Suyoung Son's monograph follows the careers of two early Qing literati writers-cum-publishers, Zhang Chao 張潮 (1650–ca. 1707) and Wang Zhuo 王晫 (1636–ca. 1707). The result is far more than a solidly researched and lucidly written account of how print was socially used in shaping literati communities with transregional impacts. Son's ultimate achievement lies in ascribing back to the print medium per se the social processes surrounding it, not as its origins or explanatory causes but as effects testifying to its structure of temporality, which challenges us to rethink how a media history can be told.
Son opens the book with Chinese literati's mixed feelings toward print since the sixteenth century: less costly self-publishing rendered reputation achievable during one's lifetime but also provoked suspicions of diminished merit. Meanwhile, such ambivalence toward print also motivated “conflicting expectations”: “Writers used it to target a small, exclusive readership consisting of one's chosen coterie and...
