Text/Bohua
Empress Dowager Cixi and Queen Victoria were contemporaneous historical figures. As a powerful female historical figure, although she is not an emperor, she plays with China's political power by means of listening to the government, but under the pressure of internal and external troubles, she does not want to make progress and reform, and brings the ancient Chinese empire into a desperate situation of facing national extinction. Far away in the British Empire, Queen Victoria, as a "hypocrisy" who "ruled but not ruled", ruled as an enlightened constitutional monarchy, was loved by the people, and created the heyday of the British Empire. Cixi and Victoria, one is the empress dowager of the Eastern Empire, and the other is the queen of the "empire on which the sun never sets", these two most powerful women in the world at that time, but when they stepped into the threshold of the new century, they encountered two distinct historical destinies.
Queen Victoria Alexandrina Victoria (24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) Queen Victoria was the longest-reigning monarch in British history, reigning for 64 years. She was the first British monarch to be addressed by the title "Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Empress of India". Her 64-year reign (1837-1901) was the period of Britain's most powerful so-called "empire on which the sun never sets". The period of the Queen's reign, known in British history as the Victorian era. Her reign of more than 60 years coincided with the transition of British liberal capitalism from its infancy to its peak and then to monopoly capitalism, with unprecedented economic and cultural prosperity and full development of the constitutional monarchy, making Queen Victoria a symbol of peace and prosperity in Britain.
By the time Queen Victoria ascended the throne in 1837, Britain had completed the capitalist industrial revolution, and in order to meet the country's requirements for finding raw materials and sales markets, Britain began to establish colonies and dominions around the world.
The British occupation of New Zealand in 1840 marked the formation of the British colonial system around the world. Britain has a long history of ambitions for China. Britain's trade with China began with the trade in tea and silk, but these goods were luxury goods on the British market, and China's self-sufficient economic system rendered the products of Britain's Industrial Revolution useless. In order to reverse the trade deficit with China, British merchants began dumping opium with the support of the British government. In 1839, Lin Zexu sold cigarettes in Humen, which greatly dealt a blow to the dumping policy of the British government, and in early 1840, Queen Victoria gave a famous speech in Parliament, calling for war against China "in the interests of the British Empire". The First Opium War began.
Queen Victoria and her husband, Prince Albert, had a good relationship, but when the prince died in the middle of the queen's life in 1861, Queen Victoria was generally respected by the British, and ministers began to ask for her opinion. However, the death of her husband left the queen depressed, and she had been away from London for a long time to live in seclusion, even in public, without wearing a crown, but always dressed as a widow. Due to Victoria's long period of seclusion, the prime minister was unable to consult the queen on everything, so the prime minister's power gradually increased, which led to the improvement of the British constitutional monarchy.
Queen Victoria regained her life in the late 1870s after a long period of isolation, and in 1897 the country celebrated 60 years on the throne, which greatly increased the prestige of the Queen and the royal family. In December 1900, Queen Victoria was in poor health but insisted on going to the Isle of Wight, a favorite place for her and her late husband, Albert. Many years ago, on this island, they were surrounded by adorable young girls. In this secluded place, the queen wrote her will, writing down the details of her funeral, and she instructed her to dress her in a white dress after her death.
On January 22, 1901, a historical era came to an end when Queen Victoria died on the Isle of Wight at the age of 82. As she died, she was accompanied by her son, the Prince of Wales, who had decided to succeed to the throne in the name of Edward VII. At the queen's bedside were other descendants, including her grandson, Kaiser Wilhelm II. Queen Victoria's reign lasted for more than half a century, and she continued to expand new territories overseas, forming the "sun never sets" British Empire, and making Queen Victoria the Empress of India. Under her rule, the stability and dignity of the country made the monarchy popular again.
While Queen Victoria was enjoying the tsunami of salutes and cheers from her British subjects, in 1852, in the heavily guarded palace of the Forbidden City of the Qing Dynasty, the seventeen-year-old Cixi was tremblingly led by the eunuchs to participate in the "draft". Luckily, she stood out from the many show girls and was able to stay in the palace and was named "Lan Guiren". This is the so-called "natural beauty is difficult to give up, once chosen on the king's side", this is the first step to change her life destiny, and it is also a crucial step. Cixi did not have a noble bloodline, but a blue flag from the lower five banners, no prominent family background, and her father Huizheng was just an ordinary official.
However, in just ten years, this inconspicuous palace maid suddenly became a powerful figure in the ruling Qing Empire. 1861 was a year that Cixi and Victoria could not forget, perhaps the two of them had different feelings and different meanings of life, but it was in this year that both lost their husbands. First of all, the husband, who is the other half of their lives, plays a different role in the emotional world of the two. Cixi's husband, Emperor Xianfeng, was Cixi's political springboard to realize the value of life.
And Queen Victoria's husband Albert is an important adviser and assistant in her life, and an important emotional partner and life sustenance for her as a woman. The loss of her husband meant the loss of everything, and the grief-stricken Queen Victoria wrote in her heart to her loved ones: "The world is dead". It shows the depth of the relationship between the two. Cixi lost her husband, which means that she lost her restraints, and she relied on the status of the empress dowager of "mother to son", exerting various political skills, in the name of "listening to the government", in China, a society with male power as the core, played the edge ball of power, and climbed to the peak of power in the late Qing Dynasty, and controlled the late Qing regime, which directly affected the trend of China's modern history.
One East and One West, two great empires, two systems, two eras, and two women with infinite scenery, at the peak of political power, their political deeds have won different historical evaluations for them. As a woman, Cixi's personal life is also very unfortunate. She lost her husband at the age of 27 and her son before she was 40. Young widowed, middle-aged lost children, she accounted for all the major misfortunes in her life. Although she has supreme power in her life, she can't get the love of men and women that a normal woman can get, nor can she get the happiness of a normal mother's children and grandchildren around her knees and teasing her grandchildren. Perhaps Cixi, who has a strong desire for power, disdained this, as an ordinary girl from the Eight Banners, and relied on luck to give birth to the only prince of Emperor Xianfeng, so that with the identity of "mother is precious to son", she was promoted all the way from a nobleman, to a concubine, a concubine, until the queen mother.
As a woman, she finally reached the pinnacle of power with her skills in the intriguing and murderous palace, and as the queen mother, she went from the sideways in the patriarchal world, manipulating power in applause, so that the elite of those men had to bow down at her feet. Although Cixi was personally beautiful, the country suffered the greatest misfortune in history, and slipped into the quagmire of semi-colony step by step. This made the "Lafayette", who was in power during his lifetime, enjoy the infamy of "a generation of demon queens" after his death, and even suffered the fate of destroying the coffin and throwing the corpse. While the Qing Empire was struggling to survive the storm, the British Empire was entering the Victorian era in its heyday. Britain's economy and culture are unprecedentedly prosperous, science and art have developed greatly, the constitutional monarchy has become stable and mature, and the sun never sets on the empire is proud of the world.
The queen, who was at a loss when she ascended the throne at the age of eighteen, remained until her death at the age of eighty-two, and fate seemed to allow her to witness and enjoy the glory of Britain in its entirety. Queen Victoria accompanied Britain through the 19th century, the longest reigning queen in British history, except for raising 9 children, remembering her husband who died young, and making her children and grandchildren all over Europe call her "the grandmother of Europe", she did almost nothing in her later years. This is in huge contrast with the life trajectory of the Empress Dowager Cixi, who has a strong desire for power.
The political talent of the Empress Dowager Cixi may not be inferior to that of Queen Victoria, but why did China, under her rule, defeat again and again and sue for peace, cede land and pay reparations, until the erosion became worse day by day, and reached a situation that was out of control? While Britain appeared in the same historical period, the Victorian era, which soared to the sky and stood alone in the world? The power-hungry Empress Dowager Cixi also endured the crisis in the midst of domestic and foreign difficulties, trying to revive the shame, but in the end she withdrew from the scene in a desolate manner, and ended up with the infamy of bringing disaster to the country and the people. Queen Victoria, on the other hand, played the role of a "hypocrite monarch" and rarely interfered in the country's affairs, but she was sincerely respected and missed by the British, and even her name was called a symbol of prosperity and abundance. The Victorian era became a time of pride and relishment for the British, while the late Qing dynasty in which Cixi lived was an era of humiliation for Chinese. Therefore, tracing the fate of two women from a global perspective is actually exploring the deep historical reasons for the rise and fall of countries under the framework of two different civilization systems.
The character of Cixi is a contradictory figure who is proficient in healing, but is obsessed with the general trend of world development. Her ability and quality to understand human nature, work in scheming, put the individual first, and dare to act boldly give her the qualities that an autocratic emperor should have. Imagine how she could dominate the world as a woman without such a special feature? Cixi failed again, her failure was that she had an almost pathological thirst for power, and she spent most of her life wantonly appreciating the thrill of chasing power and enjoying the pleasure of obtaining power.
In other words, she will do whatever she wants for the sake of power! Cixi lived in a historical era, the industrial revolution in the Western world had been completed, and the west wind was moving eastward, which was an unprecedented new era for mankind, and it was also a critical moment for China's sleeping lion to cope with this life-and-death challenge. Cixi, as the supreme ruler of China at the time, should have used her power to lead China's crumbling ancient ship through the rapids and waves to the other shore. It is a pity that although she is familiar with the imperial art in the power field, she is ignorant of the world trend. In the face of the dangerous situation, China either turned a blind eye, or reacted slowly, or made mistakes in judgment and decision-making, and as a result, China slipped into the abyss of semi-colonialism and semi-feudalism.
This is really a tragedy for China, and it is also a tragedy for her personally! In stark contrast, Queen Victoria and the government did not hesitate to use all possible means for the prosperity and development of Britain. The sordid and filthy nature of the British government in the name of the Queen in the international political struggle at that time made it impossible for us to associate these methods with the beautiful words that described the Queen as "beautiful, gentle, noble." These methods are: conspiracy, bribery, power, striking first, and conquering by force.
These injustices soon bore fruit from the humiliation and defeat of China and other small and weak countries, and they provided a steady source of wealth for the prosperity of the British Empire. When the ruthless history makes us face two women in the same historical period, our hearts as Chinese are undoubtedly heavy. For the sake of her own strength, Cixi did not hesitate to adopt the policy of "measuring China's material resources and forming a friendship with the country", which made China lose face on the international political stage, but she was still majestic in the face of her subjects. And Queen Victoria has had a bumper harvest in her love and career in her life. As a woman, Victoria has done her duties as a queen brilliantly with her inaction, while at the same time having the happiness of an ordinary woman and making herself a great woman in the annals of history.