本书以晚清科幻小说为研究对象，通过对几部代表性作品的细读，考察晚清的知识精英们如何努力学习现代的历史观、科技观、时空观，并将其运用于探索未来、太空、心灵等未知事物，由此发现：他们梦想着汲取新知以革新本土文化，同时以本土智慧批判并超越殖民主义。这一融合中西的努力将他们引向对大同世界的描绘，而这些描绘中种种出人意表的奇异情节则揭示了他们在中与西、新与旧之间的挣扎与困境。

Sul’s history of the international ginseng trade reveals the cultural aspects of international capitalism and the impact of this single commodity on relations between the East and the West. Ginseng emerged as a major international commodity in the seventeenth century, when the East India Company began trading it westward. Europeans were drawn to the plant’s efficacy as a medicine, but their attempts to transplant it for mass production were unsuccessful. Also, due to a failure of extracting its active ingredients, Western pharmacology disparaged ginseng in the process of modernization. In the meantime, ginseng was discovered on the American continent and became one of the United States’ key exports to Asia and particularly China, but never cultivated a significant domestic market. As such, historicizing the ginseng trade provides a unique perspective on the impact of both culture and economics on international trade. A compelling interdisciplinary history of over five centuries of East–West trade and cultural exchange, this book will be invaluable to students and scholars of transnational history and a fascinating read for anyone interested in the history of international trade.