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[flemmings]

Historically useful article on Asian steampunk.

All I know about the Warlord period in China comes from Tsui Hark's Peking Opera Blues/ 刀馬旦 and the first bit of Mei Lanfang but that always seemed made for steampunk. So does late Meiji, if I didn't have late Meiji totally confused with the elegant ghosts of the RainyWillow Store.

Comments

[paleaswater.livejournal.com]

I guess the warlord period is a bit late-ish timewise for steampunk -- it parallels Taisho more than Meiji. Feels more like Taisho than Meiji too - always has a eulogiec feel to it. Thought the Rainy willow is more Taisho too, but perhaps I'm not sure much in touch with Japan.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

1916-1928 is lateish for steampunk in the west, but to me the military trappings of the era (going by manga and film alone, I grant you) seems more akin to imperial England than to, say, Jazz Age or Roaring Twenties. Taishou to me always has that dim golden age feel, a better time than what went before or came after; is that how the Warlord period is seen in China?

Rainywillow is very distinctly Meiji, especially in the early volumes where you still have impoverished and disfranchised offspring of the samurai houses, and the violence and upheaval of the Bakumatsu and early Meiji period are alive in the memories of people who are still young.

[mvrdrk.livejournal.com]

If I understand things correctly, China was a mish mash of periods at that point. Shanghai was doing the roaring twenties/jazz age, while other parts of the country were doing the warlords military stuff, and still other parts were still working out of the imperial system. Dad says one of my maternal grandmother's distant (grand?)uncles was a warlord, but I've no clue who or what is up with that.

[paleaswater.livejournal.com]

Yes exactly -- I guess you could call it the warlord period, but I think the period is not really associated with them that strongly in popular imagination -- mostly it's the coming of modernity in the cities vs the still very traditional countryside.

It would not be terribly surprising if you're related to some warlord -- Most upper class Chinese who ended up in America or Taiwan are related to one somehow -- that's why they get out of the country. My grandfather on my mother's side was senior secretary to the warlord (well, official he was a nationalist general, but everyone know that was just for appearances) who controlled large sections of northern China and Beijing itself -- unfortunately he didn't manage to get out of the country. On the other hand if he did I wouldn't be here today, so I guess I'm glad it worked out that way.