Китайската цивилизация

by Jacques Gernet, Жак Жерне

Тази класическа вече книга ще срещне българския читател по време, когато за всички става ясно, че съвременния свят не може да бъде мислен без Китай. Нашият свят все повече и повече ще изпитва икономическите и политически предизвикателства на формиращата се на Изток велика сила.
Не е ли това необходимото предизвикателство за да се опитаме да разберем Китай, неговата хилядолетна история и цивилизация?

Genres: History, China, Nonfiction, Asia, Reference, Historical

512 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Jacques Gernet was an eminent French sinologist of the second half of the 20th century. His best-known work is The Chinese Civilization, a 900-page summary of Chinese history and civilization which has been translated into many languages.

Reviews

[Mkp · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gernet's coverage is very interesting and encompasses the full range of Chinese history. He is very much an appreciator of Chinese culture, but he has his own perspective which colors the disquisition. In particular, his Marxist sympathies are always in the background. Perhaps not surprisingly, he is highly dismissive of Taoist and Buddhist culture and feels that they diminished Chinese society. He also dismissed Confucius, although he seems to think that the later Confucian tradition (to which he gives scant credit to the original teachings of Confucius) was pretty good. In general he champions the Legalist tradition and its contributions to the later Confucian current. As a consequence, he is rather sympathetic towards the first Qin Emperor.

His collectivist, Marxist prejudices also render his explanation for China's economic and technological stagnation in the late 19th Century completely unconvincing. Although the second edition was published in 1996, he was still in the thrall of Maoist economic development. Thus he says,

"in turning in our day towards a collectivist, state economy nearer to its ancient traditions the Chinese world has remained faithful to its own genius. Similarly the adoption of parliamentary institutions modelled on those of the Western nations was to turn out later to be a nonsense, not because China was not 'ripe' for liberal democracy, but because such borrowed institutions were profoundly alien to Chinese traditions."

To say thus is overly simplistic, and in fact it disrespects the genius and adaptability of the Chinese people (or any other people, for that matter). His description of China's decline at the end of the 19th century focuses considerably on "humiliation" and face. He seems to suggest that their humiliation at the hands of arrogant Westerners prevented the Chinese from being capable of any energetic action. This I don't believe -- the abuse that they suffered at the hands of the Mongols was far greater, and even the Ching takeover included devastating massacres that must have been dispiriting to many elements of society.

Also, his scornful dismissal of Chiang Kai-shek appears to be emotion-laden, just as is his celebration of the Maoist "peasant" army. This description of what happened is completely contradicted by Chang and Halliday's account in "Mao, the Unknown Story". In particular, he offers a complete whitewash of the "100 Flowers Movement" and the "Great Leap Forward".

This lack of objectivity has its advantages and disadvantages. On the negative side, of course, you are getting a slanted presentation of history. On the positive, side, though, you are getting a point of view that rises above the all-too-common dry accounting of events without analysis.

The book uses the Wade-Giles system of transliteration into Roman characters. The translation from the French is amazingly fluent and makes the book a good read. However, the index is so atrocious as to be absolutely worthless. It is a waste of time to look anything up in this index.

[Olethros · Rating 4 out of 5]

-Muy clarificador, muy global, muy jugoso, muy rígido.-

Género. Historia.

Lo que nos cuenta. El libro El mundo chino (publicación original: Le monde chinois, 1972) es una aproximación a China desde la Edad de Bronce hasta el final del siglo XX, que cubre aspectos arqueológicos, sociológicos, políticos y puramente históricos.

¿Quiere saber más de este libro, sin spoilers? Visite:

http://librosdeolethros.blogspot.com/...

[Phil · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this book up because I'm teaching a World Civilizations course in the fall and felt I needed to read a bit deeper into the history of China because this will be one of my go-to civilizations for the course. I was generally aware of the basic outlines of Chinese history, but not really in much detail because most of my academic background is the Graeco-Roman world.

Gernet presents a vast panorama of history which is difficult at the best of times. He presents it with clarity and erudition, so it holds together and is quite readable. Of course, with any scholarly survey, he simply doesn't have the time and space (it is already over 600 pages long) to go into tremendous detail which is a challenge for a non-specialist like myself. My general familiarity with the broad outline of Chinese history helped, but I know there are details I missed because I simply didn't understand it well enough. This is particularly true in intellectual history which is not my strong point in this area. I have a general sense now, but I don't think I understand Chinese philosophy, art or religion. Not really, at any rate.

My sense of the general narrative is, at times, shaky. This is particularly true in the ancient period, which is the period I'm teaching on (along with the mediaeval). I'm not sure I understand the earliest period of Chinese history except that it has the familiar blend of legend and material evidence that one finds in the Graeco-Roman period before, say, 800 BCE. (or later as some would argue, say 490 BCE). Again, not Gernet's fault, but sometimes it helps to tell the stories, even if they are likely legendary.

The tone, in general, is the standard detached academic tone for much of the book. It shifts as we reach the late 19th century to include much more outrage at the treatment of China by the Western powers and Japan from the 1850s on. The outrage is understandible, but Gernet loses his edge of detachment around here. His treatment of the Communist era is, of course, rather skimpy, but he is getting to the end of a rather long work and, as he notes, it wasn't (and still isn't really) clear what the historical significance of events of the 80s and 90s are likely to be.

Gernet's book is well worth the reading, even if it is getting a little long in the tooth.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew I only knew a little about China’s history, but reading these books made me realize I knew even less than I thought. I read the books in concert, alternating between them to cover the same time periods. Together they gave a broad view and reinforced what I was learning, one from the other.

Far and away the most interesting period for me was the 19th century. It is mindboggling how China fell from such a power to a third world country at the mercy of multiple foreign powers. So many small happenings and circumstances conspired to destroy all that China had going for it. It is fascinating to try and understand. It gave me a greater appreciation for the Industrial Revolution in the Western World. Only in seeing the effect its absence had on China do I understand the progress made clearer.

Some other random things that caught my mind:

Since the Chinese alphabet is in symbols, not letters, dialects and sound changes don’t matter. I can’t read Old English because the letters/sounds have changed too much. But Chinese can read ancient text because changes in sounds have no effect on meaning. However, learning all the symbols is a very long process, so throughout history it took more effort to be literate.

Despite very different religions, religious beliefs worked against truth and knowledge seekers as it did in the West. The beliefs limited change and pursuit of knowledge.

Also, just like in the West, there were repeated calls in history to “return to old values.” Buddhism was driven out as a foreign concept, as were Western ideas and innovations at various times.

China never had trademarks. This has to have had profound effects on the effort put into innovation.


Overall I was left wanting to know more about several things:

Ming Taizu (Hongwu Emperor) is someone I would like to know more about.

For centuries China relied heavily on eunuchs as administrators. Why? What did they believe was different about eunuchs that made them fit to govern?

Both books referred often to cults and “secret societies” throughout history. White Lotus Cult, Cult of the Red Hats, etc. These cults started civil wars, and were a near constant source of unrest. But little was explained about them. How did they start? How did they function? How did people get involved in them? What about Chinese culture predicated their popularity for thousands of years?

I consider reading these books a smashing success. I walk away feeling like I understand China so much better. Maybe next year I will tackle India.

[Helmut · Rating 5 out of 5]

6 Jahre pro Seite

Die Geschichte Chinas, einen Zeitraum von 4000 Jahren, beschrieben in knapp 600 Seiten - das ist ein enormes, mutiges Unterfangen. Grundsätzlich finde ich dieses Werk sehr gelungen, habe aber so meine Probleme mit Universalgeschichten. So richtig zum entspannten Lesen taugt der Band nicht wirklich, da sein Aufzählungscharakter dafür zu hinderlich ist, es kommt kein richtiger Lesefluss auf, besonders, da unterschiedliche Ebenen (wie die wirtschaftliche, geistige und politische) getrennt voneinander abgehandelt werden - andererseits ist er als Nachschlagewerk für spezielle Fragestellungen dann aber zu unfokussiert.

Einzelne Bereiche, wie die Kapitel über die vorgeschichtliche Zeit Chinas, sind mühsam zu lesen - andere Bereiche, wie die Kapitel über die ausgehende Qing-Dynastie und den Taiping-Aufstand lesen sich dagegen wie ein Krimi und faszinieren extrem. Das Problem besteht bei diesem Buch natürlich auch in der Entstehungszeit - man kann nicht wirklich heutzutage ein Buch von 1972 bedingungslos empfehlen. Erstens fehlen dadurch alle Post-Mao-Themen, und auch die Analyse der Ereignisse gerade des 20.Jh. bis dahin sind doch vom Zeitgeist beeinflusst und nur sehr rudimentär in oberflächlichster Form abgehandelt. Zweitens gibt es gerade im geschichtlichen Bereich neue Ansätze und Forschungsergebnisse in diesen 40 vergangenen Jahren, die so unter den Tisch fallen. Wer also sich mehr für das "neue" China nach 1911 interessiert oder wirklich auf dem aktuellen Forschungsstand sein möchte, sollte die Lektüre mit aktuellen Werken unterfüttern. Für einen allgemeinen Überblick über Chinas Geschichte allerdings ist dieses Werk durchaus gelungen, wenn für Laien aber vielleicht etwas umfangreich und detailliert.

Sehr umfangreiche Indizes und ausführlichste Zeittabellen komplettieren das Werk. Der dicke Wälzer ist dicht bedruckt und enthält immer wieder Illustrationen, Karten und Fotografien von Kunstwerken - diese alle sind im typischen Time-Life-Stil und wirken heutzutage etwas altbacken.

[Gonzalo · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a general hisotry of China, from the first dynasties of the Bronze Age all the way to the second half of the XXth century.
It is a given that covering such a large span of time in a single book that is not even a thousand pages long will necessarily gloss over many important events and the book will be lacking in one are or another, but Jacques Gerrnet makes a good enough synthesis of most of China's history and the book can be read comfortably most of the time.
The book is at it's worst when reaching the end of XIXth century and is especailly outrageous when dealing with Mao's reforms.
He describes the backyard furnaces fiasco as "an appeal to the inventive genious and traditional techniques", the Hundred Flowers Campaing as "a reform attempt getting out of hand" and the sparrow killings as "fighting the pests destroying the crops".
But considering it was written last century by a French sinologist, his Maoism shouldn't come as a surprise.
His perspective is systematic and with a clear focus on the material conditions, which is probably the only good way to write a general history, but I found the last chapter of each section of the book, the ones that talk about the cultural history (mainly literature and philosophy) to be the most interesting.
Overall this is a good introductory book to Chinese history and getting a general overview, even if it can come off as too dry at times. Just skip everything from the 1850s forward.

[Benjamin Hoffman · Rating 2 out of 5]

Gernet gives an overview of the history of China, but his organization of the materials is distracting. He covers a period, jumps to the end, and goes back to cover the period again with a storm of Chinese names, dates (he puts the lifespan of every person mentioned in parentheses like this), and book titles. He also uses an archaic Latinization of Chinese which makes pronunciation of any of the Chinese words a guessing game. At the end, Gernet is full of praise for the Communist regime and glosses over the fact that the Cultural Revolution slaughtered millions upon millions of people and he doesn't mention Tiannemen Square at all. Read at your peril or try to find another book that covers Chinese history better (hint: any other book will do).

[Anthony · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm not going to beat around the bush... I would NOT recommend this to anyone who is a newbee to Chinese history. You will lose your mind. Save for chapter 9 which chronologizes the Northern and Southern Dynasties era, this... work.... was... awful in a few ways. The whole work suffers from good editing and organization. It's so disjointed and random. I don't get how how he organized this book. I've seen some reviews comment on eloquence of the writing. I did not find it to be thus. I found it to be "baggy" and "clunky." Instead of lists of names with the person's date of birth and death after his or her name in parenthesis, save that nonsense for an appendix!

Cruicial figures or important events which I thought the author would have naturally provided more story-telling, analysis, or emphasis, leaves the reader guessing why he even mentioned them in the first place if he wasn't going to tell us why they were important. Major figures are mentioned and then disappear as soon as they appear.... As if their contribution to Chinese history were insignificant. And why is this done? For the sake for filling up pages with more names with dates in parenthesis behind their names. How infuriating! Laundry listing of names is never a good things in books about history.

I would have given this book two stars had it not been for the diaster with which he handled the collapse of the the Warlord era, the Nationalist era in Nanjing, World War II, and the Chinese Civil War. In a 681 page book, he spends 15 pages on these events. A measly 15 pages! Un-f__king-believable.

Oh! And how he sings the praises of the commmunists. As a historian, rule number one: Be objective! Don't let your biases show! Commie sympathizer. Never once does he even mention that if the Japanese hadn't invaded, the nationalists most likely would have pulled the country together. Some reviewers have commented on his use of Wade Giles as opposed to pinyin system that we use today. I don't know. I'm fine with either system. At least he provided and index with the chinese characters attached to the name / thing.

[Douglas Hayes · Rating 2 out of 5]

In my ongoing quest to gain a general knowledge of China and its history I trudged my way through this exhaustively, comprehensive and scholastic tome. I'm sure the last sentence seems a criticism, when, in fact, I intend it as, well, a statement of fact. I found it full of them. Enough that I imagine that it would serve well as a graduate program text book.

For my purposes, it provided such a detailed look at the trees, I got completely lost in the forest, and sometime forgot I was in a forest - the very thing I was looking for. It is clearly a book that is designed for those who already are conversant with the names and concepts of all of the times and places and peoples of China, without explaining what they refer to. This was hard for me to get my mind around.

Thus, its a good scholastic work - but not for the uninitiated or faint of heart.

[Pedro Picapiedra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Estupendo libro que repasa toda la historia de China y la evolución de su pensamiento filosófico. Lo elegí porque quería adentrarme y conocer la evolución de esta civilización y lo cierto es que el libro lo recoge todo a la perfección. Para todos los años que recorre y toda la información que incluye, sorprende que sólo necesite 600 páginas. MUY recomendable.

[carly · Rating 2 out of 5]

I shoved my nose in this book almost ever day for two semesters, but I don't think I retained a single word of it.

[Alex Helling · Rating 2 out of 5]

China is a civilisation state that has dominated east Asia for millenia with the civilisation taking in or influencing all around it, even when China may have considered them barbarians. Jacques Gernet’s A History of Chinese Civilisation is a sweeping history aiming to take in the whole of Chinese civilisation throughout history. And as such broad in scope geographically and in terms of subjects. Grand ambitions, so not surprisingly quite a chunky book.

Pros
Covers the whole sweep of Chinese history so can provide an introduction to any point.
Gives equal place to economic, intellectual, religious and scientific history, as well as political history.

Cons
Not an easy read
Does not explain very well
Becomes increasingly biased as it gets into modern history

Quite a dry book and not always the easiest read - I think it was probably written in French and translated to English. However it does move quite quickly (given how much it needs to get through I guess it has to!) so it is quite a good book for getting the outlines of Chinese history.

At the outset we are told that the book is about Chinese civilisation a “history of the Chinese world” and not just about China. China itself covers an immense geographical area, and has a great long history so this is no small undertaking already without widening the scope to much of East Asia. Perhaps fortunately then this promise does not really come to pass and China’s impacts on other peoples and regions only get brief mentions.

Gernet gives the book an idiosyncratic structure for a book that essentially moves chronologically through history. This is done by not structuring the book by dynasty. Thus the Tang get split in half. The structure is quite complicated with the top level being multiple parts, which each contain 3-5 chapters which are themselves split into sub chapters. Often the first chapter of a part tells the political history and we then jump back and forth as Gernet looks at other aspects, particularly intellectual history. I found this could become confusing.

As Gernet takes a structural view of history there is a lack of any emphasis on individuals, for example Cao Pi is mentioned several times but first as an emperor, and second as a poet, without any indication as to whether they are the same person or simply share the same name and live in a similar time period (looking up wikipedia i’m fairly sure they are the same - but when reading a general history book one should not have to look up wikipedia for such basics).

The lack of depth means no room to explain why something has happened. This is combined with an annoying tendency to assert things without explaining - sometimes while proclaiming it as an explanation! For example “The Nanking dynasty’s interest in overseas countries is contemporaneous with the expansion of Indo-Iranian seafaring activities and with the development of commercial routes between the Middle East, the Indian Ocean, and South-East Asia. This is the explanation of the progressive conversion to Hinduism of the coastal plains of the Indo-Chinese peninsula and Indonesia”(p.197). This is not an explanation; it does not tell us there had to be a change, or why it should be to Hinduism given three origin points are mentioned with differing religions; why not a change to Iranian influenced Islam, or Chinese influenced confucianism? To make things more confusing the next sentence asserts foreigners coming through this route contributed to the spread of Buddhism. I dare say it did, but when put next to the previous sentence it is rather contradictory.

I was not really reading for the modern part of the history. But it is also the bit that I was least convinced by Gernet is very clearly pro the communists in the civil war. I would not go so far as to say he ignores the atrocities of Mao’s regime but it does come very close to being whitewashing. The last few chapters certainly feel anything but rigorously academic and I would recommend stopping at the fall of the Qing.

I have not read many books that seek to tell the whole sweep of chinese civilisation so I cant draw any comparisons. But given the issues I have with Gernet’s A History of Chinese Civilisation outlined above I’m not sure I would recommend it.

[Edmund Bloxam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clear prose with elements of humour to make it easier to read.

Exhaustive (and a little exhausting)--contrasted politics/war/economics with culture in separate chapters. I couldn't decide if this was an interesting perspective or a distraction. Perhaps it would have been clearer in two separate books.

My issue with it only surfaced when I (finally!) reached 20th century Chinese history. Because I actually knew something about that, I started to realise how much was being skipped over (less than a page on the Civil War, about the same on the Great Leap Forward!).

Since detail is clearly not its thing, does it serve as a good introduction? Well, then I become overwhelmed with the cultural history chapters. Perhaps it didn't help that I picked up, in a second hand store, a massive Folio version of the text, which spanned two volumes and, because it was big and heavy, was a literal physical effort to read. (Upon reflection, its 750 pages should not have taken three and a half years to read, and that after a number of false starts). What can I say? It's not light reading, and I was ill for a while.

I was spurred to attempt this run-through by buying a 'History of Modern China' that is now yellowing with age (published in 2008). That should 'fill in the gaps' of this book on modern Chinese history. Even then, so much has happened that is crucial in understanding world history since 2008--is it even possible to read history books like that?

[Valentín Serrano García · Rating 5 out of 5]

Obra monumental, global y abrumadora por los datos que provee al lector.
Un clásico cuya publicación hace ya varias décadas lo convirtió en una obra inaugural, pero que, en gran medida, no ha sido superada en el mercado hispanoparlante (no conozco una obra general sobre China tan profunda y esclarecedora; La historia de Asia Oriental de Charles Holcombe no resulta tan esclarecedora, por ejemplo).

Por supuesto, se le pueden plantear innumerables críticas a varias de las opiniones y percepciones del autor (sobre su percepción del budismo y del taoísmo, del marxismo y un largo etcétera) pero no menos que a cualquier obra histórica omnicomprensiva. Y, si bien bebe de la tradición histórica positivista político-económica (como casi todo este tipo de obras), lo cierto es que consigue también exponer en profundidad las vivencias sociales y culturales, desde las artísticas a las religiosas. Moldea, sin descuido, las lecciones que se pueden extraer de este extraño mundo oriental (muy interesantes las reflexiones acerca de la economía intervencionista, las revueltas campesinas, etcétera).

Por supuesto, entiendo que su valor es introductorio y de ahí seguramente que la calificación media no sea más alta. Los interesados y especialistas en el tema preferirán centrarse en obras concretas para cada período y aspecto particular

[Santiago · Rating 4 out of 5]

Es apenas el segundo libro que leo que cubre la historia entera de China y he quedado abrumado con tantos personajes con nombres parecidos. Tal vez funciona mejor como un libro de consulta que como uno de lectura. De todos modos queda claro que la civilización china ha sido asombrosa y quiero leer más acerca de diversos episodios de su historia.

Me tengo que quejar de la edición de Crítica. La impresión opaca vuelve inútiles los interesantes mapas y diagramas que trae el libro.

[Laphirax Helminen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Uno de los mejores libros de historia general de China que hay disponibles en nuestra lengua —para bien o para mal—. Sintético, riguroso y de fácil lectura. Desde la Edad de Bronce hasta finales del s. XX en poco más de 700 páginas.

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

Difficult at first but gets much easier once you get going.

[Nathan Senters · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book with a formidable, and well-deserved, reputation; if you only read one book about China, read this one.

[Paco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Muy completo, interesante pero llega un momento en que si se hace una lectura pesada.

[Susu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Übersicht zur chinesischen Geschichte - von der Vorgeschichte, über die erste Staatenbildung bis zum modernen China

[S.P. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a considerable lump of volumes, somewhat dense and drier than a tin of birds custard. It is however interesting still for all that. From the earliest known history right up to Tienanmen Square in 1989 Gernet whizzes through it all. The version I have is the Folio Society printing of the Cambridge University Press 1996 revision. There are a couple of older versions 1973, and 1982 which have less in the final chapter. The final chapter discusses the end of the Mao Tsu-tung era and the start of the combining of capitalist ideas with the communist regime which has worked so well for China. This most contemporary section is somewhat brief and I have been left with wanting to know much more about recent history – especially since the events within my lifetime (progress of Hong Kong for example) and those periods leading up to the end of the empire and into modern times, which are covered in reasonable detail (as are all the historic epochs) but for which I would like to know more.

[Luis Fernando Ayala · Rating 3 out of 5]

Esta monumental obra es una verdadera enciclopedia sobre China, que trata con mucha profundidad los distintos aspectos de la evolución de ese milenario pueblo. El desarrollo de la economía, la sociedad, las artes, la religión y la política son analizados de manera amplia, y contextualizada. A pesar de los amplios méritos que tiene el autor por haber podido concretar una obra de esta envergadura; la cantidad de datos, fechas y personajes que menciona, hace que la lectura no resulte tan entretenida. Criticable quizás es el poco espacio que le dedica el autor al último siglo de la historia de China, con sus múltiples eventos trascendentales. Este libro resulta imprescindible para quien quiera entender la idiosincrasia de la que es hoy claramente una potencial mundial en expansión.

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

Though I do not doubt Gernet's scholarship, which in this book is wide-ranging and often in depth, the book suffers firstly from a sometimes over-specialisation on certain matters (such as devoting several pages to the intricacies of Tang dynasty horse-breeding) and a startling lack of work on post-1949 China. Obviously, there is the problem of age, but even so, to devote less than a page to post-Cultural Revolution events is poor writing. As for the English translation, to render all the original pinyin spellings into Wade-Giles is baffling.

[Ari]

It's no mean feat to condense 3000 years of civilisation into 700 or so pages, and Gernet provides a surprisingly comprehensive overview of the history of China. However, it begins to fail when he covers modern China, where the text loses its objectivity and he largely glosses over the failures of the Maoist era (he even called the Great Leap Forward, the resulting famine of which caused the loss of about 60 million lives, 'an extraordinarily bold experiment'). A dry read, but extremely useful for studying China prior to the 1920s.

[Lesley · Rating 2 out of 5]

so far...(ch 1-3)

throws a LOT of facts at you & the translators are guilty of mass circumlocution (every damn sentence). never the less...interesting

Notes of use:
Author uses wade-Giles (get out your converter)

It is best to understand the basic structure of ancient china prior to reading, not the layman structure of what is meant by "Chinese"

It gets easier to read as you move along, especially keeping in mind the above.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think I first came across this book as a university student in Asian studies. I am now re-reading it and am completely in awe of Gernet's breadth and depth of knowledge about the subject. As I'm currently working on my own, much shorter history of China, I find myself turning to it again and again; its insights are endless.

[^^ · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is an excellent reference book providing in-depth analysis and linkage between Chinese history and culture.

It is not, however, a good read - too dry and condensed.

Treat it like a detailed encyclopaedia; if you want an informative but smooth read, try Jonathan Spence's books.

[AskHistorians]

A readable and detailed survey of Chinese history that is notable for not prejudicing modern history over earlier periods. It heavily focuses on intellectual and cultural history, and at times the details of the political history get ignored, but any survey this ambitious must make cuts. The account of the nineteenth century is particularly vivid.

[André]

Some pictures and charts and tables are quite useful, but it's astonishingly difficult to read, although it isn't *in* Chinese at all. Indeed I didn't get past the first one or two chapters. Instead, I preferred Franke/Trauzettel's "Das chinesische Kaiserreich".

[Pedro Enguita · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excelente descripción de la cultura china, la única pega es que el autor llega a justificar a los chinos hasta límites un tanto ridículos (cosa que se puede entender como "reivindicativa" ya que la China de los años 60 era apenas una sombra de lo que había sido).