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Olivia DrakeOctober 13, 20143min
Vera Schwarcz, the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, professor of history, is the author of a new book titled Colors of Veracity: A Quest for Truth in China, and Beyond, published by the University of Hawai'i Press in November 2014. In Colors of Veracity, Schwarcz condenses four decades of teaching and scholarship about China to raise fundamental questions about the nature of truth and history. In vivid prose, she addresses contemporary moral dilemmas with a highly personal sense of ethics and aesthetics. Drawing on classical sources in Hebrew and Chinese (as well as several Greek and Japanese texts), Schwarcz…

Olivia DrakeJuly 29, 20133min
Vera Schwarcz, the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, professor of history, is the author of Ancestral Intelligence, published by Antrim House Books in 2013. In Ancestral Intelligence, Schwarcz depicts the cultural landscape of contemporary China by creating “renditions” of poems by a mid-20th century dissident poet, Chen Yinke, and by adding a group of her own poems in harmony with Chen Yinke’s. Like his, her poems show a degradation of culture and humanity, in this case through comparison of classic and modern Chinese logographs. In the tragic yet inspiring story of Chen Yinke, Schwarcz finds her own powerful…

Olivia DrakeJanuary 25, 20133min
During Wesleyan's winter recess, Vera Schwarcz, the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, worked on a paratroopers' reservist base in Israel through Volunteers for Israel. The 30-year-old program seeks volunteers to promote solidarity and goodwill among Israelis, American Jews, and other friends of Israel. Each day, Schwarcz and 13 other volunteers in her group, reported for work in a warehouse overseen by a female officer, the mother of two young children. "We, the American volunteers worked alongside young soldiers (mostly 19-year-old girls) and male reservists in their late 20s - all sent to this base to help out with…

Olivia DrakeDecember 11, 20122min
After visiting Israel several times to lecture about Chinese and Jewish history, Vera Schwarcz, the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, professor of history, decided to do something different during her next trip abroad. "I wanted to let go of the 'specialness' of my training and skills and do something more basic, something more grounded and more urgently needed at the moment," she says. On Dec. 16, Schwarcz will begin a two week service trip with “Volunteers for Israel," a 30-year-old program that promotes solidarity and goodwill among Israelis, American Jews, and other friends of Israel. Since 1982, more than 30,000…

Olivia DrakeJanuary 23, 20122min
Vera Schwarcz, the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, presented a paper on Jan. 20 titled "To Honor the Language of Truth: Reflections on F. Nietzsche, H.N. Bialik, Chen Yinke and Zhang Longxi" at the City University of Hong Kong. Schwarcz, who also is a professor of history, professor of East Asian Studies, was an invited speaker at the international conference on "Cross Cultural Studies: China and the World." Schwarcz's essay will be published as part of a book on 2012. (more…)

Eric GershonJuly 25, 20114min
This issue we ask "5 Questions" of Vera Schwarcz, who spent the spring semester as a Lady Davis Fellow at Hebrew University in Israel. Schwarcz is the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, professor of history, professor of East Asian studies.  She returns to campus this fall. Q: What will you remember most about your recent sojourn in Israel? A: What lingers most in mind is the vibrant commitment to live fully the values of Jewish tradition. In Jerusalem, each day I witnessed some act of kindness, some conscious effort to reach out to strangers in a way that pays homage…

Olivia DrakeDecember 2, 20102min
Vera Schwarcz, the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, professor of history, was selected by the United States’ Department of State to serve in the Speakers Program Oct. 20-24. She lectured at several universities in Chongqing and Beijing—on the subject of the 150th anniversary of the destruction of the old summer palace of Yuan Ming Yuan, in 1860. Having been selected by the State Department as a member of the very first group of American exchange scholars to live and study in China in 1979, Schwarcz has been returning regularly to China for the past three decades. This was…

Olivia DrakeApril 21, 20101min
Vera Schwarcz, the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, director of the Freeman Center for East Asian Studies, chair and professor of East Asian Studies, professor of history, was a guest author at the Farmington River Literary Arts Center's "Readings by the River" series April 18. Schwarcz read from her book of poetry titled Chisel of Remembrance. The daughter of Holocaust survivors, Schwarcz has made the quest for remembrance a central theme in all her works. Her writing has been nominated for the National Jewish Book Award and has been accorded several major grants, including a Guggenheim Fellowship.