I told my editors at The New Yorker that it would probably be at least two years before I transitioned back to journalism. During my first semester, the magazine sent two other writers, Evan Osnos and Jiayang Fan, to China and Hong Kong to research stories. But such travel became impossible after the country closed its borders in response to the pandemic. In mid-March of 2020, as part of an ongoing diplomatic dispute with the Trump administration, the Chinese government announced that it was expelling American correspondents from The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. The expulsions targeted many of the most experienced journalists, leaving bureaus badly understaffed.
fredag 26. juli 2024
Peter Hessler: Sideline Sinology
When I moved to Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province, in August 2019, my intention was to take a break from journalism. I accepted a position at the Sichuan University-Pittsburgh Institute, where I agreed to a relatively full teaching load, with around 60 students per semester in writing and journalism classes. One of my goals was to get a sense of how Chinese students and universities had changed over the past two decades. I had first arrived in Sichuan in 1996 as a Peace Corps volunteer posted to a small city called Fuling, and ever since I had stayed in touch with many of my former students. I planned to frequently revisit Fuling in order to write a follow-up to River Town.
I told my editors at The New Yorker that it would probably be at least two years before I transitioned back to journalism. During my first semester, the magazine sent two other writers, Evan Osnos and Jiayang Fan, to China and Hong Kong to research stories. But such travel became impossible after the country closed its borders in response to the pandemic. In mid-March of 2020, as part of an ongoing diplomatic dispute with the Trump administration, the Chinese government announced that it was expelling American correspondents from The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. The expulsions targeted many of the most experienced journalists, leaving bureaus badly understaffed.
I told my editors at The New Yorker that it would probably be at least two years before I transitioned back to journalism. During my first semester, the magazine sent two other writers, Evan Osnos and Jiayang Fan, to China and Hong Kong to research stories. But such travel became impossible after the country closed its borders in response to the pandemic. In mid-March of 2020, as part of an ongoing diplomatic dispute with the Trump administration, the Chinese government announced that it was expelling American correspondents from The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. The expulsions targeted many of the most experienced journalists, leaving bureaus badly understaffed.
