A major contribution to our present literature on the general
historiography of late Imperial China. Not only is it eminently
accessible to a wide nonspecialized intellectual public, it also
provides a major corrective within the field to some of the
tendencies that have dominated the writing of Chinese history. Mote
has highly cogent things to say about the nature of what has been
called the 'gentry' in China and highly relevant questions to raise
about the notion of a demographic explosion in eighteenth-century
China, and he examines many of the prevailing abstract conceptions
that dominate the field. Yet he vividly demonstrates how limited
our effort has been to explore in depth the vast documentary
materials available to us, which are supposed to provide the
'empirical data' for our models, paradigms, and structural
theories. Mote's major contribution is his detailed account of the
growing complexity of relations between the Chinese state and the
surrounding East Asian world during
A personal meditation on the later imperial history of China by an
author who has studied and taught the subject all his life and
whose knowledge of it is truly formidable. It is written in a
readable, accessible style that attracts the reader's sustained
attention.--John W. Dardess "University of Kansas "
An outstanding feature that distinguishes this book from similar
works is the author's effort to readdress the imbalance in
traditional historiography with its lopsided focus on the political
and geographic center of the realm. He does a wonderful job of
reconstructing the history of such historically neglected regimes
as Khitan-Liao, Jurchen-Jin, and Tangut-Western Xia, from the
perspective of the Other...What I find most praiseworthy is the
lucid, elegant expository style of writing. In spite of the wealth
of knowledge the author clearly possesses about traditional China,
he chooses to cover in depth a select number of topics--personages,
events, institutions, etc.--in a language that is understandable to
the average man in the street, without relying on opaque verbosity.
Consequently, the book is likely to leave a profound and lasting
impact on the reader in areas it focuses on.--Victor Cunrui
Xiong"Chinese Historical Review" (09/01/2005)
This massive tome crowns the long, distinguished career of
Frederick Mote, an influential scholar of Late Imperial China in
the United States... He does a wonderful job of reconstructing the
history of such historically neglected regimes as Khitan-Liao,
Jurchen-Jin, and Tangut-Western Xia, from the perspective of the
Other. What I find most praiseworthy is the lucid, elegant
expository style of writing...The book is likely to leave a
profound and lasting impact on the reader in areas it focuses on,
whichwill in turn help him or her better understand a given period
of Late Imperial China from a long-term perspective.--Victor Cunrui
Xiong "Chinese Historical Review "
complexity of relations between the Chinese state and the
surrounding East Asian world during the period 900-1800.
profound and lasting impact on the reader in areas it focuses on,
which will in turn help him or her better understand a given period
of Late Imperial China from a long-term perspective.
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