Culture, courtiers, and competition

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"Drawing from various disciplines and incorporating a wide range of documentary sources, artifacts, and foreign accounts, this collection of essays reveals the Ming court as an arena of competition and negotiation, where a large cast of actors pursued individual and corporate ends, personal agency shaped protocol and style, and diverse people, goods, and tastes converged. Rather than observing an immutable set of traditions, court culture underwent frequent reinterpretation and rearticulation, processes driven by immediate and keenly felt personal imperatives, mediated through social, political, and cultural interaction."--BOOK JACKET.