In 1998, the eminent Qing historian Guo Chengkang remarked to Michael G. Chang that although “[e]verybody can say a few words about the southern tours,” those trips to the south taken most frequently and notably by the Qianlong emperor, “nobody has studied them in depth yet” (pp. 3–4). Professor Chang remedies this situation with his richly detailed and carefully nuanced study of imperial tours undertaken during the period from 1680 to 1785. Although that period encompasses the tours undertaken by Kangxi, which began in earnest after the Qing victory in the Rebellion of the Three Feudatories in 1681, the main subject of the book is really Qianlong's touring, for which his grandfather's tours serve as backdrop and precedent.
Chang incontrovertibly demonstrates the range of meanings involved in both the court's decision to travel and the ways in which it structured and presented those tours. In reviving the practice of imperial...
