Stitch and +Sam and all of you. Nicholas Kristoff and Sheryll WuDunn won the Pulitzer Prize for their reporting of the events of 1989 in China. Their book China Wakes : The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power is,I think, the best book on China since Edgar Snow's Inside Red China. Quite a statement. Check it out on Amazon.com.
Here is the description.
Reviews and Commentary for China Wakes : The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power
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From Kirkus Reviews , 06/15/94:
A vivid and thoughtful portrait of China by a Pulitzer Prize- winning husband-and-wife team of New York Times correspondents formerly in Beijing. Allowing for the complexity of the task, and for the sad record of China watchers (almost all of whom, for example, were unaware of the greatest man-made famine in history, which followed the so-called Great Leap Forward at the end of the 1950s and killed 30 million people), Kristof and WuDunn puzzle over the great paradox of present-day China: that, amid all the signs of a dying political dynasty, there flourishes one of the most buoyant economies in the world. All the signs of the death of the Communist Party era are visible: the alienation of the people; the loss of belief in the ideology even among the Party elite; the loss of control over information; and the growth of competing centers of power. It is a regime that has ''the worst public relations sense of any major government in the world'' and is ''too corrupt, too rotten, to be very successful at being totalitarian.'' And yet, in bringing industry to the rural areas, Deng Xiaoping unleashed a second agricultural revolution which--largely by removing Party control and instituting a regime closer to that of Dickensian England--brought about an annual growth rate of 13% in 1992 and 1993. This rate, as the authors point out, is unsustainable, but it has already raised more than 100 million Chinese out of poverty. With due recognition of the fallibility of the experts, the authors think that the most likely scenario is one of peaceful evolution, along the lines of Taiwan. The authors may not always be quite as skeptical of statistics as one would like, but this is a hard-headed, clear analysis filled with anecdote and vivid reportage. -- Copyright c1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Synopsis:
A definitive book on China's rise to economic and political power by the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporters of The New York Times. Taking readers inside the world's largest country at a time of seismic change, Kristof and WuDunn encapsulate in human terms the exhilarating and terrifying paradoxes of China today. Photos throughout. --This text refers to the hardcover edition of this title.
Synopsis:
The definitive book on China's uneasy transformation into an economic and political superpower by two Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporters. An insightful and thought-provoking analysis of daily life in China, China Wakes is an exemplary work of reportage. 16 pages of photos.
Customer Comments
A Reader from Pennsylvania , 11/08/97, rating=10:
Great reading and very educational
I agree with all the other reviewers. This book is a must for anyone who is interested in China and wants to learn about its history.
70473.3221@compuserve.com from Holden, MA , 09/03/97, rating=10:
The best book on China I have read. I have been to the countryside of China twice in the last three years as part of a medical mission team. This book provided a unique perspective about the interior of China. I speak some Chinese, and some of the nuances of the language were explained in the book. Anyone with the least bit of interest in China MUST read this book. My only regret is that I did not read it before my journey. The book gave a complete texture to the experience of visiting the country. It provided an insight into the way people think and act. So much of my journey has been amplified and clarified as a result of reading this book.
For those of you haven't read them you might also look at:
Life and Death in Shanghai; Nien Cheng
The Search for Modern China; Jonathan D. Spence
* Jonathan co-wrote one of my books on China.
My best to you |
