1587, a Year of No Significance (Chinese: 萬曆十五年; pinyin: Wanli Shiwunian) is Chinese historian Ray Huang's most famous work. First published by Yale University Press in 1981[1], it examines how a number of seemingly insignificant events in 1587 might have caused the downfall of the Ming empire. The views expressed in the book follow the macro history perspective.
The Chinese title, meaning "the fifteenth year of the Emperor Wanli", is how the year 1587 was expressed in the Chinese calendar: the era name of the emperor at the time, followed by which year of his reign it was.
Although Huang had completed the manuscript by 1976, no publisher would accept it at first, as it was not serious enough for an academic work, but was too serious for popular non-fiction.[2]
The work has been translated into a number of different languages: Chinese, Japanese, German and French.
1587 was adapted into a play by Zuni Icosahedron (進念二十面體) director Mathias Woo, which premièred in Hong Kong in 1999. The second production was in 2006, after Woo and Towards the Republic (走向共和) screenwriter Zhang Jianwei (張建偉) re-wrote the script by adding a considerable amount of Kun opera and other elements.[3] There was a third run in 2008.