Jung Chang

This is from the bestselling author of Wild Swans and Mao: The Unknown Story. In this groundbreaking biography, Jung Chang vividly describes how Empress Dowager Cixi - the most important woman in Chinese history - brought a medieval empire into the modern age. Under her, the ancient country attained virtually all the attributes of a modern state and it was she who abolished gruesome punishments like 'death by a thousand cuts' and put an end to foot-binding. Jung Chang comprehensively overturns the conventional view of Cixi as a diehard conservative and cruel despot and also takes the reader into the depths of her splendid Summer Palace and the harem of Beijing's Forbidden City, where she lived surrounded by eunuchs - with one of whom she fell in love, with tragic consequences. Packed with drama, fast-paced and gripping, it is both a panoramic depiction of the birth of modern China and an intimate portrait of a woman: as the concubine to a monarch, as the absolute ruler of a third of the world's population, and as a unique stateswoman. "Powerful". (Simon Sebag Montefiore). "Truly authoritative". (New York Times). "Wonderful". (Sunday Times). It is shortlisted for the James Tait Black Biography Prize.

Discover the extraordinary story of the woman who brought China into the modern age, from the bestselling author of Wild Swans In this groundbreaking biography, Jung Chang vividly describes how Empress Dowager Cixi - the most important woman in Chinese history - brought a medieval empire into the modern age.

OVER 13M COPIES SOLD â?? THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING PHENOMENON â?? NUMBER 8 ON SUNDAY TIMES BEST OF THE BESTSELLER LIST

Based on a decade of research, and on interviews with many of Mao's close circle in China who have never talked before - and everyone outside China who had significant dealings with him, this book is the story of the life of Mao. It is full of revelations, exploding the myth of the Long March, and showing completely unknown Mao.

A gripping portrait of the late Chinese leader provides hitherto unavailable details about the life of Mao Tse-tung, exploding a wide variety of myths about Mao, including facts about the Long March, his relationship with Stalin, his ruthless campaign of getting his own way, his monstrous behavior toward those close to him, and the devastating impact of his thirst for power on the Chinese people. Reprint.

The story of three generations in twentieth-century China that blends the intimacy of memoir and the panoramic sweep of eyewitness history--a bestselling classic in thirty languages with more than ten million copies sold around the world, now with a new introduction from the author. An engrossing record of Mao's impact on China, an unusual window on the female experience in the modern world, and an inspiring tale of courage and love, Jung Chang describes the extraordinary lives and experiences of her family members: her grandmother, a warlord's concubine; her mother's struggles as a young idealistic Communist; and her parents' experience as members of the Communist elite and their ordeal during the Cultural Revolution. Chang was a Red Guard briefly at the age of fourteen, then worked as a peasant, a "barefoot doctor," a steelworker, and an electrician. As the story of each generation unfolds, Chang captures in gripping, moving--and ultimately uplifting--detail the cycles of violent drama visited on her own family and millions of others caught in the whirlwind of history.

Ville svaner (1991) var en bok som definerte en generasjon – historien om «tre døtre av Kina»: Jung, hennes mor og bestemor, og deres liv gjennom et århundre med revolusjon. Fly, Wild Swans forteller ganske enkelt hva som skjedde videre. Fly, ville svaner er et kjærlighetsbrev til moren, satt mot Kinas utvikling – fra 1970-tallets relative frihet, gjennom 1990-tallets kapitalisme, til dagens autoritære styre under Xi Jinping. Med tilbakeblikk på familiens erfaringer i Kommunist-Kina, gir boken også en sterk skildring av Jungs forskning på Mao Tse-Tungs regime, løgnene hun avdekket, og konsekvensene av å publisere biografien hans. Jung Chang kom til Storbritannia i 1978, 26 år gammel, gjennom et kinesisk stipendprogram. London var preget av punk, protester og Ziggy Stardust – en verden totalt annerledes enn den hun kom fra. Hun hadde vokst opp i isolasjon fra Vesten, med streng statskontroll og frykt for å bryte reglene. Hun møtte friheten, men adskillelsen fra familien i Kina var tung. Etter hvert som Jung tilpasset seg Vesten, ble hun fascinert av motescenen, og hun ble den første fra Folkerepublikken Kina som tok en doktorgrad ved et britisk universitet. Som suksessrik akademiker i Vesten viser Jung hvor sterkt hun fortsatt er knyttet til moren i Kina – og hvor vanskelig det har vært når den politiske situasjonen i landet har hindret dem i å møtes. Gjennom deres liv forteller hun gripende om det kommunistisk diktaturet hun vokser opp i og truslene Kina i dag utgjør for verdensordenen. Dette er familiehistorie på sitt beste.