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The Morning Deluge I: From Mao's Childhood to The Long March
Volume I of The Morning Deluge covers the period from the childhood of Mao Tsetung to the Long March. Volume II, also available in Panther Books, continues the history of China and the life of Mao up to the Korean War.
400 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1971
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About the author
Han Suyin
106 books103 followersHan Suyin (Pinyin: Hán Sùyīn) is the pen name of Elizabeth Comber, born Rosalie Elisabeth Kuanghu Chow (Pinyin: Zhōu Guānghú). She was a Chinese-born Eurasian author of several books on modern China, novels set in East Asia, and autobiographical works, as well as a physician. She wrote in English and French. She died in Lausanne, Switzerland in 2012.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 11, 2020
Excellent and very detailed account of the life of Mao Zedong, since he was a child until the end of The Long March.
Han Suyin is openly sympathetic to Mao and to the revolution, which makes reading it all the better, although it felt as an hagiography at times. She gives a solid account of the two-line struggle inside the Party through the years.
The book is particularly clear given the circumstances: it narrates over 40 years of vibrant political development, in the middle of a rapidly-changing international framework, in the most populated country in world. It can be hard to track the different people through the years, but the author makes an effort to contextualize them when they haven't been mentioned in a while, and the table of contents in the end allows to quickly look names up.
Han Suyin is openly sympathetic to Mao and to the revolution, which makes reading it all the better, although it felt as an hagiography at times. She gives a solid account of the two-line struggle inside the Party through the years.
The book is particularly clear given the circumstances: it narrates over 40 years of vibrant political development, in the middle of a rapidly-changing international framework, in the most populated country in world. It can be hard to track the different people through the years, but the author makes an effort to contextualize them when they haven't been mentioned in a while, and the table of contents in the end allows to quickly look names up.
May 30, 2019
Han Suyin was an extraordinary writer - well researched and told in such a way that the book is hard to put down. I highly recommend for anybody interested in a proper biography of Mao & a history of the Chinese Revolution. Extremely useful for anybody who wants to study the two-line struggle in the Party since it’s inception. Excited to continue on to the next volume and then on to Wind in the Tower.
Disappointed that Han Suyin, after (rightfully) lambasting Liu Shaoqi as the chief capitalist roader in the Party, ended up as a supporter of the Dengist capitalist counterrevolution of the late 70s - her work here is unmarred by this later revisionism and capitulation and should be read by all.
Disappointed that Han Suyin, after (rightfully) lambasting Liu Shaoqi as the chief capitalist roader in the Party, ended up as a supporter of the Dengist capitalist counterrevolution of the late 70s - her work here is unmarred by this later revisionism and capitulation and should be read by all.
September 16, 2012
Dry in patches, but really gripping in others. This takes this fantastic series of biography up to 1949.
February 9, 2022
Well-written journalistic summary of Mao's youth and participation in the Chinese Revolution; however, Suyin's writing is rather hagiographic in tone, which makes me skeptical of the sequel. Decent as an engaging introduction to the period, not great as a historical source.
January 6, 2019
This book is the first volume of a two-volume biography and is itself
divided into two parts. Dr. Han SuYin's talent with words, after all she is a writer not a historian, and her sympathetic view of the revolutionary leader makes this biography a real joy to read. Nevertheless the reader should be warned that her account adheres to the official narrative even when historical documents suggest that Mao occasionally made strategic bad calls. I refer in particular to the role played by the Comintern and the dramatic events that took place in 1927 and the fact that, as early as 1925 (at the August Plenum) Ch'en Tu-hsiu
had proposed that the Chinese Communist Party withdraw from the Kuomingtang (KMT), while Mao continued his collaboration until Fall 1927. Between February
and September of 1927, the forces of counterrevolution were released by
Chiang Kai-shek. In April, Chiang carried out the massacre of the Shanghai
workers. True, Stalin continued to support the united front (Chinese Communist Parti and KMT) for another five months, but the tragedy was prolonged by Mao's adventurism. She sticks to the official version that communication between Moscow and the Chinese Communist Party was complicated by a language barrier, communist cadres' psychological dependence on Moscow, and blames Borodin, the Russian ambassador, for misjudging the situation on the ground and failing to timely inform Stalin about the KMT betrayal. But Mao was a Marxist and had enough theoretical and analytical tools at his disposal to understand that a communist leader shouldn't rely on telegraph messages to make a strategic decision. One shouldn't gloss over the terrible loss of lives that followed the decision to arm peasants so that they could take cities at a time when the KMT had already betrayed the revolution. Nevertheless Dr. Han's book on Mao remains one of the most engaging and best written accounts of Mao's life i have read.
divided into two parts. Dr. Han SuYin's talent with words, after all she is a writer not a historian, and her sympathetic view of the revolutionary leader makes this biography a real joy to read. Nevertheless the reader should be warned that her account adheres to the official narrative even when historical documents suggest that Mao occasionally made strategic bad calls. I refer in particular to the role played by the Comintern and the dramatic events that took place in 1927 and the fact that, as early as 1925 (at the August Plenum) Ch'en Tu-hsiu
had proposed that the Chinese Communist Party withdraw from the Kuomingtang (KMT), while Mao continued his collaboration until Fall 1927. Between February
and September of 1927, the forces of counterrevolution were released by
Chiang Kai-shek. In April, Chiang carried out the massacre of the Shanghai
workers. True, Stalin continued to support the united front (Chinese Communist Parti and KMT) for another five months, but the tragedy was prolonged by Mao's adventurism. She sticks to the official version that communication between Moscow and the Chinese Communist Party was complicated by a language barrier, communist cadres' psychological dependence on Moscow, and blames Borodin, the Russian ambassador, for misjudging the situation on the ground and failing to timely inform Stalin about the KMT betrayal. But Mao was a Marxist and had enough theoretical and analytical tools at his disposal to understand that a communist leader shouldn't rely on telegraph messages to make a strategic decision. One shouldn't gloss over the terrible loss of lives that followed the decision to arm peasants so that they could take cities at a time when the KMT had already betrayed the revolution. Nevertheless Dr. Han's book on Mao remains one of the most engaging and best written accounts of Mao's life i have read.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews