Historical and Cultural Explorations: Essays Honoring the 80th Birthday of Professor Ying-shih Yü

All of the essays in this Chinese volume were written by students of Yu Yingshi who served as Professor of Chinese History at Harvard, then Yale and finally at Princeton. Among his notable recognitions are the Kluge Prize from the Library of Congress, the first historian of Asia to receive this honor, as well as the first humanist to receive the Tang Prize from Academia Sinica.

In the Introduction, Tillman and three of Yu’s other students wrote about his career and role as teacher. The thirty scholarly essays display some segments of the range of historical studies and periods that Professor Yu inspired them to pursue. Tillman’s own essay explores the legacy of some of Chen Liang’s twelfth-century ideas on Chen Huanzhang’s and Shibusawa Eiichi’s thinking, such as reconciling the traditional tension between pursuing wealth and living ethically. Such ideas empowered their synthesis of Western economic ideas and practices with a re-interpretation of Confucianism, a re-reading of Confucius that had definite similarities with Chen Liang’s pioneering efforts.