Inside the World of the Eunuch
This book tells the story of how Chinese palace eunuchs, a complicated and much-maligned group of people, struggled to insert a degree of agency into their lives. During the Qing dynasty, the imperial court was determined to limit the influence of eunuchs by imposing a management style based upon strict rules, corporal punishment, and collective responsibility. Emasculation and employment placed eunuchs at the center of the empire, yet also subjected them to servile status and marginalization by society. Seeking more control over their lives, eunuchs repeatedly tested the boundaries of subservience to the emperor and the imperial court. This portrait of eunuch society reveals that Qing eunuchs operated within two parallel realms, one revolving around the emperor and the court by day and another among the eunuchs themselves by night where they recreated the social bonds (through drinking, gambling, and opium smoking) denied them by their palace service. Emasculation did not produce the ideal servants; rather, eunuchs proved to be a constant source of anxiety and labor challenges for the Qing imperial court. The history of Qing palace eunuchs is defined by a tension between the role eunuchs were meant to play and the life they intended to live.