The Man Awakened from Dreams: One Man’s Life in a North China Village, 1857-1942

by Henrietta Harrison

In this beautifully crafted study of one emblematic life, Harrison addresses large themes in Chinese history while conveying with great immediacy the textures and rhythms of everyday life in the countryside in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. Liu Dapeng was a provincial degree-holder who never held government office. Through the story of his family, the author illustrates the decline of the countryside in relation to the cities as a result of modernization and the transformation of Confucian ideology as a result of these changes. Based on nearly 400 volumes of Liu's diary and other writings, the book illustrates what it was like to study in an academy and to be a schoolteacher, the pressures of changing family relationships, the daily grind of work in industry and agriculture, people's experience with government, and life under the Japanese occupation.

Genres: History, China, Nonfiction, Biography, School, Asia, Academic

220 pages, Paperback

First published January 3, 2005

About the author

Librarian Note:
There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

From: http://www.orinst.ox.ac.uk/staff/ea/c...
"I am a historian and my main interest is in what ordinary people’s lives have been like in China from the Qing dynasty until today. I am also enthusiastic about writing the kind of history that tells stories as well as making arguments. Both of my most recent books have been micro-histories and I have made extensive use of fieldwork in China, especially conducting oral history interviews and collecting village-level materials, as well as using more conventional archives and libraries.

My research has included the 1911 revolution, nationalism, Confucianism in the twentieth-century, Catholicism, interactions between China and Europe, and above all the history of Shanxi province. I have worked across different periods, writing two books about the early twentieth century, and one that is the story of a single village from 1700 to 2012, as well as several articles about the 1950s and 60s. My main current research is on the eighteenth century, with a focus on diplomacy and the social history of oral interpreting."

Reviews

[Jessica Zu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Totally loving this story ... not only is harrison an eloquent story teller but also she weaves myriad gestures toward the large themes, not to "prove" anything, but to force us rethink we think we know about Confucianism, modernity, revolution
love love love this book

[Ali · Rating 4 out of 5]

read for history class

this kind of slapped. i mean the context is crazy, right? it's this guy Liu Dapeng who wrote in a diary for like 50 years straight, often multiple times a day. he grew up in the latter end of the Qing dynasty, lived through the 1911 Revolution and then under GMD power, and dies during the Japanese occupation. and Harrison just does such an amazing job of painting this picture of this guy who grew up on Confucian ideology (b/c civil service blah blah but also just adopting it as an ethical framework to live his life by) and how the rapid changes from 1911 onwards kind of just... leaves him behind? and it's also remarkable as a story of his resilience. such a wonderful reading to supplement the class because we talk about these broad strokes and what's happening At The Top with Sun Yat-sen, Chiang Kai-Shek, Mao Zedong, and all these other "elite" but never really get to understand what the experience of it all was like as just your normal average person.

idk i just really appreciated it. i will say i heavily skimmed the middle because i was so sick of doing this reading b/c it's so long.... lol. anyways. i did get really emotional over many of the passages Harrison chooses to include -- particularly the ones where Liu is talking about how he feels as if he's failed his parents in so many ways, or when Harrison recounts the fates of Liu's children and how his view of filial piety was so intense and really colored his relationships with his children. idk man. i'm just emotional.

[Kade · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read for my class on Modern Chinese History.

For a look at the effects of modernization in China from ~1870 to 1940, this was a very interesting read. It focuses exclusively on the life of one man and his village. Typically history focuses on the important players and changes, but this is about the effects on the common people and their daily lives. His life is generally depressing as he falls from a Confucian scholar, with dreams of being a government official, to a school teacher, then a businessman, then a farmer living in poverty.

It has some dry patches, and a few odd takes, since Liu Dapeng was himself an odd person, but overall a very informative read.

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

For history class 🫠

[M · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the story of Liu Daping, a man who devoted his life to Confucian morality and state service at the inopportune moment of Confucianism’s collapse. He looked on with dismay from his northern village at the imperial examination system's discontinuation in 1905, the Qing dynasty's overthrow in 1911, and the national disorder that reigned until the country was swamped by the invasion of imperial Japan. To Liu's mind, it was the decline of Confucian piety which was the cause of China’s misfortune in the early twentieth century – an angry heaven meting out punishment onto the impious.

The author Henrietta Harrison constructs Liu’s mental universe from the volumes of daily diaries he kept throughout his life, and contrasts his traditionalism with the rise of Chinese modernity. Liu is not so much the center of the story as he is one little man hidden somewhere in an enormous painting. The real subject of the painting is the strain placed on a traditional society as it is subjected to the weight of the modern world. She discusses the Qing Empire, the banking system, the Silk Road, industrialization; she discusses filial piety, local land tenure and water rights, folk religion, and the rise of opium. It’s amazing how much she fits into this little book.

As his world goes to pieces, Liu retreats to his farm where he lives out his days tilling the land like a Confucian hermit of antiquity. At the time of his death, his village hideaway was a long day's journey away from the provincial capital city, Taiyuan; today, the village has itself been incorporated as a suburb into the expanding city. Anyone who has lived on the outskirts of a major Chinese city (all ~400 million of us) will understand how the urban expansion cements over old neighborhoods. This book fills in the history of those neighborhoods. Would-be Confucian hermits beware.

[Patrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Having read this book some three times now, I find it gets stronger each time. I see it now as one of the most important and best books about Confucianism in the modern age. It is also one of the best works of local micro history in the late-Qing/Republican period. It’s good for teaching undergraduates too.

[Toni Marie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this for class. It was an interesting look into the life of a man in 19th & 20th century china. But a lot of it was boring. And it wouldnt be somethinf that I would ahve picked up on my own.

[Henry · Rating 5 out of 5]

- Liu was born in a transitional period of China: it was when China was gradually moving from the traditional Confucius teaching into more modern, Westernized world

- Liu was born in a lower-middle class in a rather poor village (the province was wealthy at one point being a merchant hub. However with change in the business environment, has gradually became poor due to merchant hub moving to elsewhere). His dad gained lower-middle class through trading in a different town (and rarely come back to Liu)

- Liu was seen gifted as a scholar when young, however he struggled to obtain higher posts that required high examination grades (which 90% of the applicant failed)

- Liu passed the first examination and move on to the harder one. He stayed at the province's school where most of the children there are coming from much more affluent family than his. Because other children have many more option than Liu even if they fail the next exam, they couldn't understand why Liu spent so much time on studying

- Liu began diary-writing because it was popular at the time, and continued to do so till his later age

- Because Liu (and to some extent, China) continued to embrace the traditional ideal, as the world transitioned, Liu felt behind (he justify his leaving behind by stating he is embracing the Taoism ideal of seemingly exile in a remote village) and gradually became poor as time goes on

[ByeBry · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has shown its viewers the struggles of Liu Dapeng in keeping his dream in becoming a government official for China, which the systems are transitioning into a more modern country. Even though this book showcases the struggles of the protagonist, but there is a lot of historic details that describe the emotional impact of the modernization of China. Overall this book is quite insightful because the readers are being taken in a journey in understanding how history and cultures are going to be shaped.

[Naked Fish]

Micro-history的典範。標題：兩層含義，一是說明本書的主人公就是稱自己為「夢醒子」的Dapeng Liu，二是有些諷刺地指出Liu在自認為超脫於傳統中國社會政治與權力結構的狀態下又在新儒家的道德規範這一夢中睡去。辛亥變革、軍閥混戰、日寇進犯，Liu在自己的下半生中好像無法不受打擾地享受美夢了，但他最後還是沒能「醒來」。敘述結構：以小見大，不僅僅是Liu自己的歷史（經歷、思想變化等等），還記述了他的家族史、他所居住村落的經濟史、民國政治經濟史，另外對新儒家思想的一些層面也做了細緻的分析，將Liu生活中的實例與文本經典作比較。主要的primary source只是Liu的日記，敘述角度切換非常頻繁卻不失條理。有時結合當時大環境以第三人稱口吻寫Liu，有時又直接引用Liu的日記。

[Joshua Marney · Rating 5 out of 5]

A poignant micro-historical work about the life of a minor Chinese literati as he lived through the decline of traditional China.

[Emma Sharp · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fabulous and moving story of one mans struggle to adapt in a new world following the end of dynastic rule in China in 1911.

[Josh Koehn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gentle Reading

A gentle read about an ordinary man's ordinary, mundane existence in the context of his provincial world and his lifestyle.

[Lola Rogin · Rating 3 out of 5]

this man had the worst life of all time

[Devin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A gem.

[Aiden M · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good.

[Joel · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's a sense of sadness in the life of Liu Dapeng, a Confucian believer who watched the examination system deteriorate as China began adopting Western ideas after the fall of the Qing Dynasty.

[Benemint · Rating 4 out of 5]

this is the closest history can get to a novel. Very enjoyable reading