The Fox Wife

The Qing dynasty, the last imperial dynasty in China’s two millennia of imperial rule, began in 1644 and officially ended in 1912 after the Xinhai Revolution of 1911. The fall of the dynasty was largely driven by internal political turmoil and international pressures and influences. The dynasty was known for its corruption, inefficient governance, and rigid social structure that privileged an elite few. The population was beset with widespread poverty and famine, and the dynasty failed to adapt to the changing needs of the country. The tax system placed a disproportionate financial burden on the peasantry, leading to widespread social discontent and a failure to modernize the country’s economy, military, and infrastructure. 

Internationally, the Qing imperial family faced mounting pressure from Japanese imperialism and Western powers after the Opium Wars and their resulting treaties in the mid-19th century. The Treaty of Nanking in 1842 ceded Hong Kong to the British, opened five ports to British trade, and gave extraterritorial rights to British citizens, along with a large indemnity. The Treaty of Tientsin in 1858 granted Western powers access to Chinese markets and legalized the opium trade, which increased local opium addiction rates and allowed the establishment of foreign embassies in Beijing.

The Qing imperial family initially resisted the implementation of the Treaty of Tientsin. After the burning of the Summer Palace and the Convention of Peking in 1860, they were forced to adhere to its stipulations by ceding additional territories to Britain and opening more ports for international trade. The Opium Wars led to an increase in foreign presence and goods within China, weakened imperial power, and increased social hostility.

By 1899, anti-foreign sentiment had reached an all-time high and resulted in the Boxer Rebellion. The Boxers, supported by the Qing government under the Empress Dowager, attacked foreign delegations in Beijing as well as Chinese Christians. The Rebellion was crushed by a coalition of eight nations—Britain, France, Germany, Russia, the United States, Japan, Italy, and Austria-Hungary. The coalition defeated both the Boxers and the Qing military. Symbolically, this defeat announced the end of the Qing Dynasty.

In The Fox Bride, the fall of the Qing dynasty informs the narrative’s setting, as the story begins in Manchuria in 1908. Snow and the others are not involved in the political upheavals of the time. However, Choo weaves the social costs of widespread poverty and the Qing dynasty’s inability to address it into the novel’s landscape. During the dynasty’s reign, women often lost their autonomy. The Confucian belief system’s patriarchal values, in combination with financial anxieties, pushed families to sell their daughters to brothels to make ends meet. As the bookkeeper’s granddaughter puts it, without money, “you get sold” (202). Choo juxtaposes wealthy “foreigners spending money in the streets [with] starving peasants fleeing famine” to underscore the era’s civil discontent (8). Choo also showcases how civil unrest spanned across social classes. The narrative ends with Puyi’s ascension to the imperial throne at the age of two, a symbol of the dynasty’s end and the beginning of a new era.