Book description
An outcast foreigner. A quiet lover. The fate of the Far East.China, 1854. Robert Hart is on the run. Fleeing Ireland to escape a promiscuity scandal, the syphilitic nineteen-year-old arrives in the Middle Kingdom at the height of the Qing Dynasty. And though he buys a woman to share his…
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Why read it?
1 author picked My Splendid Concubine as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
I’ve long been interested in China’s Taiping Rebellion (1850-64), the bloodiest civil war in history, with an estimated 20 to 100 million casualties.
Lofthouse’s substantial novel is one of the few in English to take on this topic and successfully forge a love story out of it, and a shocking one at that. Englishman Robert Hart, a real historical figure who would later become inspector-general of China's Imperial Maritime Custom Service and a Qing Dynasty official, is known to have purchased young concubines for sexual purposes.
Lofthouse builds on this to create the most fraught, tortuous, and fascinating love triangle…
From Isham's list on novels that immerse you in Chinese history.
If you love My Splendid Concubine...
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