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    The Perils of Interpreting: The Extraordinary Lives of Two Translators between Qing China and the British Empire

    The Perils of Interpreting by Harrison, Henrietta;

    The Extraordinary Lives of Two Translators between Qing China and the British Empire

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      • Publisher's listprice GBP 35.00
      • The price is estimated because at the time of ordering we do not know what conversion rates will apply to HUF / product currency when the book arrives. In case HUF is weaker, the price increases slightly, in case HUF is stronger, the price goes lower slightly.

        17 713 Ft (16 870 Ft + 5% VAT)
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      • Discounted price 15 942 Ft (15 183 Ft + 5% VAT)

    17 713 Ft

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    Availability

    Estimated delivery time: In stock at the publisher, but not at Prospero's office. Delivery time approx. 3-5 weeks.
    Not in stock at Prospero.

    Why don't you give exact delivery time?

    Delivery time is estimated on our previous experiences. We give estimations only, because we order from outside Hungary, and the delivery time mainly depends on how quickly the publisher supplies the book. Faster or slower deliveries both happen, but we do our best to supply as quickly as possible.

    Product details:

    • Publisher Princeton University Press
    • Date of Publication 4 January 2022
    • Number of Volumes Print PDF

    • ISBN 9780691225456
    • Binding Hardback
    • No. of pages312 pages
    • Size 234x155 mm
    • Language English
    • Illustrations 36 b/w illus. 1 map.
    • 328

    Categories

    Long description:

    A fascinating history of China?s relations with the West?told through the lives of two eighteenth-century translators

    The 1793 British embassy to China, which led to Lord George Macartney?s fraught encounter with the Qianlong emperor, has often been viewed as a clash of cultures fueled by the East?s lack of interest in the West. In The Perils of Interpreting, Henrietta Harrison presents a more nuanced picture, ingeniously shifting the historical lens to focus on Macartney?s two interpreters at that meeting?Li Zibiao and George Thomas Staunton. Who were these two men? How did they intervene in the exchanges that they mediated? And what did these exchanges mean for them? From Galway to Chengde, and from political intrigues to personal encounters, Harrison reassesses a pivotal moment in relations between China and Britain. She shows that there were Chinese who were familiar with the West, but growing tensions endangered those who embraced both cultures and would eventually culminate in the Opium Wars.

    Harrison demonstrates that the Qing court?s ignorance about the British did not simply happen, but was manufactured through the repression of cultural go-betweens like Li and Staunton. She traces Li?s influence as Macartney?s interpreter, the pressures Li faced in China as a result, and his later years in hiding. Staunton interpreted successfully for the British East India Company in Canton, but as Chinese anger grew against British imperial expansion in South Asia, he was compelled to flee to England. Harrison contends that in silencing expert voices, the Qing court missed an opportunity to gain insights that might have prevented a losing conflict with Britain.

    Uncovering the lives of two overlooked figures, The Perils of Interpreting offers an empathic argument for cross-cultural understanding in a connected world.



    "Winner of the Kenshur Prize, Bloomington Center for Eighteenth-Century Studies"

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