Description
Book SynopsisIn the eleventh century, the cities of the Song Empire (960-1279) emerged into writing. Literati in prior centuries had looked away from crowded streets, but literati in the eleventh century found beauty in towering buildings and busy harbors. Their purpose in writing the city was ideological. On the written page, they tried to establish a distinction that eluded them in the avenues and to discern an immanent pattern in the movement of people, goods, and money. By the end of the eleventh century, however, they recognized that they had failed in their efforts. They had lost the Way in the city. Urban Life and Intellectual Crisis in Middle-Period China, 800-1100 reveals the central place of urban life in the history of the eleventh century. Important developments in literary innovation and monetary policy, in canonical exegesis and civil engineering, in financial reform and public health, converge in this book as they converged in the city.
Trade Review"This is a challenging and significant book that should have a lasting impact on middle period scholarship."
- Hugh Clark,
Journal of Chinese History, Cambridge University Press (2023)
Table of ContentsPreface
Introduction. The Emergence of the City into Writing
Chapter 1. The City at the Center of the World: Chang’an as Center and as Ruin in the Ninth Century
Chapter 2. Finding Oneself in the City: Crowds, Commodities, and Subjectivity in the Eleventh Century
Chapter 3. Losing the Way in the City: Infrastructure, Money, and Intellectual Crisis in the Eleventh Century
Conclusion. The City Remergent
Bibliography
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