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The East Asian War, 1592–1598: International Relations, Violence, and Memory. Edited by James B. Lewis. Asian States and Empires 9. London: Routledge, 2015. 418 pp. ISBN: 9781138786639 (cloth, also available in paper and as e-book).

With The East Asian War, 1592–1598, it is better to begin at the end, with the one-and-a-half-page conclusion, in which the editor, James B. Lewis, explains the nature of the book and his aim in editing it, and provides one-line summaries of each of its seventeen chapters. He points out that, in Western and Chinese scholarship, little attention is paid to the Imjin War (1592–98), while in Korea and Japan studies abound. Sources, too, are lavishly available in Korean, Japanese, and Chinese. Hence, Lewis asked prominent scholars from Korea, Japan, and Western countries to contribute articles that would “provide introductions to large areas of concern and identify analytical problems” (p. 378). This explains why several contributions read like reviews of existing Japanese and Korean literature, while others seem to fly off on a tangent. It also explains why the volume as a whole does not establish a set of questions or problems regarding the war, which the authors would then address individually. The consequence is that, beyond the basic topic of the Imjin War as its common denominator, the book lacks focus and coherence. Some of the contributions, specifically those by Murai Shōsuke, Kenneth Swope, and Lewis, hardly treat the war at all. Murai introduces unexplored sources in Kagoshima, but regarding the war itself, his essay only contains “excerpts” from one of them (pp. 112–17). Similarly, Swope’s contribution discusses a lot of methodology, and a lot of grand Chinese strategy, but includes only four pages about the war itself (pp. 179–82). Lewis, too, only offers four pages on the war (pp. 261–64); what he says about King Sŏnjo’s flight in 1592 is intended to illustrate the concepts of “hierarchy and hegemony,” which “were (and perhaps are) significant questions for Northeast Asia” (p. 261). He recommends turning to specialists in international relations for further exploration. The essays are arranged into three sections: “International and Domestic Background,” “War,” and “Impact and Memory.” The third section heavily leans towards memory: worship of the Ming’s Wanli Emperor, Chinese generals, and Chinese soldiers (Kuwano Eiji); the war in literature (Choi Gwan); and the social and political significance of the moralistic compendium Tongguk Sinsok Samgang Haengsildo (Michael J. Pettid). The treatment of impact is limited to the introduction into Japan of moveable type, books, Confucian scholarship, and ceramics, and of tobacco and chili pepper into