Robert van Gulik with wife Shui Shih-fang 1946
Sample of authors
Gulik, Robert van
Robert Hans van Gulik was born in Zutphen, the Netherlands, and grew up in Batavia (now Jakarta) in the former Dutch East Indies, where his father served as a medical officer in the Dutch Army. Van Gulik’s father collected Chinese porcelain and passed his interest on to his son who taught himself Mandarin. Robert van Gulik was fascinated by Chinese history and culture, and he became an authority o...
Literary figures
Flavia Albia
Gender: Female
When ‘private informer’ Marcus Didius Falco’s wife Helena meets her, Flavia Albia is a sullen teenager of unknown origin: she probably has a Roman father and a mother from Britannia. Falco and Helena adopt the girl, who grows up to become a beautiful woman and a clever detective. She takes over after Falco as the main character in Lindsay Davis’ historical detective stories, which are set in the 1...