Symptoms of an Unruly Age: Li Zhi and Cultures of Early Modernity

Symptoms of an Unruly Age compares the writings of Li Zhi and his late-Ming compatriots to texts composed by European contemporaries, including Montaigne, Shakespeare, and Cervantes. Emphasizing aesthetic patterns that transcend national boundaries, Handler-Spitz explores these works as culturally distinct responses to similar social and economic tensions affecting early modern cultures on both ends of Eurasia. The book shows us that these texts each constitute cultural manifestations of early modernity.