Red Bishop with Robin Yuan

Weds, May 11, 7pm on Zoom – In honor of Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month, Robin T. W. Yuan will speak on his book Red Bishop, the story of his grandfather Robin Chen, the last presiding bishop of the Anglican Church in China. Yuan charts Chen’s intricate journey, ranging from his early childhood years and his conversion to Christianity as a schoolboy at an Anglican missionary school to his death under house arrest decades later, showing a more nuanced picture of the Cultural Revolution than the version found in propaganda periodicals of the time disseminating “idyllic pictures of a communal utopia with caring barefoot doctors, smiling farmers, and singing factory workers.”

Kirkus Reviews stated of Yuan’s work that,  “although Yuan reminds his readers in a postscript that he’s writing fiction, the book gives the strong impression of being the best biography Chen will ever get. The novel’s blending of personalities and the seething politics of 20th-century China is seamlessly done, and its heroic portrait of its central character is always admiring but never saccharine. A detailed and moving tale about a heroic bishop in atheist China.”

REGISTER for the Zoom here.

Presented in partnership with the Belmont, Maynard and Winchester Public Libraries. Hosted by the Belmont Public Library.

Dr. Robin T.W. Yuan, in private practice in Beverly Hills since 1987, is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Medical School. He trained in general surgery at UCLA and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, and was a post-doctoral scholar in plastic surgery research at UCLA. Yuan is an assistant clinical professor of plastic surgery at UCLA and was one of the original participants in the hit TV show, “Extreme Makeover.” He was named as an LA SuperDoctor in cosmetic surgery by his peers and was recently selected by KCOP 13 as its “2011 Best Plastic Surgeon in Beverly Hills.” He is the author of four books which can be found at his website, RobinYuanAuthor.com.