Empress Dowager Cixi
The Concubine Who Launched Modern China
From internationally bestselling author of Wild Swans, and co-author of the bestselling Mao: The Unknown Story, this is the dramatic, epic biography of the unusual woman who ruled China for 50 years.
A woman, an Empress of immense wealth who was largely a prisoner within the compound walls of her palaces, a mother, a ruthless enemy, and a brilliant strategist: Chang makes a compelling case that Cixi was one of the most formidable and enlightened rulers of any nation. Cixi led an intense and singular life. Chosen at the age of 12 to be a concubine by the Emperor Xianfeng, she gave birth to his only male heir who at four was designated Emperor when his father died. In a…
$28.00
September 30, 2014
JUNG CHANG was born in Sichuan Province, China, in 1952. She was a Red Guard briefly at the age of fourteen and then worked as a "barefoot doctor," a steelworker, and an electrician before becoming an English-language student and, later, an assistant lecturer at Sichuan University. She left China for Britain in 1978 and was subsequently awarded a scholarship by York University, where she obtained a Ph.D. in linguistics in 1982, the first person from the People's Republic of China to receive a doctorate from a British university.
Big Sister, Little Sister, Red Sister
Jung Chang
Empress Dowager Cixi
Jung Chang