China’s 1895 defeat to Japan and the resulting Treaty of Shimonoseki (read more about the treaty in the chapter on Empress Dowager Cixi) opened the eyes of many Chinese intellectuals, Liang included, to China’s weakness. The treaty inspired Liang to coin the now famous phrase, “Sick Man of Asia,” to describe China’s precarious position. The phrase in… Read more »
Kang Youwei (1858–1927), along with Liang, was one of the most important reformist thinkers of the late Qing period. Kang met Liang Qichao in Beijing in 1890, after his first failed attempt to pass the highest level of the imperial examinations. Kang introduced the younger Liang to a bold teleological reinterpretation of Confucian thought, inspired… Read more »
Liang Qichao is born on February 23, 1873 in a village of farmers and fishermen in Xinhui, a southern Chinese county in Guangdong province. Liang came from a relatively wealthy family of local gentry. Given a traditional Confucian schooling, Liang quickly emerged as a prodigy, passing the local examinations at 11 and the provincial examinations… Read more »