"If a memoir is how one remembers one's own life, the account of the experiences of Stanley S. K. Kwan in The Dragon and the Crown is not just a collection of personal recollections. It says volumes about the collective memory of Hong Kong Chinese amid th

"Our lives today seem dull compared to those who lived through the war, and not only witnessed but experienced the tussle between the Nationalists and Communists in the borrowed place of British colonial Hong Kong. Political ideology has always been a div

"The Dragon and the Crown is a fascinating account of the twentieth-century history of Hong Kong. Stanley Kwan is the master of the telling detail as he recounts the saga of his extended family, torn between capitalist, colonialist Hong Kong and the Chine

"A compelling story, and he tells it well." --Frank Ching, Wall Street Journal Asia

Stanley S. K. Kwan was born in Hong Kong in 1925 into a traditional Chinese banking family. He attended King's College until the fall of Hong Kong in 1941 and joined the Chinese army as an interpreter for US forces during the war. From 1962 until he retired in 1984, he headed the Research Department in Hang Seng Bank. He launched the Hang Seng Index in 1969, served on the government's Statistics Advisory Board during 1976-84 and was awarded the MBE in 1985. He now lives in Toronto, Canada. Nicole Kwan is the niece of Stanley Kwan. She has a BA degree from Smith College and MAs from Yale University and the University of Hong Kong. She worked in international banking for over twenty years while based in Hong Kong.