Toward the end of the Qing Dynasty, Empress Dowager Cixi arrogated all powers onto herself. This period, called the Guangxu Xuantong Reign, was China's darkest and most corrupt political period.

But the newly named Empress Dowager Cixi quickly ousted them on fabricated charges of incompetence. She then issued imperial edicts "from behind the curtains" that she and Dowager Empress Cian ...

Empress Dowager Cixi, who dominated China's political stage for more than 40 years, practiced political, economic, and cultural autocracy. The extreme social darkness determined that the Qing ...

Like Wild Swans it is banned in China. 2013 saw the publication of Empress Dowager Cixi: The Concubine Who Launched Modern China. Here Chang reassesses the reputation of the formidable 19th ...

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Han Hsiang Li's lush epic re-creates the fascinating life and times of Tzu Hsi, the Manchu Qing dynasty empress who rose from the ranks of Emperor Xianfeng's many concubines to become the de facto ...