The Boxer Rebellion: The Dramatic Story of China's War on Foreigners that Shook the World in the Summer of 1900
by Diana Preston
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"The Boxer Rebellion is a panoramic chronicle of the uprising and ensuing two-month siege of the eleven foreign ministries in Peking (now Beijing), and of the foreign community in Tientsin (now Tianjin), during the summer of 1900 - the repercussions of which have echoed throughout the intervening century. It left tens of thousands of Chinese dead, precipitated the end of dynastic rule in China, and has tainted China's relationship with the wider world to this day. It is also a richly human show more story." "Relying on the diaries, letters, and memoirs of the defenders, and on her own extensive research from both Chinese and Western perspectives, Diana Preston portrays the dramatic human experience of the Boxer rising."--Jacket. show lessTags
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I was a little disappointed. Most of the book is an account of the Europeans and how they survived the siege. If that is what you are looking for than this is a great book (5 stars). However, it left me wanting more from the Chinese perspective. If you want that then read "Three Keys," an excellent book on the Chinese side of the Boxer Rebellion.
Preston is out of her depth in China.
China > History > Boxer Rebellion, 1899-1901
Boxer rebellion
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18+ Works 3,011 Members
Diana Preston is a prize-winning historian and author of A Higher Form of Killing, Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy, Before the Fallout: From Marie Curie to Hiroshima (winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Science and Technology), The Boxer Rebellion, Paradise in Chains, and A Pirate of Exquisite Mind, among other works of acclaimed narrative show more history. She and her husband, Michael, live in London. show less
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Awards
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Common Knowledge
- Original title
- Besieged in Peking
- Alternate titles
- The Boxer Rebellion: The Dramatic Story of China's War on Foreigners That Shook the World in the Summer of 1900; A Brief History of the Boxer Rebellion: China's War on Foreigners, 1900
- Original publication date
- 1999
- Important places
- China
- Important events
- Boxer Rebellion (1899-08 | 1901-09)
- Epigraph
- The actual truth has never been written about any war, and this will be no exception. -George Lynch, journalist
- First words
- "Standing together as the sun rose fully, the little remaining band, all Europeans, met death stubbornly.... As one man fell others advanced, and finally, overcome by overwhelming odds, every one of the Europeans remaining wa... (show all)s put to the sword in a most atrocious manner." So read a dramatic dispatch in the London Daily Mail of 16 July 1900 from its special correspondent in Shanghai. Under the headline "The Pekin Massacre," it confirmed in gruesome detail what the world already suspected - that hundreds of foreigners besieged in Peking's diplomatic quarter since 20 June had been murder -Prologue
Turn-of-the century Peking (Beijing) was the world's filthiest city - or so foreigners thought Their letters and diaries rail about "the worst smells imaginable," "the sickening odor," "dusty and malodorous streets," and "dir... (show all)t, piled in mountains of dust in the summer, spread in oozing quagmires of mud after the rains." They complained it was "impossible to avoid the foul sights and smells" that made Peking "superlatively disgusting even for China" and that "the European eye may perhaps become more or less callous after years of education but the European nose never." They deplored "an infragrant population ignorant of the most elementary laws of sanitation, cleanliness, or decency," content to collect their sewage in great holes at the sides of unlit streets into which at least one unwary foreigner had tumbled and drowned. The city was nicknamed Pekin-les-Odeurs. -Chapter 1, A Thousand Deaths - Canonical DDC/MDS
- 951.035
- Canonical LCC
- DS771 .P73
- Disambiguation notice
- First published with the title: Besieged in Peking
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Statistics
- Members
- 562
- Popularity
- 52,298
- Reviews
- 4
- Rating
- (3.75)
- Languages
- English, German
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 6
- ASINs
- 3
