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SUNY series in Chinese Philosophy and Culture
Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty: His Life, Times, and Legacy
Looking at the life and legacy of Emperor Yang (569-618) of the brief Sui dynasty in a new light, this book presents a compelling case for his importance to Chinese history. Author Victor Cunrui Xiong utilizes traditional scholarship and secondary literature from China, Japan, and the West to go beyond the common perception of Emperor Yang as merely a profligate tyrant. Xiong accepts neither the traditional verdict against Emperor Yang nor the apologist effort to revise it, and instead offers a reassessment of Emperor Yang by exploring the larger political, economic, military, religious, and diplomatic contexts of Sui society. This reconstruction of the life of Emperor Yang reveals an astute visionary with literary, administrative, and reformist accomplishments. While a series of strategic blunders resulting from the darker side of his personality led to the collapse of the socioeconomic order and to his own death, the Sui legacy that Emperor Yang left behind lived on to provide the foundation for the rise of the Tang dynasty, the pinnacle of medieval Chinese civilization.
358 pages, Hardcover
First published February 15, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 29, 2023
Victor Cunrui Xiong’s Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty covers the life of Emperor Yan, a Chinese Emperor at the turn of the 6th-7th Century. He was the son of Emperor Wendi who had reunited China after a couple of hundred years of division, yet Yang was to throw it away and himself be overthrown as the Empire descended into turmoil once more. It is a narrative of his life and also on the most notable policy areas during his rule such as buildings, bureaucracy and economics. Emperor Yang has been regarded as among the worst Chinese Emperors, and Xiong seeks to re-evaluate this – still pretty tyrannical, but with some great achievements too.
The first shorter section is a narrative of Emperor Yang’s life. This is a bit too short for my liking, only 60 pages, and despite being a narrative is still a pretty dry read. Which is a shame as it is an exciting subject – court intrigues to become emperor, monumental ambition in building projects, embassies and warfare, and a great fall. So this is an interesting read but I feel more could have been made of it.
The second section takes us more in-depth into particular policy areas; his grand building projects; the bureaucracy; education and rites; religion; economics; and foreign policy. This is necessary both to show why Yang’s regime collapsed by showing how the economy was strained, and also to illustrate what his legacy was. And it is a pretty big legacy; reforms in the tax system, further entrenching the civil service, building a system of granaries, and the building of Luoyang and the grand canal.
There are lots of maps – very helpful as even if you know China well many of the names of places have changed or are simply spelled differently. And also lots of miscellaneous data such as lists of government appointments which for a non-academic reader is not so necessary but is no-doubt a mine of information for students and academics of medieval China.
There are not many books on individual Chinese emperors available in English, and as you go back to the Middle Ages and ancient times there are very few (an obvious exception would be Empress Wu, and the ‘first Emperor’). This then is unusual and a valuable book because of it. Particularly because the Sui dynasty laid a lot of the foundations for the dynasties that followed; the civil service (mostly Wendi’s doing) is the most obvious but the Grand Canal has had as much of a long term impact economically and that was Yang’s great achievement. Xiong shows that if Yang had been willing to do things a bit slower, and been less obsessed with conquering Korea then he might well have been regarded as one of China’s greatest emperors.
The first shorter section is a narrative of Emperor Yang’s life. This is a bit too short for my liking, only 60 pages, and despite being a narrative is still a pretty dry read. Which is a shame as it is an exciting subject – court intrigues to become emperor, monumental ambition in building projects, embassies and warfare, and a great fall. So this is an interesting read but I feel more could have been made of it.
The second section takes us more in-depth into particular policy areas; his grand building projects; the bureaucracy; education and rites; religion; economics; and foreign policy. This is necessary both to show why Yang’s regime collapsed by showing how the economy was strained, and also to illustrate what his legacy was. And it is a pretty big legacy; reforms in the tax system, further entrenching the civil service, building a system of granaries, and the building of Luoyang and the grand canal.
There are lots of maps – very helpful as even if you know China well many of the names of places have changed or are simply spelled differently. And also lots of miscellaneous data such as lists of government appointments which for a non-academic reader is not so necessary but is no-doubt a mine of information for students and academics of medieval China.
There are not many books on individual Chinese emperors available in English, and as you go back to the Middle Ages and ancient times there are very few (an obvious exception would be Empress Wu, and the ‘first Emperor’). This then is unusual and a valuable book because of it. Particularly because the Sui dynasty laid a lot of the foundations for the dynasties that followed; the civil service (mostly Wendi’s doing) is the most obvious but the Grand Canal has had as much of a long term impact economically and that was Yang’s great achievement. Xiong shows that if Yang had been willing to do things a bit slower, and been less obsessed with conquering Korea then he might well have been regarded as one of China’s greatest emperors.
November 22, 2023
A good informative text. I found the information on granaries and the economy the most interesting. The text didn't really change my views of Yangdi. Ultimately, I don't deny that he was a truly visionary individual in creating the grand canal and building up Sui Luoyang, but he should have gone slower and been more willing to listen to remonstrance. Letting the grand canal be completed a generation later is not too late.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews