Zhang Taiyue, Chief Assistant of the Ming Dynasty

This is one man's war and the tragedy of an era. During the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, Zhang Juzheng, the chief minister of the cabinet, single-handedly raised up a crumbling empire. He implemented the examination method and the one-whip method, organized border defenses, and cleared the fields, so that the dying Ming Dynasty glowed with the last glow of its prosperity. However, the deeper the reform goes, the more enemies there are - the emperor's jealousy, colleagues' strife, eunuchs' betrayal, disciples' betrayal, Jianghu assassination, family separation... He stands at the pinnacle of power, but finds himself the loneliest person in the world. This book presents Zhang Juzheng's ups and downs in a grand and panoramic manner: from a prodigy in Jiangling to a protégé of the emperor, from forbearance in the Imperial Academy to seizing power in the cabinet, from iron-fisted reforms to betrayal and separation, from the fall of a superstar to ransacking homes and humiliating corpses, and then to being rehabilitated forty years later. It is not only a personal biography, but also an epic of the rise and fall of the Ming Dynasty - the power games in the court, the grudges in the rivers and lakes, the love between sons and daughters in the boudoir, and the iron horses and glaciers outside the border gates, intertwined into a magnificent historical picture. This is not the story of a successful person, but a tragic legend of an idealist who knew he could not do anything but did it, and fought against the entire era at the cost of his life. When the dust of history has settled, future generations will be able to comment on right and wrong.