A General History of Taiwan

Lian Heng's Taiwan General History, a general history spanning 1,290 years written by a private scholar, is itself an anomaly in the annals of historiography. Completed during the Japanese colonial period and grounded in the conviction that "a nation may perish, but its history must not," the author gathered Chinese and foreign sources, archives, and folk accounts, laying out layer by layer Taiwan's political evolution, economic settlement, military defense, culture and customs, and social welfare from the Sui dynasty to the late Qing, with particular detail on the mainland migrants' development of Taiwan and the people's resistance against foreign invasion. The book's value lies not only in its historical material but in a method of writing that preserves aspiration through history: it lets readers see how Taiwan's history has always been bound by blood to the mainland. Read it as a "general history with a stance," attentive both to its narrative framework and emotional leanings and to the wealth of primary material it preserves. Suitable for readers interested in Taiwanese history and the history of modern Chinese historiography, and as an introductory reference for regional history research.