The Immobile Empire

A meticulous study of Britain's 1793 mission to China and the diplomatic misunderstandings that followed. Using classified Chinese reports and contemporary British journals, the author reconstructs the encounter between Qing court protocol and Western trade ambitions.

The book explores diplomatic ritual, commercial negotiation, and the cultural assumptions that made the mission abortive. It situates the embassy within wider political and economic currents to show how early Sino‑Western contact shaped later relations.

Well suited to readers of diplomatic and Asian history, the work offers deep archival evidence and sustained analysis for scholars, students, and informed general readers interested in the origins of modern East–West interactions.

• Primary-source research from Chinese and British archives
• Close analysis of the 1793 embassy and trade diplomacy
• Knopf hardcover, 630 pages

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