Mao Tsê-tung

by Stuart R. Schram

very good reading copy--photos--ships quick--alex2

Genres: China, Biography, History, Nonfiction

351 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1967

About the author

Stuart Reynolds Schram was an American physicist, political scientist and sinologist who specialized in the study of modern Chinese politics.

Reviews

[Bryan Shaw]

Solid monograph published during the Cultural Revolution. Unencumbered by the verdict which historians subsequently delivered.

[Henry Sturcke]

A title in Penguin's Political Leaders of the Twentieth Century series. Originally published in 1966, I read the revised edition, published 1967.
Here is the description from the back cover: "By any reckoning Mao Tse-tung must be regarded as one of the greatest and most remarkable statesmen of modern times. As a poet of distinction, as a political philosopher of major importance, and as a strategist whose 6000-mile trek across China has become a legend, Mao has devoted his life to China and the Chinese peasants. Indeed the Chinese People's Republic has shaped a whole pattern of revolution for poor peasant societies. In this new biography, Stuart Schram sifts fact from fiction in the long story of Mao's struggle to free the greatness of China and to give a new meaning to Marxism."
As I said, written in 1966, if you couldn't tell from this book description.
Given its date, it does not cover the Cultural Revolution or the amazing turn of events when Nixon visited China. But when it appeared, it was a useful overview of Mao's life until then.

[Ryan Soh]

Surprisingly quite an objective telling of Mao Tse-Tung’s life journey given the author’s American nationality. This book manages to illustrate the complex political dynamics in 20th century China, highlighting the contradictions from within and without, in which has now emerged the greatest socialist superpower in the current world stage. That being said, the author rightfully critiques the major pitfalls in Mao’s political career revolving the economic failures of his radical agricultural collectivisation policies leading to a widespread national famine. Laying flat all the facts of Mao Tse-Tung’s leadership and pivotal role in the survival and establishment of the People’s Republic of China, his greatness must be reckoned with as among the most remarkable political philosophers, strategists, and revolutionaries in the history of class struggle. Mao’s Thought has momentously introduced and adapted orthodox Marxist doctrine to the material conditions of the third-world, igniting the revolutionary propensity in the hearts of the ‘external proletariat’ of the peoples of Asia, Africa, and Latin America.