History in Three Keys

Paul A. Cohen is Edith Stix Wasserman Professor of Asian Studies and History at Wellesley College and an associate at the Fairbank Center for East Asian Research, Harvard University. His publications include the award-winning Discovering History in China: American Historical Writing on the Recent Chinese Past (Columbia).

• List of Illustrations Preface Acknowledgments Part I. The Boxers as Event Prologue: The Historically Reconstructed Past 1. The Boxer Uprising: A Narrative History Part 2: The Boxers as Experience Prologue: The Experience Past 2. Drought and the Foreign Presence 3. Mass Spirit Possession 4. Magic and Female Pollution 5. Rumor and Rumor Panic 6. Death Part 3: The Boxers as Myth Prologue: The Mythologized Past 7. The New Culture Movement and the Boxers 8. Anti-Imperialism and the Recasting of the Boxer Myth 9. The Cultural Revolution and the Boxers Conclusion Abbreciations Notes Glossary Bibliography Index

The most adventurous writing on modern Chinese history currently available. History An extraordinary book. It is breathtaking, bold in concept, innovative in methodology, provocative at times, and eminently readable. -- Edmund S. K. Fung Asian Studies Review Cohen offers excellent insight into the idiosyncratics of the Boxer movement, including its ideas, origins, rituals, and development... Highly recommended. Library Journal