The Opium War: Drugs, Dreams and the Making of China - Softcover

Lovell, Julia

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0330537857 ISBN 13: 9780330537858

Verlag: Picador, 2011

Inhaltsangabe

Book by Lovell Julia

Über diesen Titel

Reseña del editor

`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 voted to fight Britain's first Opium War (1839-42) with China. The conflict turned out to be rich in tragicomedy: in bureaucratic fumblings, military missteps, political opportunism and collaboration. Yet over the past hundred and seventy years, this strange tale of misunderstanding, incompetence and compromise has become the founding myth of modern Chinese nationalism: the start of China's heroic struggle against a Western conspiracy to destroy the country with opium and gunboat diplomacy. The Opium War is both the story of modern China - starting from this first conflict with the West - and an analysis of the country's contemporary self-image. It explores how China's national myths mould its interactions with the outside world, how public memory is spun to serve the present; and how delusion and prejudice have bedevilled its relationship with the modern West.

Biografía del autor

Julia Lovell teaches modern Chinese history at Birkbeck College, University of London. She is the author of The Opium War: Drugs, Drama And The Making Of China, The Great Wall: China Against the World and The Politics of Cultural Capital: China's Quest for a Nobel Prize in Literature and writes on China for the Guardian, Independent and The Times Literary Supplement. Her many translations of modern Chinese fiction include, most recently, Lu Xun's The Real Story of Ah-Q, and Other Tales of China.

Über diese Auflage

• Verlag: Picador
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0330537857
• ISBN 13: 9780330537858
• Einband: Tapa blanda
• Anzahl der Seiten: 480