Public
Despite a long list of works, recognition of Burke largely concerns
Limehouse Nights, his second publication. Published in 1917, Burke’s gritty tales of London’s Chinatown ignited immediate controversy. The book was initially banned by circulating libraries, not only on grounds of general immorality, but also for the scandalous interracial relationships portrayed between Chinese men and white women. Set during World War I in a declining British Empire,
Limehouse Nights aggravated already present anxieties. As critic Anne Witchard notes, the twentieth century Britain of Burke's lifetime propagated the idea of Yellow perilism, which saw the presence of the Chinese in London as a cause of "degenerative metropolitan blight and imperial and racial decline”. In no small part thanks to Burke and his contemporary, Sax Rohmer, what had been a largely unnoticed Chinese immigrant population now found itself under public scrutiny. The culmination of this negative attention was a hysteria in the late 1920s, centered around claims of “the hypnotism of white girls by yellow men”. In America, aided by D.W. Griffith’s adaptation of “The Chink and the Child,” the 1919 silent film
Broken Blossoms, Burke’s reception was much more positive. Having so closely tied his literature to Limehouse, illuminating an otherwise shadowed community, it is somewhat ironic that Burke’s popularity correlated with the decline of Chinese concentration in the district, leaving him all but forgotten today.
Critical
Burke’s critical reception is as concentrated on
Limehouse Nights as his public reception. Consensus is largely positive, praise coming from such notable authors as H.G. Wells and Arnold Bennett. Even negative reviews tend to be tempered by acknowledgement for Burke’s craft. Critic Gilbert Seldes, for instance, wrote:
“Possibly Mr. Burke’s books, at once vigorous and wanton, may be respected afterward; one fears only that they will be found a little purposeless, a little lacking in social direction. It is that lack, of course, which makes them so attractive. For, it may be mentioned, these are wonderfully good things to read.”
More ecstatic reviewers echo critic Milton Bronner’s favorable comparison: “Not since the days when Kipling burst upon the English word has any writer displayed more sheer power and driving force”.. Unlike Kipling, who wrote at the height of empire in distant India, however, recent interpretation suggests Burke found critical success by bringing the exotic home, providing escape for a public caught in the unprecedented brutality of World War I.
Reviews of Burke's many other works are more mixed, and always overshadowed by the controversial and successful
Limehouse Nights.
Twinkletoes, published a year later in 1918, rode on the same wave of approval.
More Limehouse Nights in 1921 was also generally well received, but Burke was increasingly criticized for repetition. As critic John Gunther remarked, “[it] may be true that London is big enough to stand nine books about her from one hand. But that hand should be a bigger one than Thomas Burke’s”. While critical interest in Burke is now typically sparse, when recognized he is still regarded favorably as a Modernist author.