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A review by theravingcelt
Empress Dowager Cixi: The Concubine Who Launched Modern China by Jung Chang
5.0
I started this book, carrying with me all standard anecdotal baggage one hears about the cruel old crone who loomed behind the imperial throne in the final decades of Qing dynasty China. Very quickly, the author thoroughly dispelled each and every one of these clichéd images. Rather than acting as a bulwark against modernisation and progress, Cixi actually spent nearly every waking day in her role as Empress Dowager drawing the Chinese state into a new age whilst still maintaining its independence from European dominance. The fact that this truth has for so long been obscured from the general public is owed as much to the inherent sexism of her times as to the modern Chinese Communist Party’s eagerness to denigrate everything associated with the old empire in order to increase their own historical standing.
As I find myself reading more and more biographies as the years go by, I have begun to grow more capable of noticing when a writer is being too kind to their subject matter. Fawning over figures from the past serves about as much good as damning them for all eternity, in my opinion. That is why I was more than happy at Chang’s willingness to highlight Cixi’s flaws, both on a political and personal level, as it served to help me understand just why the Qing Empire struggled to adapt to an ever-changing world it was so woefully unprepared to face.
In addition to the titular star of the book, the author took time to showcase the many other figures who served under the “Old Buddha” (as the Dowager Empress was affectionately known in the provinces), working diligently to reform China’s administration. Many of these figures were not even native Chinese, as it turns out! One of the most prominent individuals Chang brought up was one Sir Robert Hart, born in County Armagh, Ireland, who served as Inspector General for the Imperial Customs Service for over five decades, helping to reform an antiquated and thoroughly-corrupt system of trade. I appreciated the time spent giving due credit to people such as these because it helped to enhance Cixi’s stature as a leader of talented individuals, rather than as some mythic heroine who saved a nation all by herself.
I would absolutely recommend this book to anyone with even a passing interest in Chinese history. The author’s style of writing is easily accessible to anyone who is curious as to how China entered the twentieth century, a century that it would later come to dominate when men and women followed from Cixi’s example of slow but inevitable progress concerned with the benefit of all.
As I find myself reading more and more biographies as the years go by, I have begun to grow more capable of noticing when a writer is being too kind to their subject matter. Fawning over figures from the past serves about as much good as damning them for all eternity, in my opinion. That is why I was more than happy at Chang’s willingness to highlight Cixi’s flaws, both on a political and personal level, as it served to help me understand just why the Qing Empire struggled to adapt to an ever-changing world it was so woefully unprepared to face.
In addition to the titular star of the book, the author took time to showcase the many other figures who served under the “Old Buddha” (as the Dowager Empress was affectionately known in the provinces), working diligently to reform China’s administration. Many of these figures were not even native Chinese, as it turns out! One of the most prominent individuals Chang brought up was one Sir Robert Hart, born in County Armagh, Ireland, who served as Inspector General for the Imperial Customs Service for over five decades, helping to reform an antiquated and thoroughly-corrupt system of trade. I appreciated the time spent giving due credit to people such as these because it helped to enhance Cixi’s stature as a leader of talented individuals, rather than as some mythic heroine who saved a nation all by herself.
I would absolutely recommend this book to anyone with even a passing interest in Chinese history. The author’s style of writing is easily accessible to anyone who is curious as to how China entered the twentieth century, a century that it would later come to dominate when men and women followed from Cixi’s example of slow but inevitable progress concerned with the benefit of all.