The Cult of HappinessHistory and art come together in this definitive discussion of the Chinese woodblock print form of nianhua, literally New Year pictures. James Flath analyzes the role of nianhua in the home and later in the theatre and relates these artworks to the social, cultural, and political milieu of North China as it was between the late Qing dynasty and the early 1950s. Among the first studies in any field to treat folk art as historical text, this