"A pathbreaking effort. While much has been written concerning Chinese monuments and natural landscapes, Philippe Forêt has broken new ground in re-creating the spatial and temporal dimensions of imperial landscape creation and transition. His argument is so novel that it should provoke others to examine Chinese imperial and vernacular landscapes in fresh ways." --Ronald G. Knapp, Distinguished Professor of Geography, State University of New York at New Paltz

"Forêt uses a stunningly effective postmodern analytical technique and demonstrates a new way of reading landscape and symbol in the Qing imperial enterprise." --Journal of Asian Studies, May 2001

"Luxueusement présenté, avec un très important appareil critique et une iconographie très parlante" --Géographie et cultures 43 (2002)

"Important ... deserves the attention of Qing scholars as well as those interested in the creation of cultural landscape or in early modern projects of imperial expansion worldwide" --Journal of Asian History 36 (2002)

"Elegantly styled ... a noteworthy contribution not only to Chinese studies, but to landscape studies in general" --China Quarterly, 2003

The imperial residence of Chengde was built by two powerful and ambitious Manchu emperors between 1703 and 1780 in the mountains of Jehol. This volume, the first scholarly publication in English on the Manchu summer capital, reveals how this unlikely architectural and landscape enterprise came to help forge a dynasty's multicultural identity and concretize its claims of political legitimacy. Using both visual and textual materials, the author explores the hidden dimensions of landscape, showing how geographical imagination shaped the aesthetics of Qing court culture while proposing a new interpretation of the mental universe that conceived one of the world's most remarkable examples of imperial architecture.

Philippe Forêt is assistant professor in the Department of Geography and International Academic Programs, University of Oklahoma.