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Title: Treason by the Book by Jonathan D. Spence ISBN: 0142000418 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 05 March, 2002 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.33
Rating: 5
Summary: A Whodunit from 18th Century China
Comment: "Treason by the Book", by Yale historian Jonathan D Spence, is my early candidate for the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for History. It is a slim jewel of a book about the investigation and prosecution for treason of a rustic scholar by the third emperor of the Manchu dynasty. Spence's book is so many-faceted that it is hard to summarize -- reflecting backward to the very origins of Chinese culture and forward into our own time. It sheds light on the nature of Chinese government and society in the early 18th century, relates a police-procedural story worthy of Ed MacBain, and tells the story of a book coauthored by an emperor and a traitor. "Treason by the Book is essentially a book about the power of words -- those written down and preserved and those spread by gossip and rumor that harden into myth.
The story begins in 1728 when the Governor General of a remote province is handed a letter by a stranger which contains a denunication of the Manchu emperor, Yongzheng. The writer, calling himself "Summer Calm", urges General Yue to "rise in revolt" and stop serving a "bandit ruler". "The barbarians(Manchurians) are different species from us (Chinese)...[and] should be driven out". The letter goes on to accuse the emperor of plotting against his parents, murdering several of his brothers, piling up material wealth, and living a debauched life. It praises a scholar, identified as "Master of the Eastern Sea" who has upheld the ideals of earlier times.
General Yue, though Chinese, is a loyal official of the "bandit ruler". He arrests the messenger, tortures and interrogates him to find out more about the conspiracy hinted at in the letter. His report to the emperor sets off an imperial investigation involving hundreds of officials in many provinces. Through detective work worthy of a modern police state, they net everyone connected to the messenger and, no matter how remotely, to "Summer Calm", a rural teacher whose real name in Zeng Jing. The roundup also includes the family, friends and former students of a poet-scholar name Lu Liuliang, the "Master of the Eastern Ocean" who has been dead for forty years. Not even dead poets can escape the long arm of a Chinese emperor.
One is awed by the efficiency of the Manchu emperor's administrative control over his vast country -- exercised through his Confucian-trained bureaucracy and a communication system unmatched in the west until the advent of the railroad. At about the same time Louis XIV's Intendants were just beginning to challenge the hereditary nobles for administrative control of the French provinces and the Hanoverians in Britain, a new alien dynasty like the Manchus, had no professional administrators. The British civil service, that would rule an empire greater than Yongzheng's, was a century in the future.
Under interrogation, Zeng Jing confessed that the "conspiracy" was mostly in his head, germinated by his reading of Lu Liuliang and nutured by gossip about the emperor he heard from a mysterious scholar named Wang Shu who had visited his schoolhouse six years earlier. After Zeng had been tried and convicted, the emperor decided that clearing his own reputation was a more important matter than executing a misguided slanderer. Zeng, he announced, was just a dupe of literary troublemakers like Lu Liuliang. To set record straight, the emperor published a 500 page book titled "Awakening from Delusion" Containing his own critque of the Zeng letter, an attack on the writings of Lu, and -- strangest of all -- a series of written exchanges between himself and Zeng Jing regarding the allegations of the letter. Zeng Jing confessed his errors of "understanding" abjectly, but in the process argued for land reform, more equitable distribution of wealth, and local "selection" of officals. The emperor made an enlightened argument for tolerance in a multi-ethnic nation. Both based their reasoning on the writings of Confucius and earlier scholars. Hundreds of thousands of copies of "Awakening" were printed and distributed throughout the empire together with imperial orders that it was to be read at bi-monthly public gatherings.
Neither of the principals lived to see the ironic conclusion of the decade-long affair. Nor could they have imagined that three hundred years later a "barbarian" scholar would use their story as a mirror in which his readers can study the reflection of their own times.
Rating: 5
Summary: Political thriller,philosophy & police procedural all in one
Comment: On the night of October 28,1728 the Governor General ,Yue Zhongqi, of China's Shaanxi and Sichuan province is handed a letter by a messenger that reveals a plot against Yongzheng, 3rd Manchu Emperor of China. TREASON BY THE BOOK by noted Chinese scholar Jonathan Spence examines a treason plot that is inspired by the writings of a dead scholar and the reactions of the Chinese government to the alleged plot. The book is a blend of political thriller, philosophy and police procedural. Spence clearly lays out the intricate workings of the government bureaucracy and law enforcement system whose skill would make a modern computerized police force green with envy. A suspect or witness only briefly glimpsed years before is easily found due to the intricate and labyrinth record keeping methods of the government on all levels. Equally fascinating is the Emperor's method of dealing with the plot. To Westerners it may appear strange but Spence has firmly laid out the cultural background that makes it understandable.The great detail that is found in the book is the result of that vast government bureaucrcy which kept voluminous records and correspondences covering every detail from great to appearingly trivial. Spence deftly brings clarity to all these sources and has given the reader the best kind of history- one that reads like a good story.
Rating: 3
Summary: Lacks Analysis
Comment: This is a solid book by a renowned China scholar. The author, Jonathan Spence, has written a number of books in which he focuses on one individual or episode of Chinese history to explore some important aspect of the Chinese past. Spence is an excellent writer and scholar who excels at weaving primary sources into a coherent narrative. In this book, Spence details the story of an obscure provincial who attempted to arouse resistance against the ruling Qing Emperor. This incredibly naive attempt is immediately crushed and the ensuing investigation is directed largely by the Emperor himself. Spence uses this story to implicitly portray several important aspects of the Qing state. Among these are the impressive reach and organization of the Ching bureaucracy, the tremendous involvement of the Emperor at the center of the Qing state, the insecurity felt by the Qing because of their non-Chinese origin, and the consequences of poorly defined succession for the Imperial throne. Other important aspects of Chinese society revealed by this story are the resentments felt by provincials unable to succeed in the Imperial examination system and the over-arching importance of Confucian ideology. This is an effective and very readable way of presenting historical information.
This vignette approach, however, has significant drawbacks. Spence makes all his points implicitly and there is no explicit analysis of the importance of the phenomena exposed by the story. For example, does this story tell us something about the Qing state in general (probably yes) or does the way events unfolded have more to do with the personality of the Yongzheng emperor? Both are relevant but Spence never provides the broad perspective needed to address this question. To be a first rate book, Spence would have to provide additional information about the nature of the Qing state, the nature and consequences of dissent, and how other emperors handled these questions. As shown in some of his other books, Spence is certainly capable of broader analysis.
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Title: Emperor of China: Self-Portrait of K'Ang-Hsi by Jonathan D. Spence, Kangxi ISBN: 067972074X Publisher: Vintage Books Pub. Date: October, 1988 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: The Search for Modern China by Jonathan D. Spence ISBN: 0393307808 Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company Pub. Date: October, 2001 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci by Jonathan D. Spence ISBN: 0140080988 Publisher: Viking Press Pub. Date: June, 1994 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The Gate of Heavenly Peace: The Chinese and Their Revolution 1895-1980 by Jonathan D. Spence ISBN: 0140062793 Publisher: Viking Press Pub. Date: October, 1982 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
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Title: History in Three Keys by Paul A. Cohen ISBN: 0231106513 Publisher: Columbia University Press Pub. Date: 15 April, 1998 List Price(USD): $22.50 |
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