Guyuan Lectures on the Comprehensive Mirror: The Rise and Fall of the Eastern Han (Two Volumes)

This book is based on the Eastern Han history lectures from the popular iQIYI history program Gu Yuan Explains the Comprehensive Mirror. Using the Comprehensive Mirror as its narrative framework and drawing on official historical sources such as the Book of the Later Han, it examines the major figures and events of the Eastern Han Dynasty and presents the full course of the dynasty's rise, decline, and fall. It also touches on intellectual history, including the rise of Buddhism and Daoism. Rich in content, rigorous in its research, and compelling in its prose, this book offers a fresh perspective and fills a gap in accessible histories of the Eastern Han.

The Eastern Han Dynasty had a profound influence on the formation of the Han people and Han culture, as well as the development of the Chinese nation as a whole.

Without reading about the Eastern Han, it is impossible to understand China.