The Master of Demon Gorge: A Chinese History Podcast

By William HanHistory

The Master of Demon Gorge: A Chinese History Podcast episodes

January 25, 2024 Gu Yanwu
Regarding Gu Yanwu, the 17th century intellectual who has recently been the subject of controversy in Taiwanese politics.
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18 min
January 18, 2024 Dujiangyan
The remarkable Dujiangyan irrigation system in Sichuan was constructed in the 250s B.C. but remains in use today and remains crucial to the Chinese economy.
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17 min
January 11, 2024 Sima Guang and the General Mirror on Good Governance
Regarding Zizhi Tongjian, or "General Mirror on Good Governance," and the man who wrote it during the 11th century.
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20 min
January 04, 2024 Borges and "Extensive Records of the Taiping Era"
Taiping Guangji or "Extensive Records of the Taiping Era" is an anthology of stories compiled during the early Song Dynasty. Its editors chose to collect the stories under a series of clearly unworkable categories. In so doing, they made Taiping Guangji a perfect illustration of the point made in an essay by the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges.
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15 min
December 28, 2023 Policy Digests of the Zhen'guan Era
In 1615, the Tokugawa Shogunate made a rule that all Japanese emperors must study "Policy Digests of the Zhen'guan Era," written 900 years earlier in Tang Dynasty China. What is this book and what's important about it?
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17 min
December 21, 2023 Journey to the West
The Ming Dynasty novel "Journey to the West" ranks among the great classics of Chinese literature. I recently reread it, and I have thoughts.
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28 min
December 14, 2023 The Tocharians
The story of the somewhat mysterious Tocharian people of Kuche in today's Xinjiang, confusingly named after the Tokharoi of Bactria in modern Afghanistan, from whose language Chinese gets its word for "honey."
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21 min
December 07, 2023 Door Gods
The story of the "Door Gods" and how a pair of Tang Dynasty generals came to serve in that role.
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22 min
November 30, 2023 Chunyu Kun, Bro
The tale of another short (not to mention poor) man who achieved greatness. Chunyu Kun was a famed "wit" from Warring States era State of Qi. Besides services as a diplomat and political advisor, he was famous for being the sort of party guest you may not allow to leave by evening's end...
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17 min
November 23, 2023 Iasyr Shivaza and the Dungan
A fascinating minority group in the former USSR, chiefly Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan, is the people known as the Dungan. Originally Hui Muslims from northwestern China, they migrated into Central Asia in the 19th century. This story is about them, their Chinese-derived language, and one of their most significant cultural figures, Iasyr Shivaza.
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19 min