Description
Book SynopsisThis book seeks both to integrate Southeast Asia into world history and to rethink much of Eurasia's premodern past. It argues that Southeast Asia, Europe, Japan, China, and South Asia all embodied idiosyncratic versions of a hitherto unrecognized pattern of political and cultural integration that was governed by Eurasian-wide climatic, commercial, and military stimuli.
Trade Review'Victor Lieberman's two-volume opus is the most important work of history produced so far this century … It is no exaggeration to say that Strange Parallels is a paradigmatic work. It will inform our understanding of human history for generations to come.' The American Historical Review
Table of Contents1. A far promontory: Southeast Asia and Eurasia; 2. Varieties of European experience (I): the formation of Russia and France to c.1600; 3. Varieties of European experience (II): a great acceleration, c.1600–1830; 4. Creating Japan; 5. Integration under expanding Inner Asian influence (I): China: a precocious and durable unity; 6. Integration under expanding Inner Asian influence (II): South Asia: patterns intermediate between China and the protected zone; 7. Locating the islands; Conclusion.
