What can the end of the Ming Dynasty tell us about the election of Donald Trump and what comes next

Barbarians at the Gate

Last week’s election of Donald Trump to a second term as U.S. President disappointed half of the American electorate and much of the world (outside the Kremlin). To help Jeremiah and David process what’s next, they’re joined by Brendan O’Kane— writer, translator, expert in the literature of the late Ming Dynasty, and a Pennsylvania voter.

Brendan explores the works of Zhang Dai (張岱 1597-1634), the Jin Ping Mei 金瓶梅, and other literary examples from the twilight of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). What was it like to witness the end of an era and the collapse of an entire state? Was the Obama era an American "restoration" (中興)? What do people do when the political order is overturned and the dynasty falls? We delve into Chinese history and literature, searching for insights to ease the pain and make sense of what lies ahead.

David also shares reactions from his students in Beijing on the election results—as well as rumors of a surprising (and unsettling) prank their peers in the U.S. may have pulled at campus polling stations.

Brendan O'Kane on substack

The Southern Ming by Lynn Struve, 1984

The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in Seventeenth-Century China by Frederic Wakeman, 1986

Voices from the Ming-Qing Cataclysm: China in the Tiger's Jaws. Edited and translated by Lynn A. Struve, 1993