{"product_id":"the-promise-and-peril-of-things-literature-and-material-culture-in-late-imperial-china-paperback","title":"The Promise and Peril of Things: Literature and Material Culture in Late Imperial China - Paperback","description":"\u003cdiv\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: right;\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/reportcopyrightinfringement.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"\u003e\u003cb\u003eReport copyright infringement\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003cp\u003eby \u003cb\u003eWai-Yee Li\u003c\/b\u003e (Author)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOur relationship with things abounds with paradoxes. People assign value to objects in ways that are often deeply personal or idiosyncratic yet at the same time rooted in specific cultural and historical contexts. How do things become meaningful? How do our connections with the world of things define us? In Ming and Qing China, inquiry into things and their contradictions flourished, and its depth and complexity belie the notion that material culture simply reflects status anxiety or class conflict. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWai-yee Li traces notions of the pleasures and dangers of things in the literature and thought of late imperial China. She explores how aesthetic claims and political power intersect, probes the objective and subjective dimensions of value, and questions what determines authenticity and aesthetic appeal. Li considers core oppositions--people and things, elegance and vulgarity, real and fake, lost and found--to tease out the ambiguities of material culture. With examples spanning the late sixteenth to the mid-eighteenth centuries, she shows how relations with things can both encode and resist social change, political crisis, and personal loss. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Promise and Peril of Things\u003c\/i\u003e reconsiders major works such as \u003ci\u003eThe Plum in the Golden Vase\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe Story of the Stone\u003c\/i\u003e, Li Yu's writings, and Wu Weiye's poetry and drama, as well as a host of less familiar texts. It offers new insights into Ming and Qing literary and aesthetic sensibilities, as well as the intersections of material culture with literature, intellectual history, and art history.\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eNumber of Pages:\u003c\/strong\u003e 378\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eDimensions:\u003c\/strong\u003e 1.42 x 8.9 x 5.98 IN\u003c\/div\u003e\n            \u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublication Date:\u003c\/strong\u003e May 17, 2022\u003c\/div\u003e\n            ","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45654302785638,"sku":"9780231201032","price":72.52,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0599\/7255\/0758\/files\/MzBIZXlleXdPOFQxeFhLNnJYWEdzdz09.webp?v=1779569438","url":"https:\/\/infinitylightwa.com\/products\/the-promise-and-peril-of-things-literature-and-material-culture-in-late-imperial-china-paperback","provider":"Infinity Light","version":"1.0","type":"link"}