A D Millington

Alan Millington was brought up in a middle class environment in Monkseaton, a village attached to the seaside town of Whitley Bay in Northumberland, near Newcastle in the North East of England. He was born in 1951. He was educated at the Royal Grammar School, Newcastle
and at Balliol College, Oxford.

I first knew Alan when he was fifteen. He had learned to play Mah Jongg from his mother, a schoolteacher. We played with young friends using Alan's bamboo set and the Babcock Rules. Gradually more friends learned to play and we all acquired sets from various sources. By about 1968 we had formed the Monkseaton Mah Jongg Club. This grew steadily until it had about thirty members. The members were students at first. Later some of our parents began to play too and eventually the membership covered all age groups. We played competitions. At Christmas and Easter, when the student members were home, we had round robin
competitions, playing full games each day for three or four days. In term time there was a Residents League played at weekends. I was the competition secretary.

Alan went away to Oxford, returning during the holidays. He was a brilliant scholar, achieving a first class degree in history. He was something of an eccentric at this time, preferring traditional dress and encouraging a very formal lifestyle and behaviour. Alan stayed on at Oxford where he was commissioned to write the history of a shipping company, to celebrate its centenary. This project took longer than expected, not least because he was writing a book on Mah Jongg at the
same time.

We had become aware of different rule variations. Alan wanted to research how these had developed, analyse the differences and determine which he thought was the best game. To do this he used the Oxford libraries and their contacts to read every book he could find on the subject. He went so far as to learn to read Chinese so that he could read Chinese literature too. I understand it has been suggested that he made the whole thing up. This is ridiculous. He was a professional
author and spent years researching and writing the book. He did indeed have certain preferences. There is no doubt that Alan favoured traditional Chinese rules for very good reasons which are set out in the book. The vast majority of his explanation of the development of the game is based on his research. On occasion he has speculated on the reasons for certain features, but only when based on his study of Chinese philosophy at the time the game was being developed. Only when he comments on some of the variant forms are his remarks sometimes "tongue in cheek". Anyway, where Alan may have speculated in places, I have not seen any other explanation of the development of Mah Jongg which comes anywhere near to his work.

Alan could only undertake this work because somebody was paying him to write something else at the same time. Sadly, when the book was published, I think I recall that Alan received only £200 for the rights to it. As far as I am aware he has never had any further income from the work. However, he always said he did not set out to write it for money.

The Complete Book of Mah Jongg, of which I have a signed copy of the original hardback version, gave us a set of rules, based on sound reason, which we hoped would become a definitive standard for the future. Of course this never happened. Nevertheless, as Mah Jongg now appears to be enjoying a resurgence, partly due to the possibilities afforded by computer communications, I believe the book can still be held up to be the most complete study of the history and development of Mah Jongg to be written in English.

Alan Millington left Oxford to become a cathedral administrator and choral singer. I last heard that he had found a place for his highly developed intellect in the world of computer programming. I think I know how to find him and I will endeavour to do so.

As for the Monkseaton Mah Jongg Club, I know that it is still inexistence thirty years on and Mah Jongg competitions are still played. I have no way of knowing, but I suspect this is the oldest Mah Jongg Club in Britain and possibly in Europe.

As the popularity of the game grows, I sincerely hope that those who have been attracted to it through computer versions will come to play the real game sitting round a table with friends, as I did. I also hope that Millington's book will serve as a definitive guide to those who come to appreciate that the Traditional Chinese form of the game is indeed the variation which demands most skill and expertise in order to attempt to master it.

Tony Gray
September 1999