John Keay is a former special correspondent for the Economist and contributes regularly to the Sunday Telegraph, Times Higher Educational Supplement, and the Literary Review. His past books include the best-selling India: A History. He lives in Argyll, Scotland.
"Absorbingly readable.... A pleasingly cultured account of the
great sweep of China's evolution."--Independent (UK)
"Exquisitely written.... In fluid, effortless prose, Keay moves
energetically through the vicissitudes of China's dynastic
past."--Guardian (UK)
"Here, at roughly 130 pages per millennium, is China's history from
the earliest fragments of Xia dynasty to the last emperor, with a
little of Chairman Mao added for good (or bad) luck. Its core,
though, covers the 'big five' dynasties--Han, Tang, Song, Ming and
Qing--from 200 BC to the start of the twentieth century, and Keay's
choice is deliberate. There is no understanding China present or
future without a sense of its past. Much of that past, by any
standard, is awe-inspiring."--Observer(UK)
"John Keay has written...with unflagging zest, clear, accessible
prose, and a refreshingly panoramic perspective." --Open Letters
Monthly
"Without sacrificing substance for brevity, Keay manages to
illustrate China's history very much as a narrative of the rise and
fall of strong and feeble emperors, bureaucratic cliques and
factionalism, the development of philosophical traditions and
religious incarnations, and the constant restructuring of the
empire's geographical boundaries. Readers already interested in, or
wishing newly to embark upon, Chinese history will adore this book.
Highly recommended."--Library Journal
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