These books were made for walking

Whether as a longtime resident or a tourist passing through, there's little doubt that Shanghai's splendor in the first half of the 20th century plays a significant role in formulating one's understanding of the city. However, the significance of various buildings and avenues is often obscured by the lenses of language, time and culture.

Luckily for us, a team of longtime Shanghailanders has been assembled for a book entitled Still More Shanghai Walks: Shanghailanders & Shanghainese, Where They Lived, Worked & Played.

The third installment in the Shanghai Walks series spearheaded by Shanghai history guru Tess Johnston, the book offers up six walks packed full of historical information and detailed maps ready to turn idle strolls into trips back in time.

Many places, many styles

The book is notable for the authors' multiplicity of voices. Patrick Cranley's ode to Shanghai's most famous boulevard "The Bund: Tycoons, Coolies and Communists" takes a friendly, yet authoritative tone while describing the wonders of the Bund.

In contrast, Lisa Movius' "Culture & Cafes in the Former French Concession" includes moments of confession. While describing Huashan Road's famous Zhenliu Apartments, she admits, "Your humble author once nearly rented a flat there; while the kitchen was grotty and shared, really I was intimidated by the building's ghosts of literary accomplishment past."

The four other walks illustrated in the book also display each of the authors' idiosyncratic points of interest. Bill Savadore's "Merchant Princes and the Badlands Xinhua Road" includes an intriguing sidebar on British novelist JG Ballard's childhood home, a place even Ballard admits had a major impact on his dystopian works.

"The Former Jewish Ghetto and Tilanqiao's Lively Street Market" by Sue Anne Tay contains a fascinating account of the Indian Sikhs who once patrolled the International Settlement. Johnston's own "Crosswalking the Concession: The Many Facets of Frenchtown" is full of her indefatigable relish for architectural discovery.

Her description of roof supports in a villa off of Gaolan Road includes, "The guard was very pleased to see me so delighted with my find, and urged me to come again and I will." Duncan Hewitt's "The Western Suburbs Hongqiao Road" finishes off the collection including a brief biography of American airman Claire Lee Chennault and his influential wife Chen Hsiang-Mei.

Walking the walk

While the book is well illustrated with many color pictures of sites as they can be seen today, the book is intended to be a supplement to actually taking the walk yourself. Each walk begins with basic information such as the walk's duration, taxi instructions and even suggestions about where to grab a coffee to keep you energized.

As a result, it would hardly do the book justice not to take it for a stroll. The Global Times picked two walks from the collection Tay's "The Former Jewish Ghetto and Tilanqiao's Lively Street Market" and Movius' "Culture & Cafes in the Former French Concession."

Tay's walk delighted not only in the heritage architecture seen so easily throughout the first half of the walk, but also in the immense outdoor market on Zhoushan Road that finished it off.

Of the walk, Tay said, "It is relatively off the beaten path from the French Concession and Bund areas which are covered heavily in the series. I thought I could expand it a bit more to include a typical Shanghai street market experience."

Movius' walk is notable for the in-depth research about all the characters that once stalked the areas we walked through. In researching the book, Movius encountered difficulties, "A lot of the literati were hard to find much information on, especially in English but also in Chinese."

However, the work has paid off. Sites such as the Shanghai Theater Academy gain extraordinary depth as thoughts of performers from the past mingle with the sights of those of today.

The series of books cost 150 yuan ($22.90), available through the Old China Hand Bookstores at Deke Erh Gallery (Bldg 2B, Lane 210 Taikang Road 210 2B , 6415-0675), and the Old China Hand Reading Room (27 Shaoxing Road 27 , 6473-2526).