The Death of Woman Wang
by Jonathan Spence
The Death of Woman Wang is a brilliant reconstruction of an ordinary woman’s life in 17th century China, by Jonathan Spence, one of the West’s great China scholars. This is really a work of history with novelistic touches, so is ideal for those wanting to learn about Chinese history without reading a textbook. Spence was able to find out so much about her because she was murdered, and the crime investigated.
The Death of Woman Wang is a book which I frequently teach, and it was one of the first books I read as a student when it first came out in the late 1970s. It’s one of the books that inspired me to become a Chinese historian, and it’s a lovely work. Spence takes a woman who only shows up in the record through one incident – a crime.”
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