The seventeenth century was a time of great social and political upheaval in China. In Crisis and Transformation in Seventeenth-Century China, Chun-shu Chang and Shelley Hsueh-lun Chang offer a detailed and engaging analysis of society, culture, and the state in China during this critical period.

The main thread of the book follows the life and works of a remarkable figure of the period, Li Yü (1611-80), whose vast array of accomplishments and experiences mirror seventeenth-century China in all its complexity and excitement. Li Yü's China was a world of unprecedented changes in almost all spheres of life. A thriving commercial and industrial economy, stupendous population growth, and the emergence of a new age of science and technology were accompanied by intense urbanization, radical views on money, wealth, and luxury, liberal attitudes toward sexuality, and developments that would change the nature of the literary and intellectual world. The Changs' exhaustive exploration of Chinese historical and literary sources of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is combined with a selective application of interpretive insights and analytic techniques from the major theoretical schools.

An important resource for scholars in history, literature, and Asian studies, Crisis and Transformation extends its appeal to those interested in the history of science, issues of gender and social transformation, and popular culture movements.

Chun-shu Chang is Professor of History, University of Michigan, and Honorary Professor of Chinese History, China. Shelley Hsueh-lun Chang is Visiting Associate Professor of History and Research Associate, Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan.

张春树，生于山东梨园张庄。幼读旧式私塾长大，后入台湾大学历史系、考古人类学系，毕业后人“中央研究院”史语所工作。20世纪50年代去美国哈佛大学深造，学位完成后执教于密西根大学历史系至今。其问曾在香港中文大学任教并任历史系主任。治学专长于政治史、军事史、社会经济史、文学与思想史、边疆史、民族史、法律史、考古与人类学、科技史。主要学术专著有Nation，State，and Imperialism in Early China，ca．160017．C—A．D．8(2007）；Frontier，Immigration．and Empire in Han China．130B．C—A．D．157(2007、t Rede—fining History(与骆雪伦合著，1998）；South China in theTwelfth Century(1981）；War and Peace with the Hsiungnu in Early Han China(1980）;The Han Colonis and Their Settlements on the Chu—yen Frontier(1966）,《汉代边疆史论集》(1975）；《国电、国学与国家——浅释民初清华国学研究院四位史家之思想与史学》(2006）等十余部。