China's Cosmopolitan Empire (History of Imperial China)
Author:Mark Edward Lewis,Timothy Brook
Paperback: 368 pages
Publisher: Harvard University Press; Reprint edition (3 April 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0674064011
ISBN-13: 978-0674064010
Product Dimensions: 15.9 x 2.5 x 23.5 cm
内容简介
The Tang dynasty is often called China's "golden age", a period of commercial, religious, and cultural connections from Korea and Japan to the Persian Gulf, and a time of unsurpassed literary creativity. Mark Lewis captures a dynamic era in which the empire reached its greatest geographical extent under Chinese rule, painting and ceramic arts flourished, women played a major role both as rulers and in the economy, and China produced its finest lyric poets in Wang Wei, Li Bo, and Du Fu. The Chinese engaged in extensive trade on sea and land. Merchants from Inner Asia settled in the capital, while Chinese entrepreneurs set off for the wider world, the beginning of a global diaspora. The emergence of an economically and culturally dominant south that was controlled from a northern capital set a pattern for the rest of Chinese imperial history. Poems celebrated the glories of the capital, meditated on individual loneliness in its midst, and des cribed heroic young men and beautiful women who filled city streets and bars. Despite the romantic aura attached to the Tang, it was not a time of unending peace. In 756, General An Lushan led a revolt that shook the country to its core, weakening the government to such a degree that by the early tenth century, regional warlordism gripped many areas, heralding the decline of the Great Tang.
Review
"This series on China, brilliantly overseen by Timothy Brook, is a credit to Harvard University Press. Above all, it encourages us to think of China in different ways." -- Jonathan Mirsky, Literary Review, 1st November 2010
"In China's Cosmopolitan Empire: The Tang Dynasty, Mark Edward Lewis has done a superb job of synthesizing the scholarship on the Tang Dynasty (618-907) and rendering it into a readable account. Professor Lewis's general narrative of Tang history, chapters two and three of the book, is the best overview of Tang history in any language, and would be a good starting point for anyone interested in the dynasty...There is a large corpus of scholarship in English on Tang dynasty history and culture. China's Cosmopolitan Empire is an admirable addition to that corpus. It will undoubtedly become the standard survey in English for the foreseeable future." -- Peter Lorge, Journal of Military History, 8th January 2011
"Mark Edward Lewis has produced an impressive volume on the history of the Tang dynasty...Its greatest contribution is its integration of the latest secondary scholarship into interesting arguments about the evolution of Chinese society between the seventh and tenth centuries...This book remains an excellent place to see the latest insights into Tang history. It is a thought-provoking effort to synthesize that work and reflect on the significance of the Tang for China's history. If it inspires the next generation of students to pursue Tang history seriously, Lewis will have made a real contribution to Tang studies." --Anthony DeBlasi Journal of Asian Studies 20100501
作者简介
Mark Edward Lewis is Kwoh-Ting Li Professor in Chinese Culture at Stanford University. Timothy Brook is Professor of History and Republic of China Chair at the University of British Columbia.
我不得不承认,对于一个像我这样,更倾向于从文化人类学角度理解历史的人来说,本书的标题《世界性的帝国》立刻抓住了我的注意力。它暗示的不仅仅是疆域的辽阔,更是一种文化、思想和物质的跨界流通。我特别期待看到作者如何处理“多元文化共存”这一棘手的问题。唐朝的胡风盛行是事实,但这种“胡化”究竟是浅层的风尚模仿,还是深层的社会结构重组?佛教、景教、祆教在唐代的发展轨迹,它们是如何被国家意识形态吸收、改造或排斥的?如果作者能提供关于城市生活、饮食习惯、服饰变迁等微观层面的具体案例,来佐证宏观的政治论断,那么这本书的阅读体验将会达到一个全新的高度。历史不应该只是精英阶层的舞台,普通人在帝国扩张中的角色和体验,同样值得被细腻地书写出来。
评分坦率地说,我对某些主流西方汉学界的叙事框架持有谨慎的保留态度,总觉得他们偶尔会用过于简化的“东方主义”滤镜去解读复杂多变的中国历史。因此,在阅读这本由哈佛系列推出的卷册时,我特别关注其论证的细致度和对史料的驾驭能力。我希望它能展现出对一手汉文文献的扎实掌握,而非仅仅依赖二手研究的二手解读。更重要的是,我希望看到作者在构建“世界性帝国”这一宏大命题时,能避免将唐朝的开放性简单归因为某种偶然的“开明”,而是能深入剖析其内在的制度弹性、边疆政策的演变,以及与周边非汉族政权之间那种复杂、动态的互动关系。一个真正世界性的帝国,其复杂性绝不是一两个原因可以概括的,需要多维度、去中心化的审视,这才是检验学术功力的试金石。
评分从阅读体验的角度来看,一本厚重的学术专著往往需要极强的毅力和清晰的结构来引导读者穿越复杂的论证迷雾。我希望这本卷册在保持其学术严谨性的同时,其行文风格能够保持一种高度的叙事张力。那种平铺直叙、堆砌史实的写作方式,很容易让人在中途感到疲倦。我期待看到作者能运用精妙的过渡和富有洞察力的分析性总结,将散落的史料碎片编织成一幅连贯且引人入胜的历史画卷。如果能像讲故事那样,在关键的历史转折点设置悬念,在关键的人物出现时进行深刻的心理侧写,哪怕只是对一两位中外交流的代表性人物进行深入挖掘,都会极大地增强作品的可读性。一本好的历史书,理应在提供知识的同时,也能带来阅读的愉悦和思想的启发。
评分这本书的装帧设计真的很有心思,拿到手就能感受到哈佛出版社出品的质感。纸张厚实,印刷清晰,尤其是那些插图和地图的排版,简直就是艺术品。对于一个长期关注历史研究的读者来说,这种对细节的打磨是极其重要的,它能极大地提升阅读的沉浸感。我个人非常欣赏那种既有学术深度又不失视觉美感的书籍,这本书显然在这方面做得非常出色。封面的设计也很有意境,似乎能窥见盛唐气象的恢弘与包容,让人在翻开之前就对即将展开的叙事充满了期待。它不仅仅是一本历史著作,更像是一件可以长期珍藏的艺术品,放在书架上也是一种视觉享受。每一次翻阅,都能发现一些之前忽略的精妙之处,这种触感和视觉上的愉悦,是数字化阅读永远无法替代的体验。好的纸质书能让人慢下来,去真正品味文字背后的历史厚重感,这本书无疑做到了这一点。
评分作为一名对东亚文明演变深感兴趣的业余历史爱好者,我常常觉得现有的许多唐代研究,要么过于聚焦于政治军事的权谋斗争,要么陷于文学艺术的精妙分析,却往往忽略了那个时代最核心的“活的脉络”——社会结构与日常生活的细微变迁。这本书的切入点,似乎正是要弥补这种缺失。它不像那种传统的帝王将相传记,而是试图从更广阔的社会经济基础上去理解唐朝何以能成为一个真正意义上的“世界性”实体。我期待它能详细描绘出长安城内来自不同地域、拥有不同信仰的人们是如何共存、交流、甚至冲突的,那种基于日常经验的社会史分析,远比抽象的制度史描述要生动得多。如果它能成功地勾勒出商业网络、宗教传播、以及人口迁徙对中原王朝带来的深刻冲击与重塑,那么这本书的价值就无可估量了。
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