Emperor Can Wait… but not Emma Chen’s fans! The popular restaurateur and owner of the Red Chamber restaurant in the Hyde Park Shopping Centre in Joburg was inundated with book signing requests before her book launch even began on Tuesday, 3 November.
The launch was held at the mall’s Exclusive Books branch, literally “just around the corner” from Chen’s famous restaurant. Guests were treated to divinely delicious Chinese food and tea. Arts critic and academic Darryl Accone, the featured speaker, began by saying, “We come not to eat Emma’s food and drink in her words – but to praise them”.
Always eloquent, Accone spoke about how “Memoirs about food, family and homeland allow privileged glimpses into other cultures”. He called Chen “A citizen of the republic of letters, a vizier in the empire of grand cuisine” and praised her Red Chamber restaurant as a “home from home for many long-term patrons – a place of family, a community dedicated to excellence and humanism”.
Describing Emperor Can Wait Accone said, “It’s a memoir that knows it’s about family, friends and food, about life, love and literature, about where home and the heart are to be found”. He praised Chen for a “writer’s keen engagement with all the senses” in her book.
Sharing the Chinese greeting, “Have you eaten yet?” with the guests, Accone said the book captures the “centrality of food and social relations” in Chinese daily life. Telling of Chen’s childhood in the Republic of China in Taiwan, he recognised that, “Food carries with it the power of the old country”. For Emma Chen’s book he said, “Read it, buy it, treasure it”. He then invited Chen to step up to the mic to talk about her reasons for writing the book.
Chen immediately acknowledged Accone’s role in introducing her to her writing group and jokingly reminisced about his not-so-endearing previous role as a food critic!
She said once she started writing, she realised she “could not write anything else but my own childhood”. Speaking about her cultural heritage, she said, “The Chinese are a very reserved people, it is only through food that you feel you are being taken care of”. She added, “I think I wrote the book for myself… The process of writing made me feel that I didn’t lose my home”. And she laughed: “Everything in it is true!”
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With a wink and a smile she invited guests to listen to her read from a chapter of Emperor Can Wait, titled with a Chinese swear word that might translate as “Jou ma se…”. The chapter told of a young Emma’s adventure out on a boat with a young boy. Her reading beautifully evoked her feistiness of spirit – a well-known part of the dynamic woman of today.
Emperor Can Wait promises to be a delectable read and includes Chen’s own recipes for her famous food at the end of each chapter.
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