The Formosa Fraud
The Formosa Fraud
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The Formosa Fraud by Graham Earnshaw
More than 300 years ago, the island of Taiwan was a topic of hot controversy in London, thanks to a stupendous fraud perpetrated by a Frenchman claiming to have been born on the island. He made highly controversial claims about the life and the history of Taiwan, then called Formosa, and his book on the subject was a publishing sensation in London in 1704. His name, George Psalmanazar, was fake, and he never told anyone what his real name was or where he came from. But his Formosan stories of mass killings of young boys, of people living underground, of elephants and camels and gold mines was for a time widely accepted, including even by the Bishop of London who invited Psalmanazar to teach his (fake) Formosan language at Oxford University. This is the story of one of the great frauds in literary history.
Graham Earnshaw is a writer and publisher who has long lived in the China world. He has written and published a number of books, including On Your Own in China (1984), Tales of Old Shanghai (2008) and an account of his continuing walk across China, The Great Walk of China (2010). His translation of the Jin Yong kung fu novel The Book and The Sword was published by Oxford University Press in 2004.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9789888422128 |
| ISBN 10 | 988842212X |
| Title | The Formosa Fraud |
| Author | Graham Earnshaw |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Earnshaw Books Limited |
| Year published | 2017-08-28 |
| Number of pages | 264 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |