author
Arthur H. Smith
1845–1932
An American missionary and writer who spent more than five decades in China, he became one of the best-known English-language interpreters of Chinese society for Western readers. His books blend firsthand observation, cultural commentary, and the perspective of a late 19th- and early 20th-century outsider.
1 Audiobook
Village Life in China: A Study in Sociology
by Arthur H. Smith
About the author
Born in Vernon, Connecticut, on July 18, 1845, Arthur Henderson Smith was educated at Beloit College and later joined the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. In 1872 he went to China as a Congregational missionary and remained there for 54 years, working mainly in north China and becoming deeply familiar with everyday village life as well as major political upheavals.
Smith is best remembered for books such as Chinese Characteristics, Village Life in China, and China in Convulsion. These works introduced many English-language readers to Chinese customs and social life, and they were widely read in their time. Because he wrote as a foreign missionary shaped by the attitudes of his era, his work is often read today both for its firsthand observations and for what it reveals about Western views of China in that period.
He died on August 31, 1932. For readers interested in missionary history, cross-cultural writing, or foreign accounts of late Qing China, his books remain important historical documents.