The distinguished historian of China, author of Vermeer's Hat, argues that it was not so much the Manchu invasion as climate change that brought collapse to the Ming Dynasty.
From the home of the indigenous Formosans to a European trading post, from a Japanese colony to the last bastion of the Republic of China. Essential reading for anyone who wants to understan... read more
Xi Jinping is head of the CCP, head of state and commander-in-chief of the military, with an indefinite period in office; he's centralised power, increased state control of the economy and i... read more
Street scenes, portraits, people at work, a classroom, children: this is powerful and poignant record of Kashgar as it used to be. All the photographs were taken in 1998, on the cusp of swee... read more
From the perspective of the people who have worked and lived there since 1862, when it was a fishing village, rather than of the imperial powers who controlled it.
Conversational, elegant and subtle essays on art, literature, urban life in war-time Shanghai and Hong Kong by the admired Chinese-born American novelist, screenwriter and cultural critic. F... read more
Reframes the Silk Road as a diplomatic route, not simply a commercial thoroughfare, especially during the late Tang and Five Dynasties period. Draws on documents from Dunhuang.
A new translation of the fundamental text of Daoism, much more dynamic than the comfortably gnomic ones of the past. Ziporyn restores its strangeness and philosophical challenges.
Argues that today's Sino-American rivalry in micro-processing is as important in geopolitical terms as the economics of oil was at the time of the first Gulf War.
Creation stories, dragons, gods, demigods, the Queen Mother of the West, rivers, mountains; legends from Dunhuang, Buddhism, Daoism, etc. Illustrated. (By the late 1980s, most of these were... read more
A brilliant narrative of the interconnected lives of two Renaissance Portuguese men whose travels to India and China unseated contemporary certainties. Dazzling.
Argues that the West's strategy with China has failed: trade and contact with the West have left it more aggressive, repressive and threatening than ever.
Turkel was born in a Chinese 're-education' camp, and finally got to the US where he trained as a lawyer, specialising in Uyghur activism. This is his account of China's horrendous oppressio... read more
Poems by Li Bai, Du Fu and others from the 'golden age' of Chinese poetry. Li Bai is said to have died by falling from a boat, reaching for the moon's reflection in the water...
His father, Ai Qing, was China's most celebrated poet. This epic story of his father's legacy and his own life is a window onto 1000 years of Chinese history. (A new selection of his poems a... read more
Macartney's 1793 mission was a failure, but the Dutch were better informed. This new study argues that the Qing court was not arrogant and narrow-minded, as the English concluded, but was in... read more
A new translation of this fabulous C16th Chinese work - a wild epic, an outrageous satire, and surely one of the most exuberant works of literature the world has ever known. Based on the mon... read more