Sheng-Wei WANG was a finalist for the Proverse Prize 2018.

She is a Chinese American, currently based in Hong Kong. She has a B.S. from Tsing Hua University and a Ph.D. from the University of Southern California. In her early career, she was a staff scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. In 2006, as an independent scholar and freelance writer, she founded the China-U.S. Friendship Exchange, Inc. A year later, she launched an English-Chinese bi-lingual website to promote U.S.-China relations, which has attracted over a million viewers to date. She has also contributed many commentaries to the English-language newspaper, China Daily (Hong Kong). In 2013 she started research on Zheng He with Mark Nickless and Laurie Bonner-Nickless, and has since completed two related books: the already-published Chinese book, co-authored with the Nickless couple and the current English book by herself. She has given invited presentations on her Zheng He research at international conferences, universities, Zheng He Societies, the Executive Global Network (Hong Kong), the Clurr Club (Zürich, Switzerland), and the Straits Forum (Xiamen, China). She is a founding member of the International Zheng He Society founded in Malacca.

The above description was provided by the writer at the time of publication.

Dr Wang's introduction to her book, The Last Journey of the San Bao Eunuch, Admiral Zheng He, given at the Proverse Autumn Reception 2019, may be listened to at the following URL: https://youtu.be/xtrFmpIKetU 

Dr Wang gives frequent talks on her research. Invitations may be addressed to her through her publishers, Proverse Hong Kong, at info@proversepublishing.com

BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO THE BOOK

 From 1405, in order to maintain and expand the Ming Dynasty’s tributary system, Yongle Emperor Zhu Di (reigning 1402-1424) and Xuande Emperor Zhu Zhanji (reigning 1425-1435) ordered eunuch Zheng He to lead giant fleets across the seas. But soon after Zheng He’s seventh and last voyage in the 1430s, the Ming emperors put an end to this activity and ordered all records of previous voyages to be destroyed. Chinese writer Luo Maodeng (罗懋登), knowing the history of some of these voyages, wished to preserve a record of them, but, conscious of the possible penalty, decided to record the facts “under a veil”, in his 1597 novel, An Account of the Western World Voyage of the San Bao Eunuch (《三宝太监西洋记》). This is what Dr. Sheng-Wei Wang has concluded after reading and analysing Luo’s novel. Her book, The last journey of the San Bao Eunuch, Admiral Zheng He, shows the methodology and evidential arguments by which she has sought to lift the veil and the conclusions she suggests, includingthe derivation of the complete trans-Atlantic navigational routes and timelines ofthat last journey and the idea that Zheng He’s last expedition plausibly reached the ancient American Indian city, Cahokia, in the U.S. central Mississippi Valley in late autumn, 1433, long before Christopher Columbus set foot for the first time in the Americas. She supports the hotly debated view that Ming Chinese sailors and ships reached farther than previously accepted in modern times and calls for further research. She hopes this book will become an important step in bridging the gap in our understanding of ancient China-America history in the era before the Age of Discovery. An interesting contribution to an ongoing debate.

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