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1587: A Year of No Significance: The Ming Dynasty in Decline
Ray Huang, Huang Ren Yu · back to the book
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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorThe Boxer Rebellion: The Dramatic Story of China's War on Foreigners that Shook the World in the Summer of 1900
Diana Preston · 436 pages
"The Boxer Rebellion is a panoramic chronicle of the uprising and ensuing two-month siege of the eleven foreign ministries in Peking (now Beijing), and of the foreign community in Tientsin (now Tianjin), during the summer of 1900 - the repercussions of which have echoed throughout the intervening century. It left tens of thousands of Chinese dead, precipitated the end of dynastic rule in China, an
The Chinese Opium Wars
Jack Beeching · 376 pages
An enlightening account of a notorious period in nineteenth-century imperialism, when an effort by the Chinese government to stamp out the country's profitable opium trade resulted in a series of conflicts known as the Opium Wars. Index; illustrations and map.
China: A New History
John King Fairbank, Merle Goldman · 552 pages
John King Fairbank was the West's doyen on China, and this book is the full and final expression of his lifelong engagement with this vast ancient civilization. It remains a masterwork without parallel. The distinguished historian Merle Goldman brings the book up to date, covering reforms in the post-Mao period through the early years of the twenty-first century, including the leadership of Hu Jin
1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance
Gavin Menzies · 368 pages
The brilliance of the Renaissance laid the foundation of the modern world. Textbooks tell us that it came about as a result of a rediscovery of the ideas and ideals of classical Greece and Rome. But now bestselling historian Gavin Menzies makes the startling argument that in the year 1434, China--then the world's most technologically advanced civilization--provided the spark that set the European
Kublai Khan: The Mongol King Who Remade China
John Man · 389 pages
The Opium War: Drugs, Dreams, and the Making of Modern China
Julia Lovell · 458 pages
This title tells a story of drugs, distrust, greed and rebellion. 'On the outside, [the foreigners] seem intractable, but inside they are cowardly...Although there have been a few ups-and-downs, the situation as a whole is under control.' In October 1839, a few months after the Chinese Imperial Commissioner, Lin Zexu, dispatched these confident words to his emperor, a Cabinet meeting in Windsor vo
Dragon Lady: The Life and Legend of the Last Empress of China
Sterling Seagrave · 601 pages
The author of *The Soong Dynasty* gives us our most vivid and reliable biography yet of the Dowager Empress Tzu Hsi, remembered through the exaggeration and falsehood of legend as the ruthless Manchu concubine who seduced and murdered her way to the Chinese throne in 1861.
The Last Manchu: The Autobiography of Henry Pu Yi, Last Emperor of China
Pu Yi, Henry Pu Yi, Paul M. Kramer · 318 pages
Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom: China, the West, and the Epic Story of the Taiping Civil War
Stephen R. Platt · 385 pages
The Travels
Marco Polo · 480 pages
"Marco Polo was the most famous traveller of his time. His voyages began in 1271 with a visit to China, after which he served the Kublai Khan on numerous diplomatic missions. On his return to the West he was made a prisoner of war and met Rustichello of Pisa, with whom he collaborated on this book. His account of his travels offers a fascinating glimpse of what he encountered abroad: unfamiliar re
The Man Who Loved China: The Fantastic Story of the Eccentric Scientist Who Unlocked the Mysteries of the Middle Kingdom
Simon Winchester · 316 pages
In sumptuous and illuminating detail, Simon Winchester, the bestselling author of The Professor and the Madman ("Elegant and scrupulous"—New York Times Book Review) and Krakatoa ("A mesmerizing page-turner"—Time) brings to life the extraordinary story of Joseph Needham, the brilliant Cambridge scientist who unlocked the most closely held secrets of China, long the world's most technologically adva
The Devil Soldier
Caleb Carr · 366 pages
A courageous leader who became the first American mandarin, Frederick Townsend Ward won crucial victories for the Emperor of China during the Taiping Rebellion, history's bloodiest civil war. Carr's skills as historian and storyteller come to the fore in this thrilling account of the kind of adventurer the world no longer sees.
Empress Dowager Cixi: The Concubine Who Launched Modern China
Jung Chang · 464 pages
In 1852, at age sixteen, Cixi was chosen as one of Emperor Xianfeng’s numerous concubines. When he died in 1861, their five-year-old son succeeded to the throne. Cixi at once launched a coup against her son’s regents and placed herself as the true source of power—governing through a silk screen that separated her from her male officials. Drawing on newly available sources, Jung Chang comprehen
The Chinese Opium Question in British Opinion and Action
Wenzao Wu · 196 pages
Color: A Natural History of the Palette
Victoria Finlay · 448 pages
The Analects
Confucius · 252 pages
"Formulated in the ruins of a society that had been founded on untenable spiritualistic concepts of governance, Confucius' philosophy postulated a humanistic social order that has survived as China's social ideal ever since." "Confucius' teachings are very literary in nature. The Analects is made up of dialogues, stories, and anecdotes, always aphoristic and full of poetic turns of thought."--BOOK
Six Records of a Floating Life
Shen Fu · 176 pages
Autobiographical story of Shen Fu and his wife, Yun, in 19th(?) century China. (In four parts - two lost).
The Art of War
Sun Tzu · 80 pages
The Art of War is an ancient Chinese military treatise dating from the Late Spring and Autumn Period. The work, which is attributed to the ancient Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu
Mao's Last Dancer
Li Cunxin · 444 pages
A poor child living in poverty is chosen out of millions of children to attend Madame Mao's dancing ballet. His life drastically shifted from living in poverty to studying dance.
The I Ching or Book of Changes
Anonymous · 740 pages
A translation of the early document of Chinese philosophy with explanatory notes.