Who writes Hong Kong memoirs? Examples from World War II survivors to policemen to those who just want to settle scores can reveal history in a new light
- Police memoirs have begun to appear in quantity from Hong Kong which, until recently, were among the most elusive
- Some recent offerings were clearly written in response to earlier works by former superiors or contemporaries; a desire to ‘set the record straight’ is apparent
Looking back is a corollary of advancing age. Life’s arc tends to make more sense as the trajectory reaches certain vantage points, and distance – whether from places, people or events – lends valuable perspective.
Retirement, sometimes far away from a life once lived, spent among those who stayed at home who – all too often – have little interest in someone else’s very different life lived on the other side of the world, brings formerly exotic, everyday experiences into sharp contrast.
Individuals mostly remember what they “choose” to remember. Without detailed diaries or other aids to accurate chronological recall, human memory gradually sifts recollections and reorders events, usually not from a deliberate desire to rewrite the past, but to make sense of it, in terms of a coherent story.
Personal motivations for memoir writing are various; a desire to be better understood by later generations of one’s own family often plays a key role. Dedications to children and grandchildren, as well as a spouse who shared long-ago, far-off adventures, are commonplace.
Whether a personal story is released close to the events it chronicles, or some decades later, often affects how accurate and decisive a memoir is. A degree of individual score-settling characterises some later publications; with potentially controversial people safely dead – and the risk of libel suits thus eliminated – more honest accounts become possible.
Distinct genres exist within Hong Kong memoir writing. Accounts of prisoners-of-war and of civilian internee camps enjoyed a brief flowering after World War II ended. As immediate interest tapered off, and people went on with their renewed peacetime lives, publications dwindled. Intermittent releases continued, until public interest resurged from the 1970s to the 1990s when significant historical anniversaries chimed.
Having your photo taken by this man was quite the Hong Kong status marker
Colonial service and administrative memoirs generally appeared long after retirement, when the experiences of life in various corners of the British Empire gradually receded into history.
As anyone with an adult memory of the Pacific war years is now long dead – and likewise, most formerly senior government officials – these genres are effectively extinct, unless some compelling unpublished manuscript unexpectedly sees the light of day.
Police memoirs have begun to appear in quantity from Hong Kong. Until recently, these were among the most elusive; various examples exist from across former colonial territories, but they are few and far between.
Most policemen, presumably, found the detail of their working lives interesting enough on a day-to-day basis while they were actually living them, but too pedestrian in retrospect to sit down and comprehensively document it after retirement. All too often, others must find someone’s personal story of compelling interest, worth recording for posterity, and start to badger them to do so, before people see the inherent value for themselves.
Some recent offerings were clearly written in response to earlier works by former superiors or contemporaries; a desire to tell their own side of the story, or “set the record straight” in some regard, soon becomes apparent.
What all of these reminiscences have in common is genuine period flavour, and the kind of telling detail that caught an individual’s eye. Humour generally predominates; a desire to remember the good times, and look on the bright side of various experiences, is a common enough human trait.
For historians with specialist interests in particular places or periods, memoirs offer rich, frequently unexpected sources of primary information. A few random paragraphs, tucked away among more generic tales of long-ago mess nights, jungle patrols and football matches, might accurately confirm – or authoritatively contradict – generally held views about a particular event, or shine important light on some hitherto hard-to-fathom personality.
Likewise, an individual whose name appears throughout official files often remains obscure until they reveal themselves in the pages of a chatty memoir. Tantalising insights into official thought processes suddenly materialise and can offer key clues to otherwise hard-to-solve historical puzzles.
