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The Search for Modern China by Jonathan Spence (Norton, $30). This highly readable and informative journey through the final Chinese imperial dynasty gives the reader insight into how China governed itself in the imperial days, and illuminates governing patterns that are now returning as China searches for modernization that preserves the Chinese “essence.”
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Wild Swans, by Jung Chang (Touchstone, $16). This saga of three generations of a Chinese family—from a mistreated concubine to a pair of communist true-believers to their Red Guard daughter who sees through the lies—summarizes in colorful detail and compelling prose the story of nearly every Chinese family of the past 100 years.
400 Million Customers, by Carl Crow (out of print). A humorous and insightful 1937 best-seller by a journalist turned businessman who lived in Shanghai for 26 years. A cult classic among longtime China business hands, 400 Million Customers examines Chinese business practices and habits that remain with us to this day.
The Tyranny of History: The Roots of China’s Crisis, by W.J.F. Jenner (out of print). A book that examines the dark side of Chinese history and culture and exposes the sometimes fatal flaws in China’s civilization that have so often prevented the country from living up to its potential.
The Immobile Empire, by Alain Peyrefitte (out of print). The story of Lord Macartney’s mission to open trade with China in the late 1700s, and its undercurrent of deceit, distrust, and delusion. Written from Chinese imperial records and the memoirs of British delegates, this 1992 book reveals how each side walked away from the negotiations and banquets with completely different understandings, foreshadowing many of the joint-venture business deals of today.
River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze by Peter Hessler (Harper, $14). Recalling his experiences as a Peace Corps volunteer teaching English in a nowhere town on the banks of China’s biggest river, Hessler displays a novelist’s flair and a psychologist’s understanding of how Chinese people live their lives and of how they interact with a friendly foreigner.
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