Dragon Lady: The Life and Legend of the Last Empress of China (Paperback)

~ (Author) "We do not even know her name..." (more)
Key Phrases: special regents, false eunuchs, seventh prince, Tzu Hsi, Kuang Hsu, Prince Kung (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

The Dowager Empress Tzu Hsi, ruling from behind the silk curtain, held extraordinary power during the last decades of China's tottering empire. Her name has always been linked with unflattering adjectives like ruthless and cunning. Now, Seagrave explains why the woman has had such a bad press. In this quite irresistible history, the author argues that it was a trio of Englishmen who were ruthless and cunning, and it was through their flawed and distorted reporting on the court that Tzu Hsi received the bum rap from which she has never recovered. Seagrave's revisionism is based on the earlier revelations of Hugh Trevor-Roper's Hermit of Peking ( LJ 4/1/77), itself a lively book, but Seagrave is matchless when it comes to turning avid research into engaging history. Wonderful for the general reader (a helpful cast of some 200 characters is provided) but the book also has the notes and bibliography of a scholarly study.
- John H. Boyle, California State Univ., Chico
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Kirkus Reviews

Spectacularly told debunking of myth and legend surrounding China's last empress--the Dowager Empress Tzu Hsi (1835-1908)--by Seagrave (The Marcos Dynasty, 1988, etc.). Born the obscure daughter of an obscure Manchu officer in 1835, Tzu's notorious ride to fame and power began in the imperial concubinage in 1856, when she gave birth to a boy heir. Seagrave's aim here is primarily to destroy longstanding myths about this most powerful of Chinese women, myths created by Western imperialist adventurers of pen and sword who painted her as the Wicked Witch of the East. The author's primary target and culprit is the infamous British literary agent Edmund Backhouse. Living in China at the turn of the century, Backhouse apparently culled gossip and rumor and fabricated evidence in order to coauthor, with J.O.P. Bland, the influential 1910 book China Under the Dowager Empress--which, according to Seagrave, presented a ``bloodthirsty caricature'' of Tzu that mixed ``Western fantasy and Chinese pornography.'' Backhouse reported that Tzu's ascent to power included killing off enemies with poisoned cakes, keeping hordes of false eunuchs close at hand, and choreographing wild sexual escapades in the Imperial Palace--escapades to which Backhouse claimed invitation. Seagrave relies partly on Hugh Trevor-Roper's Hermit of Peking (1974) to expose Backhouse as a prurient fraud who willfully set out to create a fictitious empress who would satiate Western stereotypes of sex-starved Asian women and justify British adventuring inside China. Seagrave also exposes other Western writers--including Pearl Buck--who perpetuated Backhouse's seamy portrait. An engrossing, fact-filled read and masterful debunking of a troubling distortion of Chinese history. (Sixteen pages of illustrations--not seen.) -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 624 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; Reprint edition (August 31, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679733698
• ISBN-13: 978-0679733690
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #47,610 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The controversy never ends, December 29, 2003

By	Joanna Daneman (Middletown, DE USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)

This is a worthy biography of Tzu Hsi, the Last Empress of China. While some people criticize the history, the distortion over the events and character of Tzu Hsi still rage today. I have read the Backhouse account that Seagrave attributes to besmirching the Empress's reputation and I agree, it's imaginative, inflammatory rot. The Backhouse bio attributes some sexual exploits of the author so is completely suspect. But it was taken as gospel for years. This biography is more balanced, and shows the various sides of the despotic but venerated ruler who tried to stem the tide of modernism in Old China, and failed. The onslaught of the Western culture broke down centuries of stable peasant culture, making way for the Revolution. An interesting look into the last remnants of Imperial China.

25 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Glimpses of Tzu-Hsi, October 31, 2001

By	K. Maxwell "katmax1" (Perth, Australia) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This book is less a biogrogaphy of "the dragon empress" Tzu-Hsi of China than a revison of 19th century Chinese history.

This work is important because the author has rechecked the validity of the usual sources on 19th cent history and found them very wanting - and very biased to boot. It shows the worth of double checking your sources when doing research and questioning 'experts'. Mind you, this could also apply to this book to some extent as it could have been improved with more chinese sources.

Where this book fails is as a biography of Tzu-Hsi, she only takes up a small section of the book, the rest is all explanation of various plots and "foreign devil" attrocities in china. Nobody comes out of it well.

For an interesting (and probably mostly correct) overview of 19th century China this book is invaluable - as a biography of Tzu-Hsi it does not accomplish a great deal and you feel you know very little about the subject at the end of the book.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Daring Debunker, September 13, 2001

By	"teencynic" (Nicosia, Cyprus) - See all my reviews

I read this with great interest while studying that period of history. I expected at first, a run-of-the-mill biography of one of history's most notorious women (I've read several, and a few on Cixi), but instead got a crsip, intelligent, highly entertaining and surprisingly sympathetic account of the last dowager.

The authors (Sterling and Peggy Seagrave) have done a great job. Not only is this the most readable account by far, but it's also a daring new take at the myth that she was demonic, debuched, and depraved, showing her as a sad, lonely old woman, cut off by her status and encased in the fast-disintegrating world of the Forbidden City. Not since Cleopatra (though this is arguable) has anyone -a woman, particularly- been so vilified (and even now with more understanding at her story, Cleopatra is still regarded by many to be the epitome of of Oriental decadence, and that was two thousand years ago).

The Seagraves' version is more spare in its tone, with rich historical fact and subtle humour. It brings one to mind of Evelyn B. McCune's book EMPRESS, on Wu Zitian (or Wu Jao, as she called her). They have the same narrative verve and refreshing outlook, though DRAGON LADY has the advantage of being a serious biography instead of a historical novel.