Empress Wu the Great: Tang Dynasty China

Empress Wu ruled China for twenty years during the Tang Dynasty in the seventh century. Enigmatic as well as ambitious, she was one of just two women to reign over this Asian giant. Dr. Woo digs through chronicles and stories to pull together what is known about her family, her rise to prominence, and how she gained power against all the odds.

Empress Wu the Great, Tang Dynasty China

Biographies & Memoirs

Woo, X. L.

Community & Culture

Algora.Publishing

Empress Wu ruled China for twenty years during the Tang Dynasty in the seventh century. Enigmatic as well as ambitious, she was one of just two women to reign over this Asian giant. Dr. Woo digs through chronicles and stories to pull together what is known about her family, her rise to prominence, and how she gained power against all the odds.

Algora Pub

Love Tales of Ancient China tells stories with happy endings as well as sad endings, all with a touch of the exotic, the colors of a very different time and place. While the stories are familiar to Chinese people, this is the first time they have been presented in English translation for the benefit of American readers interested in Chinese culture and history and, of course, a good story.First, the dramatic tale of the famous beauty Yang tells of her life as Concubine of a Tang dynasty emperor, the grandson of Empress Wu the Great. After the mayhem that followed the collapse of the Han Dynasty in AD 220, the Tang Dynasty (618–907 AD) finally emerged as the second greatest empire in the region. The great Emperor Xuanzong succeeded to make important administrative reforms, cleaning up the finances and simplifying the swollen and corrupt bureaucracy. Then he fell for the famously attractive concubine Yang. Although he perhaps deserved a beautiful reward for his successes, the drama X. L. Woo outlines cannot have been what the Emperor had in mind.“The Tale of White Snake Genie” is a legend about the love of a genie who could never forget the young man who saved her life a thousand years ago. Seven love stories in all, these bring to the American reader characters well-known to all Chinese people through movie and drama as well as literature.

Love Tales of Ancient China

History

Asia

The Empress Dowager Cixi (1835-1908) brought destruction to the Qing Dynasty, the last feudal dynasty in the long history of China. Written with remarkable charm and verve, this book is a delightful exploration of the history of her extraordinary life and long reign, relating both historical facts and apocryphal anecdotes about her private affairs. How did she climb from the bottom rung of the ladder as an ordinary ambitious girl to the top rung of power as an empress dowager? How did she grow from an inexperienced girl to a mature politician who managed to maintain her sovereign status for 48 years? In all the history of China, only two women ever conquered and held the heights of power. Both enjoyed long reigns characterized by ruthless intrigue; they maintained an iron grip at the center while the vast country was torn by rebellions and caught up in foreign wars. Through their policy decisions as well as their personal foibles, both left a deep imprint in history and in the minds of the Chinese people, fueling literature and legend. Fighting to maintain her power base, Empress Cixi struggled with the need to modernize the painfully backward empire she had inherited while honoring age-old traditions. She studied previous rulers' failures and achievements, and especially followed the example of Wu-Hou, who had elevated herself from concubine to empress some 1200 years earlier, showing that a woman could be a successful ruler. The stories that follow, some legendary, offer a glimpse of life during the declining days of the last Chinese dynasty. Popular rebellions, foreign wars, devastating floods and drought-induced famines killed tens of millions in the 19th century. Cixi learned her lessons well. She fended off every adversary, prolonging her reign for 48 years. But all her craft and guile were not enough to repair the internal divisions and preserve traditional China against the onslaught of modernity, of Europe, and of her Asian neighbors.

Empress Dowager Cixi: China’s Last Dynasty

In all the history of China, only two women ever conquered and held the heights of power. Both enjoyed long reigns characterized by ruthless intrigue; they maintained an iron grip at the center while the vast country was torn by rebellions and caught up in foreign wars. Through their policy decisions as well as their personal foibles, both left a deep imprint in history and in the minds of the Chinese people, fueling literature and legend. Fighting to maintain her power base, Empress Cixi struggled with the need to modernize the painfully backward empire she had inherited while honoring age-old traditions. She studied previous rulers' failures and achievements, and especially followed the example of another Chinese woman leader, Wu-Hou, who had elevated herself from concubine to empress some 1200 years earlier. The stories that follow, some legendary, offer a glimpse of life during the declining days of the last Chinese dynasty. Popular rebellions, foreign wars, devastating floods and drought-induced famines killed tens of millions in the 19th century. Cixi learned her lessons well. She fended off every adversary, prolonging her reign for 48 years and proving that a woman could be a successful ruler. But all her craft and guile were not enough to repair the internal divisions and preserve traditional China against the onslaught of modernity, of Europe, and of her Asian neighbors. In the end, the Empress Dowager Cixi (1835 1908) brought destruction to the Qing Dynasty. Written with charm and verve, this book is a delightful exploration of the history of her extraordinary life and reign, relating both historical facts and apocryphal anecdotes. How did she climb from the bottom rung of the ladder as an ordinary ambitious girl to the top rung of power as an empress dowager? How did she grow from an inexperienced girl to a mature politician who managed to maintain her sovereign status for half a century?

Empress Dowager Cixi: China's Ast Dynasty and the Long Reign of a Formidable Concubine, Legends and Lives During the Declining Days of the Qing Dynasty