China Rhyming » Blog Archive » Royal Asiatic Society China in Shanghai – 14 Jan: Sir Edmund Backhouse Revisited (with Derek Sandhaus)
Few life stories illustrate the self-perpetuating cycles of misinformation and misunderstanding between East and West like that of Sir Edmund Backhouse. Celebrated in his own time as a foreigner with unique insider information at Qing-Dynasty China’s Manchu imperial court, some of his work was discredited as a fraud by subsequent generations, then re-visited again through recent research. His name evokes wildly versatile associations in the minds of China enthusiasts—a brilliant journalistic career, witness to one of China’s most turbulent eras, his alleged relationship with the Empire...
Source: chinarhyming.com