Arthur Johnson Memorial Library

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The tragedy of liberation :

by Dikotter, Frank,
Published by : Bloomsbury, (London :) Physical details: xxi, 376 pages, 18 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (black and white), maps (black and white) ; 20 cm. ISBN:9781408886359; 1408886359. Year: 2017
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Item type Current location Call number Status Date due Barcode
900 - 999 951.055 Dik (Browse shelf) Available 109034

Originally published: 2013.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Conquest (1945-49). Siege -- War -- Takeover (1949-52). Liberation -- The hurricane -- The great terror -- The bamboo curtain -- War again -- Regimentation (1952-56). The purge -- Thought reform -- The road to serfdom -- High tide -- The Gulag -- Backlash (1956-57). Behind the scenes -- Poisonous weeds.

In 1949 Mao Zedong hoisted the red flag over Beijing's Forbidden City. Instead of liberating the country, the communists destroyed the old order and replaced it with a repressive system that would dominate every aspect of Chinese life. In an epic of revolution and violence which draws on newly opened party archives, interviews and memoirs, Frank Dikotter interweaves the stories of millions of ordinary people with the brutal politics of Mao's court. A gripping account of how people from all walks of life were caught up in a tragedy that sent at least five million civilians to their deaths.

109034