Twilight in the Forbidden City
| Author | Reginald Johnston |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Subject | Chinese history |
| Genre | Memoir |
| Publisher | Victor Gollancz Ltd |
Publication date | 1934 |
| Publication place |  United Kingdom |
| 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 years of the 1920s and 1930s. Johnston was also a professor of Chinese at the University of London as well as the British Commissioner of Weihaiwei.
Overview
Twilight in the Forbidden City is prefaced by Puyi 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.[original research?]
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 film The Last Emperor features 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 4-939154-04-1).
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 pp. with bonus previously unpublished chapter.
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