Tai-Pan: The Second Novel of the Asian Saga

Product Information

Before joining Goodreads, I had already read ‘Shogun’, so you, my friendly reader, do not have the luxury of a review of that as comparison, but I believe that what I say about ‘Tai-Pan’, set in Hong Kong, can easily be said of it’s predecessor.

In the end, he is unfortunately not much more than another low hurdle or toothless lion that Struan overcomes with ease, which is a shame because Struan's personal relationship with Brock is actually one of the more interesting parts of the story. Clavell reveals our central protagonist to be an alpha male’s male that would make Ted Nugent look like Wallace Shawn. If Queen Victoria was the biggest drug dealer in the history of the world, then Dirk Struan, the 'Tai-pan' is her Main Dealer in Hong Kong. But Clavell goes farther, for while there is a George Washington and an Abraham Lincoln who resemble who they generally were in history in Jakes‘ series, Clavell actually invents names to stand in to the company of historical figures. As the pace kept speeding up and the end of the book was getting closer and closer I stopped hoping for some interesting finale and accepted that I would likely get some terrible twist of fate or act of god in the end that would make the finale seem less wholesome and try to make up for the fact that the protagonist faced no challenge throughout the entire story.Set in 1840s China (Canton), Macao and most importantly, the brand-new English colony of Hong Kong (which Dirk negotiated away from the Emperor through the oh-so-pliable governor), the story is set around Dirk Stuan, a larger than life English “China trader” pitted against Brock, his dark and brutish arch enemy, in a nonstop race to be the best, make the most and outsmart all the rest as tai-pans of The Noble House and the Second Noble House.

I will talk about the finale in the spoiler below because I feel it's necessary as it made me lower my score from barely 3 stars to a fair 2 stars, but I can say without spoiling anything that I was not wrong in my assumption. He brings to light the manipulations that occur behind locked doors over a glass or two of good port or brandy with results that benefit the few over the many. The second part of the arrangement, Struan agreed that a member of the Chen family would forever be comprador of Noble House. In 1834, free trade reform advocates succeeded in ending the monopoly of the British East India Company under the Charter Act of 1833. He knows how merciless life can be and his primary goal every day is to protect what is his and the people he cares about.

Diverso anche il tipo di personaggi: il protagonista, il Tai Pan, è un uomo che grazie alle proprie qualità eccezionali ha creato un impero commerciale, e che da solo manovra la politica inglese e quella cinese, i commercianti delle due nazioni e chiunque gli passi vicino, al solo scopo di creare Hong Kong, e di usarla come grimaldello per aprire la Cina al mondo. All these aspects of Clavell come out strongly in his novels and will either drive you crazy or have you nodding in agreement.

What gives this book a plus, aside from the historical problems is that it is a decent drama and adventure. Clavell seems to not have been able to decide whether he wants Brock to be simply a rival of Struan's or an evil fantasy antagonist. Clavell is best known for his epic Asian Saga series of novels and their televised adaptations, along with such films as The Great Escape, The Fly and To Sir, with Love. Dirk Struan and Tyler Brock left many children, legitimate and illegitimate, who take up their respective fathers' mantles and continue the battle.

The man could tell a tale, and one with enough recognizable features enmeshed within the exotic and the historic to propel his literary vessel across roiling, tempestuous seas. It conjures up some excellent historical imagery and introduces many of the most important historical developments of the era. I just try to protect mysel’ and mine as best I know how and to choose the time of my dying, that’s all. The book's got great ambience, impressive characters - villains and good guys - and a fine plot, but what really have stuck with me through all these years is the larger-than-life persona of Dirk Struan, the "Taipan", or "supreme leader. I have a bias towards historical novels and as such I liked it even 5hough this kind of narrative may not be of anyone’s taste.

I mean megabooks in the sense that this is a pretty long one at around 7-800 pages but it’s also unashamedly full of pure entertainment. I was gonna go with Noble House but that one seems like it has a lot of shit having to do with finance, which I pretty much don’t understand a lot about. It is the second book in Clavell's Asian Saga, and the first to feature the fictional Struan family. There were so many great characters especially Dirk and his Mei Mei, they were so well suited,yin and yang. There aren't really good guys and bad guys (except, you know, Imperialism), just competing interests and agendas.I don't often fall victim to employing modern-day lingo, but it offers a great way to describe Dirk Struan in a single word, and that word is Chad. I think that's why a person can give a five star to a book like say, The Alchemist, and a four or maybe even a three star, to a Dostoyevsky. Diversa la collocazione geografica, uguale la sottolineatura sulle abitudini igieniche e di pulizia degli orientali (giapponesi in Shogun, cinesi qui) contrapposte al culto della sporcizia e delle superstizioni dannose (tipo quelle su pulizia delle mani o aria fresca) di noi occidentali dell'epoca. Tai-Pan was Clavell’s second book, first published in 1966, and is coincidentally also the second chronological book in his Asian saga of books.