But then Crook is a natural stylist. "At the heart of Chinese religion lies a frank reciprocity," he asserts, ever intent on the epigrammatic judgment. What he means is that you make offerings to the gods only so long as they appear able to give you something in return.
Essentially, Crook is a kind of philosopher, and like many philosophers he gains pleasure from high mountains. He admits his curiosity is usually insatiable, and has a thinker's natural aversion to dogma. He concludes his research in one area with a measured judgment worthy of Solomon: "No rule in Taiwan, it appears, is hard and fast." He also knows Taiwan's history, explaining for instance that Keelung was once a treaty port. Only in one instance would I take issue with him. He extracts from James W. Davidson's 1903 book The Island of Formosa a horrific description of the sale of Aborigine flesh by some Chinese merchants. But he should have gone on to mention that Davidson's book is driven by anti-Chinese sentiment, and that it uses this to justify the then recent occupation of Taiwan by Japanese forces. The reality was that Davidson had previously been a war correspondent with the Japanese, was presumably in their pay, and lost no opportunity to blacken the image of Chinese people throughout his massive and (to borrow for a moment Crook's characteristic even-handedness) nevertheless fascinating tome.
Crook is also an unostentatious satirist. He writes of "penny-dreadful demons with bug eyes and collar-length eyebrows", and then of the historical celebrity Liu Min-chuan (
Typical of his approach is the phrase "This may well be true, but at the same time ...", and it's a sure sign of a good mind. "No thesis drives this book," he asserts at the beginning. I should hope not -- the adoption of dogmatic theories is a certain indication of a narrow mentality. Unfortunately, the humanities departments of universities, which should be bastions of disinterested thought, are currently full of such impostors.
Crook, by contrast, has the enormously valuable quality of being able to hold two points of view in his mind at the same time without coming down firmly in favor of either of them. Indeed, he appears to relish the paradoxical and the contradictory. This is precisely what produces the astute, ironic tone and the quietly skeptical, sardonic remark, and is in the last analysis why this book is such a pleasure to read.
"I have always regarded," he concludes, " the extremes of beauty and ugliness on this island as an entertainment -- a freak-show, almost -- guaranteeing that I should never feel bored." All in all, this is a book that ought to be bought up in large quantities by the Taiwan authorities and distributed free to all English-speaking visitors. They would not be disappointed.
Publication Notes:
Keeping Up With the War God
By Steven Crook
135 Pages
Yushan Publications
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