His autobiography is well worth a read. I got it out of the library. It’s called From Emperor to Citizen. There’s another book about him by his English tutor who was a massive fetishist about imperial China
It’s called From Emperor to Citizen.
I’m already proud of him for that title.
Would you say there are any main CWs for it?
Definitely yes - physical cruelty towards servants, misogyny, Japanese imperialist aggression and the horrors of their colonial oppression of China are the major ones I can think of. The book details his whole life from unfathomable wealth to puppet of the Manchurian regime to re-education under communism and out the other side. It’s fascinating.
I’ve just remembered a third book that was a translation of the autobiography of one of China’s last palace eunuchs, he worked for Puyi. That was a really good read. Sorry I can’t remember the title off the top of my head
With those CWs, mainly about Japanese colonialism, I’m putting it on the backburner. But I’m truly intending to read the book one day.
Would you also say this is a rough journey towards him finally having friends for the first time?
I think it’s definitely redemptive in the sense that he slowly starts to see other humans as people, not subjects. To me the biggest takeaway was that communist re-education, combined with a fair society, is effective: if it can work on him it can work on anyone
Puyi really comes across in the different accounts as what all those postmodern heroes of inaction in books would actually be like.
