"Schlesinger has written a tremendously important book. Through rigorous multi-archival and multi-lingual research, he brings the most valuable perspectives from the "New Qing History" into dialogue with scholarship on late imperial Chinese environmental history, thereby enriching our understanding of both fields. This is scholarship of the highest order." -- Micah Muscolino * Oxford University * "Schlesinger offers many refreshing surprises as he punctures the idea of Manchuria as the Qing's last pristine wilderness. By showing just how disastrous the consumption of natural products could be on the environment and Manchu identity, he demonstrates the relevance of the Qing for understanding environmental consequences in our own world." -- Timothy Brook * University of British Columbia * "Offering an exhaustively researched study using Manchu, Mongolian, and Chinese sources, Jonathan Schlesinger describes in compelling detail the integration of Inner Asian sensibilities into Chinese metropolitan life and the creation of zones of indigenous purity on the frontier. The story of an elite desire for fur and other luxuries paired with a market-driven obsession with authenticity will find familiar echo today to anyone who has ever been in an airport duty-free shop." -- Mark C. Elliott * Harvard University * "This is a particularly fine example of the fresh insights that can be gained by viewing history from multiple angles...Environmental historians, historians of empire, of migration and diasporas, and of globalization and the early modern world of goods, should all read this book. They will find much to ponder." -- Joanna Waley-Cohen * <i>China Review International</i> *