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A review by bellisk
Empress Dowager Cixi: The Concubine Who Launched Modern China by Jung Chang
5.0
A detailed, thorough and beautifully written account of the life of a complex and very capable person.
Before I read this biography, I had no real knowledge of Cixi's role in history, only the vague impression, picked up who knows where, that she was in some way a monster. Jung Chang mentions several points in her reign where evil ideas about her were deliberately spread by her enemies, propaganda that Cixi was unable to counteract for fear of revealing more harmful truths. For example, when she imprisoned her ineffectual adopted son, the Emperor Guangxu, and retook the reigns of the empire, slander of all kinds was spread about her. Cixi, however, could not let out the knowledge that Guangxu had attempted to assassinate her, which would risk delegitimising the whole Qing dynasty and her own right to rule. I wondered at times if Chang's account favoured Cixi too much, but she doesn't shirk from depicting the Empress Dowager's real flaws and missteps. The unprecedentedly deep research that supports the book also backs up her view on Cixi.
No one interested in courtly life and political intrigue should miss out on this book. I've had conversations with several friends recently about how much we love this in SFF (JY Yang's Tensorate series has been recommended to me on this basis, though I haven't read it yet); here is a wonderful original study. Throughout, Chang's writing is clear and enjoyable. She presents Cixi as a political genius working successfully within near-impossible limits, as simultaneously a devout Buddhist and a moderniser, and as a very human lover of beauty and the arts. Balancing a huge cast of historical figures, all with their own agendas and beliefs, Chang shows Cixi's place in the context of both China's long dynastic history and its new relations with the wider world. The result is fascinating.
Before I read this biography, I had no real knowledge of Cixi's role in history, only the vague impression, picked up who knows where, that she was in some way a monster. Jung Chang mentions several points in her reign where evil ideas about her were deliberately spread by her enemies, propaganda that Cixi was unable to counteract for fear of revealing more harmful truths. For example, when she imprisoned her ineffectual adopted son, the Emperor Guangxu, and retook the reigns of the empire, slander of all kinds was spread about her. Cixi, however, could not let out the knowledge that Guangxu had attempted to assassinate her, which would risk delegitimising the whole Qing dynasty and her own right to rule. I wondered at times if Chang's account favoured Cixi too much, but she doesn't shirk from depicting the Empress Dowager's real flaws and missteps. The unprecedentedly deep research that supports the book also backs up her view on Cixi.
No one interested in courtly life and political intrigue should miss out on this book. I've had conversations with several friends recently about how much we love this in SFF (JY Yang's Tensorate series has been recommended to me on this basis, though I haven't read it yet); here is a wonderful original study. Throughout, Chang's writing is clear and enjoyable. She presents Cixi as a political genius working successfully within near-impossible limits, as simultaneously a devout Buddhist and a moderniser, and as a very human lover of beauty and the arts. Balancing a huge cast of historical figures, all with their own agendas and beliefs, Chang shows Cixi's place in the context of both China's long dynastic history and its new relations with the wider world. The result is fascinating.