Wu Jen-shu, 2013, Urban Pleasures: Leisure Consumption and Spatial Transformation in Jiangnan Cities during the Ming-Qing Period, 418 pages, Taipei: Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica.

Urban Pleasures focuses on the diversity of leisure, shopping activities, and spaces that marked urban lifestyles and life experiences from the mid-Ming to the mid-Qing. It considers the concept of “space” in the field of consumption research, arguing for the effects of consumption on changing spatial configurations, and exploring the social relations and political negotiations underlying such changes. This book is divided into three sections, each consisting of two chapters, which collectively explore the subject from six aspects. Part One examines on the characteristics and incentives of consumption in Ming and Qing cities through aspects of leisure and shopping. Part Two explores social spaces reflected in urban leisure consumption, while Part Three centers on gender and consumption. The Conclusion explores the significance of variations in urban consumer space on three levels, namely spatial practice of consumption, social production of consumer space, and political negotiation of urban spaces. The appeal of leisure consumption helps explain why the gentry often moved their residences from the country to the city from the mid-Ming on.