Jonathan Spence
Academy of Achievement
Over the last 40 years, Jonathan Spence of Yale University has become the West's leading authority on Chinese history. His books, such as The Gate of Heavenly Peace and The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci, have brought remote times and places to life for the general reading public, while The Search for Modern China has become a standard text in universities around the world. The undergraduate course he teaches on the modern history of China is among the most popular ever given at Yale. Year after year, a new class of students packs the lecture hall to enjoy his spellbinding presentation. Born and educated in England, Spence did not discover his passion for Chinese studies until he came to Yale University, from Clare College, Cambridge, on a Mellon Fellowship. While still a graduate student, he became the first Westerner to study the confidential correspondence of the Manchu (Qing Dynasty) Emperors, preserved at the Palace Museum in Taiwan. The resulting dissertation became his first book