Twilight in the Forbidden City
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| Twilight in the Forbidden City | |
| Author | Reginald Johnston |
|---|---|
| Country |  United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Subject(s) | Chinese history |
| Genre(s) | Memoir |
| Publisher | Victor Gollancz Ltd |
| Publication date | 1934 |
| Pages | 486 |
Twilight in the Forbidden City (Chinese: 紫禁城的黄昏) is Reginald Johnston's 486-page memoir of the Xuantong Emperor or Henry Puyi as he eventually became known.
Johnston was tutor to the Emperor and an eyewitness to Chinese events in the crucial years of the 1920s and 1930s. Many of his views are at variance with those held today. Johnston was also a professor of Chinese at the University of London and as well a British Commissioner of Weihaiwei.
[edit] Overview
Twilight in the Forbidden City is prefaced by the Emperor Hsüan-T'ung himself in the year 1931.
Johnston provides a good deal of anecdotal material for the last days of the Ch'ing (Qing Dynasty) court before the 1911 Revolution. He knew many of the active players in those events, and of historical significance are his observations on the Ch'ing court's political structure, and in particular the Nei Wu Fu or Imperial Household Department. Johnston had little use for the Empress T'zu-hsi (Empress Dowager Cixi) and many other principal players in these events.
Twilight in the Forbidden City is very much a history of an entire period and not an exclusive portrait of the last Emperor of China. The latter impression is perhaps a result of the film The Last Emperor having been based on the book.
In the fourth impression, published in December 1934 by Victor Gollancz Ltd., additional information such as the fully spread fan (pp 448–9) was developed and some important parts of the history, such as confinement of Ts'ao K'un (Cao Kun) (p. 381) and K'ang You-wei's (Kang Youwei) refuge country (p. 17), were reviewed for modification with "preface to the fourth impression" (p. 6) (Japanese translation; ISBN 4939154041).
[edit] Publication history
- Reginald F. Johnston, Twilight in the Forbidden City, Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1934, 486 pp.
- Reginald F. Johnston, Twilight in the Forbidden City, Oxford University Press, 1985, 486 pp.
- Reginald F. Johnston, Twilight in the Forbidden City, Soul Care Publishing, 2008, 488 pages with bonus previously unpublished chapter.
