N ot since I read Leo Tolstoy’s very different War and Peace, almost fifty years ago, have I completed a book with such a sense of regret at the loss of intimate friends.
      My Journey in Mystic China: Old Pu’s Travel Diary – John Blofeld’s Chinese name was Pu – is a remarkable account of life lived in China in the 1930s and 1940s, by an Englishman who responded simply and purely to the elegant spirituality and intellectuality of traditional Chinese life.
      His account is direct, honest and unadorned. A sympathetic reader will share his experiences, sentiments and insights, as if they were being lived today.
      One of my major contentions with Blofeld’s account is his conviction that 1949 marked the end of this extraordinary civilisation. He does not recognise that Mao’s communist revolution was the means used by the Chinese people to regain their autonomy, reassert their independence and rediscover their identity in a world invaded by alien and destructive forces.
      He was permanently scarred by the regrettable destruction and many personal tragedies amongst the inevitable bloody, messy confusion of revolution.
      As result, Blofeld was alienated from China for the last three decades of his life, which were lived predominantly in Bangkok where he wrote this book in Chinese in his last years.
      Yet his book will enlighten anyone who has truly experienced something of life in contemporary China. Chinese civilisation is too deep and rich to be wiped out by European intruders, Japanese invaders or an alien communist ideology.
      In fact, today the Chinese civilisation that Blofeld loved and exalted is not only reinventing itself in China, but increasingly visiting, inspiriting and re-energising much of the rest of the world.
      Most obvious are the consequences of the success of Chinese traditional medicine, of Chinese therapeutic practices like giqong and taijiquan, of Chinese meditative disciplines like Daoism and Chan Buddhism, and of unique Chinese forms of consciousness that derive from the Yijing and Daodejing.
      It is fitting that Daniel Reid, whose writings have done so much to bring profound dimensions of Chinese medical, scientific, spiritual and meditative wisdom to English language readers, has translated this book.
      While written by Blofeld in Chinese, as almost a dying salute to the love of his life, Reid’s translation captures the soul, spirit, inspiration and wisdom of a unique life.
      Blofeld, who died in 1987, did not live long enough to see the remarkable renaissance of the Chinese spirit that is now beginning to transform the world.
      This book offers many unique and rare insights into that spirit which helps explain its recent robust revival. Contrary to Blofeld’s expectations, it also illuminates the character of those who are shaping what is happening in China today.
      It does this by recounting a diverse range of deeply felt personal exchanges with people at all levels and in many areas of Chinese society, including his touching romantic misadventures.
      It is a delightful experience to live again with Blofeld his discoveries of personalities from traditional China. His passing mention that the costume of the Daoist adept has not changed since the Han Dynasty two thousand years ago brought home to me the incredible profundity of the simple, constant truths of this aspect of Chinese spirituality.
      Blofeld moves seamlessly from his raptures over the courtesies and generosities of several ‘elder brothers’, drawn from the most cultivated and privileged of the Confucian literati, to the following description of country villagers in northern China:
      “Despite their poverty, shabby clothing, and illiteracy, that group of men and women, old and young alike, reflected an attitude of modesty and respect, and they were all admirably well-mannered, guileless and kind-hearted. If I were to select a term to describe them in English, I’d call them ‘nature’s gentlefolk’.”
      Soon after this passage Blofeld recounts discovering that the admonitions of the great sage, Confucius, did not differ greatly from advice given to him by Daoists on Mount Hua.
      Had Blofeld lived longer in China and delved further into the wisdom of the Chinese classics he may have discovered deeper strains, which account simultaneously for both the guileless and the resilient aspects of the character of the well-mannered and kind-hearted Chinese gentlefolk, whether elevated Confucian literati or humble villagers. After all, both Chinese strategic wisdom and martial art are characterised by highly cultivated and calculated humility, courtesy and discretion.
      Blofeld, himself, presents as simple, guileless and dedicated to respecting all he could learn about Chinese civilisation. He offers an excellent example to anyone from another culture approaching China. There is a spontaneous generosity and pride that can inform Chinese responses to a sincerely interested foreigner.
      Given the vast richness of Chinese civilisation there is much to be learned, and much need on the part of foreigners for commitment, patience and humility when undertaking that learning.
      The Chinese market, which has become such a mindless obsession for so many who seek riches in China, is never a subject of interest. Yet Blofeld, in My Journey in Mystic China: Old Pu’s Travel Diary, shows how he sought and gained great riches in China and how others can do so today.