Author: Bassin, Mark
Title: Imperial Visions : Nationalist Imagination and Geographical Expansion in the Russian Far East, 1840-1865 /
Description: Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, (1999). orig.boards. 23x15cm, xv,329 pp, Series: Cambridge Studies in Historical Geography; 29.. Textual map.. Minor rubbing. Slight bump to head of spine. VG. dustwrapper. ¶ Contents: Early visions and divinations; National identity and world mission; The rediscovery of the Amur; The push to the Pacific; Dreams of a Siberian Mississippi; Civilizing a savage realm; Poised on the Manchurian frontier; The Amur and its discontents; Conclusion; Bibliography. ["In the middle of the nineteenth century, the Russian empire made a dramatic advance on the Pacific by annexing the vast regions of the Amur and Ussuri rivers. Although this remote realm was a virtual terra incognita for the Russian educated public, the acquisition of an 'Asian Mississippi' attracted great attention nonetheless, even stirring the dreams of Russia' s most outstanding visionaries. Within a decade of its acquisition, however, the dreams were gone and the Amur region largely abandoned and forgotten. In an innovative examination of Russia's perceptions of the new territories in the Far East, Mark Bassin sets the Amur enigma squarely in the context of the Zeitgeist in Russia at the time.Imperial Visions demonstrates the fundamental importance of geographical imagination in the mentalite; of imperial Russia. The work offers a truly novel perspective on the complex and ambivalent ideological relationship between Russian nationalism, geographical identity, and imperial expansion" - publisher's description]

Keywords: Tsarist Russia, Imperial Siberia, Amur River Region, Historical, Geography, China History, Nationalism, Russian Far East, Expansion