Facing the seas -- "The inconsistency of the seas" -- Feeding China -- Cette merveilleuse machine -- Les palais europeens -- "Wind of the west" -- Pattern and variation: indigenisation -- "Race for oriental opulence" -- Conclusion
Summary
This volume challenges the "Walled Kingdom" perspective. China reached out to the seas far more actively than historians have allowed, while the maritime world shaped China, Qing China in particular, much more than the continental world. It gave birth to and defined Chinese modernity
