The "Imagination" That "Span" Brings

Liang Ch'i-ch'ao was one of the important people of China's modernhistory. He was not only a productive writer, but also an encyclopedicalacademic master. He promoted the development of society and politics of thattime with his enormous prestige. Moreover, he left many creative theoreticalpropositions for contemporary scholars to study. Liang Ch'i-ch'ao went toAmerica in 1903 and stayed there for 9 months. After this trip, he publishedhis travel notes on Xin Min Cong Bao's temporary supplement, called TravelNotes of the New Continent.This book is the detailed data that introduce politics, economy, andculture of the United States systematically. At the same time, it is one of themost important literatures that help us to comprehend what the scholars ofmodern history look the west as. It is also the basic text for us to study LiangCh'i-ch'ao.Through reviewing the background of that time, Liang's action and histhoughts' movement, this article reconstructs and unscrambles this book'scultural elements. From this book, we could see that Liang Ch'i-ch'ao hadcreated clear cognition on the United States' political culture and commercialculture through his observation. What is more significant is that he had foundand described the characters of the culture of consumption. Based on thisunderstanding, he criticized the polity of the United States.Liang's selection of the political route was based on his own logic andthe knowledge of occident and orient. Besides these, it came from the'imagination' that 'span' brought. Through analyzing the cultural meaningsof this book, we also could find the immovable spirit of his thoughts. If wecould grasp this spirit, we will understand the reason why he was capricious.