Nov 26, 2013
336 p., 5 1/2 x 8 1/4
1 b/w illus.
ISBN: 9780300184044
Cloth: $35.00 sc
By Zhou Xun
Reviews
“A terrific book. . . . The content is original, authentic and compelling; the first-hand accounts of ‘forgotten voices’ come to life vividly. The author’s personal narrative describing how the interviews were elicited is a fascinating contemporary commentary on the continuing lack of openness in Chinese civil society and the difficulties of getting to the truth, even about events that happened decades ago.”—Gerard Lemos, author of The End of the Chinese Dream: Why Chinese People Fear the Future
“Anyone who wants to understand what it was like to live through the most horrific man-made famine in history should read this. Zhou Xun has given voice to the kind of people whose views are never heard or reported. It makes you both angry and sad at the same time. It shows how little people even now understood what happened to them or why.”—Jasper Becker, author of Hungry Ghosts: Mao’s Secret Famine
“The Maoist regime insisted that the great famine of 1958-1962 was a natural disaster, but it actually resulted from the reckless policies and a pitiless disregard for human life of the regime itself. Zhou Xun’s meticulous and sensitive oral history allows survivors of the famine to tell their stories for the first time. She rectifies a great historic injustice by enabling the victims to put their harrowing ordeal into the historic record.”—Steve Smith, All Souls College, Oxford University
