Congratulations to Asian Studies Professor Josephine Chiu-Duke and Professor Emeritus Michal S. Duke on the co-translated publication From Rural China to the Ivy League: Reminiscences of Transformations in Modern Chinese History by Yü Ying-shih (Cambria Press, 2021).
A leading authority in the field of Chinese Studies, Professor Yü Ying-shih received the John W. Kluge Prize for Achievement in the Study of Humanity in 2006 and the inaugural Tang Prize in Sinology in 2014. These awards represent a recognition of his contributions over six decades to the fields of Chinese history, thought, politics, and culture. Professor Yü’s book, originally published in Chinese, covers the period from his childhood in rural Anhui Province China to his professorship at Harvard University, and it has been read extensively in Chinese, both in serial form in the Mingbao Monthly and in book form. The book sold more than 10,000 copies in the first month after its publication by Yunchen Publishing Company in Taipei, Taiwan, in late 2018, and was awarded the twelfth Hong Kong Book Prize in June 2019.
Now expertly translated by Professors Michael S. Duke and Josephine Chiu-Duke (University of British Columbia), this book is much more than the memoir of the scholar who has been hailed as the most important living Chinese historian of our times—it is also an invaluable record of a history of our times, witnessing the cultural, political, and social transformations of what Professor Yü notes as the period of the most violent turmoil and social upheaval in modern Chinese history. This complex period is now made accessible to English-language readers, who will also benefit from the helpful notes by the translators. The book also includes rare photos from Professor Yü’s personal collection.
“This book is an essential record of the history of our times, bearing witness to the cultural, political, and social transformations of what Professor Yü Ying-shih notes as the period of the most violent turmoil and social upheaval in modern Chinese history.”
Professor Chin-shing Huang of the Academia Sinica
Professor Yü passed away on August 1st at the age of 91. He has been the subject of several commemorative meetings in the past month. Professor Chiu-Duke moderated one of the panels presented by Linking Publishers in Taipei.
