Lawrence Yim focuses on Qian's poetic theory and practice, providing a critical study of his theory of poetic-history (shishi) and poems from the Toubi ji. He also examines the role played by history in early Qing verse, rethinking the nature of loyalism and historical memory in seventeenth-century China.

Focuses on Qian's poetic theory and practice, offering a critical study of his theory of poetic-history (shishi) and poems from the Toubi ji. This book examines the role played by history in early Qing verse, rethinking the nature of loyalism and historical memory in seventeenth-century China.

'Yim achieves revelation on a level where few can work and where elusive but profound understandings lie. My own view of Qian Qianyi, an unavoidable figure for anyone who studies the seventeenth century in China, has been altered by this book, and my appreciation of poety as an important kind of source material for historians, also, has been heightened. I recommend it to anyone interested in the political and literary history of the Ming-Qing era.' - Lynn A., Struve, Indiana University, Bloomington, Journal of Chinese Studies, 2010 "Yim's book is an important and admirable effort in reviving Qian Qianyi's role in the Ming loyalist narrative. Compared to the life Qian Qianyi lived, enjoyed, and achieved, it is a tragedy that he had suffered such posthumous condemnation and prosecution. Yim has put together many significant and under-appreciated sources concerning Qian Qianyi's shishi ideas and the genre of yimin poetry. His argument for Qian Qianyi may be seen as the beginning of a revisionist history of the poetic tradition and its political implications during the Ming-Qing transition." - Hsueh-Yi Lin, Princeton University, Chinese Literature: 32 (2010)