Covering more than four centuries of epic history with unsurpassed learning, imagination, and passion, Spence tells a story of vast struggle, of exhilarating dreams and crushed lives, and above all of the sheer capacity of the human spirit to endure. Professor of history at Yale University and author of numerous works on China, Spence shows the reader a world struggling to remake itself and establish harmony in light of recent events. 136 pages of full-color illustrations and black-and-white photographs.