gongs. There is a babel of sound caused by the talking of all these people, by the cries of coolies, the gong, the clappers, and the fiddle. From burning joss-sticks in the shops in front of the household god comes a savour of incense.
A couple of Mongols ride across on shaggy ponies; they wear high boots and Astrakhan caps. Then a string of camels sways slowly down the street. They carry great burdens of skins from the deserts of Mongolia. They are accompanied by wild looking fellows. Two stout Chinese gentlemen are giving their pet birds an airing; the birds are attached by the leg with a string and sit on little wooden perches. The two Chinese gentlemen discuss their merits. Round about them small boys play. They run hither and thither pursuing one another amid the crowd."
Sekundärliteratur
1920
Spectator ; Sept 9 (1920).
"Another piece of work like this and his reputation as a serious playwright will be gone."
2011
Zhang Yanping : East of Suez is a play of seven scenes set in Beijing. The story revolves around Daisy, a Eurasian woman with a past. She is engaged to Harry, a simple, honest and upright Englishman serving for the empire in China, but she is passionately in love with his best friend George. Upon Harry's introduction, George soon recognizes that Daisy is his ex-lover who he has abandoned for the sake of his career prospect in the settlements. The reunion rekindles Kitty's passion, to which George half-unwillingly falls prey. Overwhelmed by Kitty's reckless love and tortured by her intimidation to disclose their affair, George commits suicide in the end. After knowing all, Harry is desperate, realizing that marriage with a half-Chinese woman is doomed to fail.
Maugham was addicted to opium since his journey to China. It temporarily cured him of his stammer, and thus offered him an illusory promise of freedom : "After you've smoked a pipe or two your mind grows extraordinarily clear. You have a strange facility of speech and yet no desire to speak. All the puzzles of this puzzling world grow plain to you. You are tranquil and free. Your souls I gently released from the bondage of your body, and it plays, happy and careless, like a child with flowers."
2013
Du Chunmei : In the play, Maugham draws heavily from stereotypical Chinaman images. The play shows his fear of miscegenation and hybridity. Maugham's accounts of persons of mixedrace are informed by contemporary 'scientific' ideas about biological and cultural evolution.