Book review: China in Drag: Travels with a Cross-dresser

Michael Bristow spent nearly nine years in China as a reporter for the BBC and, nearing the end of his time in the country, decided to write a book about the life of his Chinese teacher.

Born soon after Chairman Mao came to power, “the Teacher”, as he is known in the book, lived through many of modern China’s trials and tribulations. Bristow decided to travel with him through China to revisit parts of the country that shaped the man’s life – documenting it as they went.

On their first venture outside of Beijing together, Bristow discovered that the Teacher’s vivid stories were not just in the past. The Teacher came out of his room dressed for dinner in high heels, tights and a crop top. The 60-something teacher was an active cross-dresser.

The book tells the modern history of China through the eyes of the Teacher and, it could be argued, his life was not so different from many others of that generation. When he was young, the Beijing native had his education cut short and was sent to the countryside to crack rocks and toil the fields. He returned to Beijing and worked in a food-flavouring factory before a stab at writing gave his career a new turn and he ended up working in “propaganda”, or marketing as we might call it.

Aside from the cross-dressing, there are few stories in the book that haven’t been heard before but what makes the Teacher stand apart is his humanity and humility. Bristow describes the protagonist with such affection, and on occasion frustration, that the reader inevitably warms to them. Factual and historical stories are transformed into personal tales that make the reader feel that they too are walking through fields propping up an old man in high heels. Bristow manages to make the sometimes brutal history of China accessible and relatable.

People say that spending a week in China allows you to write an article about it and spending a month enables a book. More time than that means you know too much and it becomes impossible to write anything. Having spent nearly a decade as a journalist in the country, Bristow clearly knows a lot about the country but presents his knowledge thoughtfully. In the book, he covers over half a century of China’s history, politics and society, without overloading the reader with detail or trivialising history by skimming over the more uncomfortable periods.

There are laugh out loud points in the book that ensure anyone who has spent time in China will relate. It is a lively reminder of the almost unbelievable changes that one generation have lived through.

Why did you decide to use “the Teacher” to tell your China story?

I decided to use the Teacher’s story to write about China because I came to realise that he personifies the country under the Communist Party. He was born just two years after the party came to power in 1949, and the ups and downs of the country in that time have mirrored the Teacher’s successes and failures. And when I found out that he was a cross-dresser I realised that I had a unique angle to talk about China. His struggles to be open about his love of women’s clothes are China’s struggles to modernise without losing the best of what it already has.

You mention that in China people were not aggressive towards his expression of his sexuality. How do you think China deals with differences like this? 

Chinese society has been more tolerant of sexual and gender differences compared to the West, where Christianity has strict moral codes. Chinese people are also more practical than people in the West. If it works, why not do it. All this means that it wasn’t hard for people to accept the teacher’s cross-dressing.

Were you worried that by writing about his cross-dressing you might “out” your teacher?

Yes, that’s why he is anonymous in the book. Although he is very comfortable about who he is, he knows that others might not be so relaxed, including his family. He didn’t want his name used in the book because he didn’t want to bring them any unwanted trouble.

How much did you know about the Teacher’s life before you set off on your journey? Were you surprised at what you discovered?

Apart from the cross-dressing, which I found out about on our first trip away, I knew a lot about the Teacher’s life before we started travelling together. But I only knew the basic facts, there were many details that I found out along the way, and of course spending so much time with someone on long journeys really helps you get to know them. I was pleased that he decided to confide in me.

That is the intention. Often books about China concentrate on the politics or the economics, and might be too dry for a general reader. I hope that by focusing on the Teacher and his story, I can introduce some of the other aspects of life in China to a wider audience. The aim is to give readers an understanding of what it is like to be Chinese and live in China.