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5 Books to Help You Understand China

2018-04-11 Claire L. Squire ShanghaiWOWeng

Reading! Yes, it’s golden; it’s the key to knowledge and the perfect escapism from reality. A person who reads lives a thousand lives, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. So if you’re going to get your read on and you're also baffled by your neighbors greeting you with ‘ne chi fan le me’ all the time, then you need to do some serious China-related reading. 


Here are five books that will help you get your heads around this topsy-turvey country.


Wild Swans



Amazon blurb - Few books have had such an impact as Wild Swans: a popular bestseller which has sold more than 13 million copies and a critically acclaimed history of China; a tragic tale of nightmarish cruelty and an uplifting story of bravery and survival.


Through the story of three generations of women in her own family – the grandmother given to the warlord as a concubine, the Communist mother and the daughter herself – Jung Chang reveals the epic history of China's twentieth century.

Breathtaking in its scope, unforgettable in its descriptions, this is a masterpiece which is extraordinary in every way.


What you’ll learn – Reading 'Wild Swans' is a great way to learn about the vast development that China has undertaken over three generations. It gives you a firsthand, in-depth understanding of how this was achieved and how it affected Chinese people.


Country Driving



Amazon blurb - After living in China for five years, and learning the language, Peter Hessler decided to undertake an even more complicated endeavor: he acquired his Chinese driving license. An eye-opening challenge, it enabled him to embark on an epic journey driving across this most enigmatic of countries. Over seven years, he traveled to places rarely explored by tourists, into the factories exporting their goods to the world and into the homes of their workers. Full of extraordinary encounters and details of life beyond Beijing, it is an unforgettable, unique portrait of the country that will likely shape all our lives in the century to come.


What you’ll learn – Country Driving looks at a side of China that most of us will never, EVER get to see, including a bra-parts factory that produces thin-steel rings for straps (and only those rings). But it also shows us how in cities far away from Shanghai's glittering lights are transforming China with consequences both negative and positive.


Life and Death in Shanghai

 


Amazon blurb – Nien Cheng, an anglophile and fluent English-speaker who worked for Shell in Shanghai under Mao, was put under house arrest by Red Guards in 1966 and subsequently jailed. All attempts to make her confess to the charges of being a British spy failed; all efforts to indoctrinate her were met by a steadfast and fearless refusal to accept the terms offered by her interrogators. When she was released from prison she was told that her daughter had committed suicide. In fact, Mei Ping had been beaten to death by Maoist revolutionaries.


What you’ll learn – Life and Death in Shanghai tells a relatable tale of a very normal woman whose life gets turned completely upside down. It helps you to understand what life was like in the early days of the reign of Mao, and how Shanghai has changed/stayed the same since.


Factory Girls

 


Amazon blurb – ‘Head and shoulders above almost all other new books about China, this unflinching and yearningly compassionate portrait of the lives and loves of ordinary Chinese workers is quite unforgettable’ Simon Winchester.

Every year in China millions of migrant workers leave their rural towns to find jobs in the cities. These people are the driving forces behind China’s economic boom: they work very hard and for little money to make the trainers, ornaments, designer handbags and toys that we buy.


What you’ll learn – Humility and appreciation for the quality of life that we have. This book will make you rethink the way you view China and its migrant works whilst teaching you the costs of the industrial and economic boom.


The Corpse Walker

 


Amazon blurb – The Corpse Walker introduces us to regular men and women at the bottom of Chinese society, most of whom have been battered by life but have managed to retain their dignity: a professional mourner, a human trafficker, a public toilet manager, a leper, a grave robber, and a Falung Gong practitioner, among others. By asking challenging questions with respect and empathy, Liao Yiwu managed to get his subjects to talk openly and sometimes hilariously about their lives, desires, and vulnerabilities, creating a book that is an instance par excellence of what was once upon a time called "The New Journalism." The Corpse Walker reveals a fascinating aspect of modern China, describing the lives of normal Chinese citizens in ways that constantly provoke and surprise.


What you’ll learn – This is a really interesting take on lives in China that are nearly always left unexplored. You’ll have a better understanding of the lives of tricycle-riding, waste-recycling men than you ever had before.


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