‘What is China?’ This was the question posed nearly a hundred years ago by the Professor of Chinese at Cambridge, Herbert Giles, and it is equally valid today. China can seem remote and separate to people in the west; this stimulating and accessible history breaks down these barriers and makes sense of this complex and varied country. ‘China: A Modern History’ illuminates the huge, scattered and diverse political world that is China. Drawing on his extensive research and a wide range of original Chinese sources, Dillon explores how the country’s many different communities have a myriad of histories and traditions, races and ethnicities, religions (or none) and languages, but still share some sense of overarching Chinese identity, reaching out to Russia, the Caucasus and Japan and much of Asia. China has been defined by the rise and fall of empires. This comprehensive political history places China’s development from the 19th century to its present status as a regional and even world economic superpower in its historical and international context. Weaving together the central themes of social, economic, religious and cultural history, ‘China: A Modern History’ is a full narrative history with many original ideas and insights.
Editorial Reviews
Review
‘For a crisp, concise and authoritative overview of where China has come from in the past two centuries, this book would be hard to better’ –Kerry Brown, ‘Book of the Week’, Times Higher Education Supplement, 21st October 2010
‘The most up-to-date history of modern China. [Dillon] provides a well structured narrative from the ‘First Opium War’ to the coming to power of the ‘fourth generation’ of Communist leaders in China.’ –Steve Tsang, Louis Cha Fellow and University Reader in Politics, St Antony’s College, Oxford
‘An excellent book that reduces a vast mass of complex data and specialist scholarship to manageable proportions. Professor Dillon has written a lucid and penetrating history of China that achieves both breadth and depth. Students will benefit from the author’s clear-headed approach and plain yet eloquent style. This is one of the best single texts on modern Chinese history yet to appear.’ –Gregor Benton, Professor of Chinese History, Cardiff University
About the Author
Michael Dillon was founding Director of the Centre for Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Durham, where he taught modern Chinese history. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and the Royal Asiatic Society and was Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University in Beijing in 2009. He currently teaches Chinese Studies at Newcastle University.
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