He would be scorned today for his cultural appropriation. In his time he was more popular than Arthur Conan Doyle. Almost all of his books are audioes on YouTube.
O, good eye. His full name was Ernest Brammah Smith but he wrote under "Ernest Brammah"---the fellow writing about him for some reason used his real last name. I will update. THANK YOU
I ran across an oldish (1960s) article where the writer was reporting on antiquarian book sales and couldn't figure out why Ernest Brammah (Smith) books were selling high at auction. I figured Ransom Center (sure enough; they are like a vacuum cleaner). And then I found someone had used the archive and found out "the secret." And you are right...he was same era as Charlie Chan.
I have a hazy memory of a number of books (a whole genre, really) of highly dubious fiction written by authors with fake oriental names/fiction presented as purported non-fiction similar to what Smith was writing. I believe it was written to satisfy the orientalism of the late 19th century.
I recently listened to a Yascha Mounk Persuasion podcast with Rachel Fraser on standpoint theory. I was fascinated by her explanation of the difference between propositional knowledge and experiential knowledge. I wonder if Brammah was a propositional expert on China?
Blameless secret. Indeed!
He would be scorned today for his cultural appropriation. In his time he was more popular than Arthur Conan Doyle. Almost all of his books are audioes on YouTube.
A lot of 19th century writers like that, I do believe. I suppose that makes Kai Lung the predecessor of Charlie Chan.
"Smith’s decision to use certain types of exaggerated language in the context of his times established the “Chineseness” of his discourse."
That said, who's Smith?
elm
?
O, good eye. His full name was Ernest Brammah Smith but he wrote under "Ernest Brammah"---the fellow writing about him for some reason used his real last name. I will update. THANK YOU
Yeah, that's what I thought but I wasn't sure.
elm
no problem
I ran across an oldish (1960s) article where the writer was reporting on antiquarian book sales and couldn't figure out why Ernest Brammah (Smith) books were selling high at auction. I figured Ransom Center (sure enough; they are like a vacuum cleaner). And then I found someone had used the archive and found out "the secret." And you are right...he was same era as Charlie Chan.
I have a hazy memory of a number of books (a whole genre, really) of highly dubious fiction written by authors with fake oriental names/fiction presented as purported non-fiction similar to what Smith was writing. I believe it was written to satisfy the orientalism of the late 19th century.
elm
it's been awhile
I recently listened to a Yascha Mounk Persuasion podcast with Rachel Fraser on standpoint theory. I was fascinated by her explanation of the difference between propositional knowledge and experiential knowledge. I wonder if Brammah was a propositional expert on China?
I will have to listen to that. (o, I see there is a transcript).
https://www.persuasion.community/p/-you-just-wont-understand
Sunday it's good catchup time. until baseball playoffs.