Recently, I interviewed Carter via email about Unsavory Elements, some controversy surrounding the book, and what it means to be a foreigner in China today. The conversation has been edited and condensed:
What provided you with the original inspiration for compiling these stories? How did you go about collecting them?
Having paid tribute to the good people of this republic with my photo book I felt it only appropriate to also celebrate China’s expatriate life, which I myself have experienced for near a decade, by showcasing all of my favorite authors in a definitive collection. None of them knew me personally but they knew of my photography, were thus likely convinced of my sincerity and agreed to write new, original essays for an equal share of the royalties (knowing full well that meant pocket change).
Unsavory Elements has been a true grassroots project since its inception: It was published by Shanghai’s own Earnshaw Books, a fixture in the local literary scene; the fantastic cover art was contributed by the creative fellows behind Plastered T-shirts and Koryo Studio in Beijing; and we debuted the book during a sold-out session at the Shanghai Literary Festival. I couldn’t be happier with how it all came together so, how shall we say in China-speak? “Gloriously Harmonious.”
I've noticed an incredible diversity in your stories, both in terms of the age and gender of the authors as well as the stories' setting within China. Was this a deliberate goal from the beginning, or simply how everything came together?
Having spent so many years backpacking across China, the geographical range of the stories in this anthology was deliberate on my part. I was conscious that the book could easily have slipped into being entirely about Beijing and the bigger cities, but I was intent on seeing it span out into regions that are not commonly written about, from the Siberian wastes of the north (where Rudy Kong gets into an ice-hockey brawl against a team of local policemen) to the steamy jungles of the deep south-west (Jonathan Watts tracking down a lead in Xishuangbanna), stopping along the way at fourth-tier cities (Matt Muller teaching indifferent students in Chenzhou) and remote villages (Dan Washburn staying with a charming farming family in Guizhou). After all, China’s geographic and ethnic diversity is one of the best things about it!
That said, your writers appeared to hail almost exclusively from the West—the United States and the United Kingdom, for the most part. Was there any reason you didn't include stories from other, non-Western writers?
Balancing out the cast with established female writers was hard enough, so imagine how nearly impossible it was for me, the lone editor with no support staff, to track down ethnic expats who not only live in China but can write about it well. I’m lucky to have found two: Nury Vittachi, who is Sri Lankan but based in Hong Kong; I’ve been a fan of his Feng Shui Detective series since 2005 and was determined to include him. Audra Ang, a Singaporean Chinese (which, according to the Chinese, qualifies her as a foreigner), is a well-known Associated Press reporter and foodie author. I even invited Mark Ndesandjo, President Obama’s half-brother from Kenya (who lives in Shenzhen and published a memoir about it), but was shunned. Nonetheless, a Kenyan character does feature prominently in my own Unsavory story, as Africans are indeed a prolific part of the expat populous here. There simply aren’t very many established non-Western writers in the Middle Kingdom.