Imperial Twilight

Imperial Twilight PDF Author: Stephen R. Platt
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307961745
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 609

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Book Description
As China reclaims its position as a world power, Imperial Twilight looks back to tell the story of the country’s last age of ascendance and how it came to an end in the nineteenth-century Opium War. As one of the most potent turning points in the country’s modern history, the Opium War has since come to stand for everything that today’s China seeks to put behind it. In this dramatic, epic story, award-winning historian Stephen Platt sheds new light on the early attempts by Western traders and missionaries to “open” China even as China’s imperial rulers were struggling to manage their country’s decline and Confucian scholars grappled with how to use foreign trade to China’s advantage. The book paints an enduring portrait of an immensely profitable—and mostly peaceful—meeting of civilizations that was destined to be shattered by one of the most shockingly unjust wars in the annals of imperial history. Brimming with a fascinating cast of British, Chinese, and American characters, this riveting narrative of relations between China and the West has important implications for today’s uncertain and ever-changing political climate.

Imperial Twilight

Imperial Twilight PDF Author: Stephen R. Platt
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307961745
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 609

Get Book Here

Book Description
As China reclaims its position as a world power, Imperial Twilight looks back to tell the story of the country’s last age of ascendance and how it came to an end in the nineteenth-century Opium War. As one of the most potent turning points in the country’s modern history, the Opium War has since come to stand for everything that today’s China seeks to put behind it. In this dramatic, epic story, award-winning historian Stephen Platt sheds new light on the early attempts by Western traders and missionaries to “open” China even as China’s imperial rulers were struggling to manage their country’s decline and Confucian scholars grappled with how to use foreign trade to China’s advantage. The book paints an enduring portrait of an immensely profitable—and mostly peaceful—meeting of civilizations that was destined to be shattered by one of the most shockingly unjust wars in the annals of imperial history. Brimming with a fascinating cast of British, Chinese, and American characters, this riveting narrative of relations between China and the West has important implications for today’s uncertain and ever-changing political climate.

Tea, Silver, Opium and War

Tea, Silver, Opium and War PDF Author: Guotu Zhuang
Publisher:
ISBN: 9787561508626
Category : China
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description


Tea War

Tea War PDF Author: Andrew B. Liu
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300252331
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 359

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Book Description
A history of capitalism in nineteenth‑ and twentieth‑century China and India that explores the competition between their tea industries “Tea War is not only a detailed comparative history of the transformation of tea production in the 19th and early 20th centuries, but it also intervenes in larger debates about the nature of capitalism, global modernity, and global history.”— Alexander F. Day, Occidental College Tea remains the world’s most popular commercial drink today, and at the turn of the twentieth century, it represented the largest export industry of both China and colonial India. In analyzing the global competition between Chinese and Indian tea, Andrew B. Liu challenges past economic histories premised on the technical “divergence” between the West and the Rest, arguing instead that seemingly traditional technologies and practices were central to modern capital accumulation across Asia. He shows how competitive pressures compelled Chinese merchants to adopt abstract industrial conceptions of time, while colonial planters in India pushed for labor indenture laws to support factory-style tea plantations. Characterizations of China and India as premodern backwaters, he explains, were themselves the historical result of new notions of political economy adopted by Chinese and Indian nationalists, who discovered that these abstract ideas corresponded to concrete social changes in their local surroundings. Together, these stories point toward a more flexible and globally oriented conceptualization of the history of capitalism in China and India.

History of the Opium Problem

History of the Opium Problem PDF Author: Hans Derks
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004221581
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 851

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Book Description
Covering a period of about four centuries, this book demonstrates the economic and political components of the opium problem. As a mass product, opium was introduced in India and Indonesia by the Dutch in the 17th century. China suffered the most, but was also the first to get rid of the opium problem around 1950.

The Opium War

The Opium War PDF Author: Julia Lovell
Publisher: Abrams
ISBN: 1468313231
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 349

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Book Description
This “crisp and readable account” of the nineteenth century British campaign sheds light on modern Chinese identity through “a heartbreaking story of war” (The Wall Street Journal). In October 1839, a Windsor cabinet meeting voted to begin the first Opium War against China. Bureaucratic fumbling, military missteps, and a healthy dose of political opportunism and collaboration followed. Rich in tragicomedy, The Opium War explores the disastrous British foreign-relations move that became a founding myth of modern Chinese nationalism, and depicts China’s heroic struggle against Western conspiracy. Julia Lovell examines the causes and consequences of the Opium War, interweaving tales of the opium pushers and dissidents. More importantly, she analyses how the Opium Wars shaped China’s self-image and created an enduring model for its interactions with the West, plagued by delusion and prejudice.

The Tale of Tea

The Tale of Tea PDF Author: George van Driem
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789004386259
Category : Tea
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
The Tale of Tea presents a comprehensive history of tea from prehistoric times to the present day in a single volume, covering the fascinating social history of tea and the origins, botany and biochemistry of this singularly important cultigen.

When America First Met China: An Exotic History of Tea, Drugs, and Money in the Age of Sail

When America First Met China: An Exotic History of Tea, Drugs, and Money in the Age of Sail PDF Author: Eric Jay Dolin
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0871404338
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 433

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Book Description
Traces the history of the relationship between America and China back to its earliest days, when the United States traded with China for furs, opium, and rare sea cucumbers, but left an ecological and human rights disaster that still reverberates today.

The Chinese Opium Wars

The Chinese Opium Wars PDF Author: Jack Beeching
Publisher: Mariner Books
ISBN: 9780156170949
Category : China
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
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.

A History of the World in 6 Glasses

A History of the World in 6 Glasses PDF Author: Tom Standage
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 0802718590
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
New York Times Bestseller * Soon to be a TV series starring Dan Aykroyd “There aren't many books this entertaining that also provide a cogent crash course in ancient, classical and modern history.” -Los Angeles Times Beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea, and Coca-Cola: In Tom Standage's deft, innovative account of world history, these six beverages turn out to be much more than just ways to quench thirst. They also represent six eras that span the course of civilization-from the adoption of agriculture, to the birth of cities, to the advent of globalization. A History of the World in 6 Glasses tells the story of humanity from the Stone Age to the twenty-first century through each epoch's signature refreshment. As Standage persuasively argues, each drink is in fact a kind of technology, advancing culture and catalyzing the intricate interplay of different societies. After reading this enlightening book, you may never look at your favorite drink in quite the same way again.

Opium and Empire

Opium and Empire PDF Author: Carl A. Trocki
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 1501746359
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 279

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Book Description
Breaking new ground in the historiography of the overseas Chinese and British colonialism, this book focuses on two areas largely ignored by students of the period—opium and the economic role of the group of institutions known as kongsi, or secret societies.