Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #777 in Books
• Published on: 2004-04-05
• Binding: Paperback
• 720 pages

The Times
`one of the most exotic and extraordinary life affirming journeys of the mind I have ever been taken on.'

Synopsis
A new edition of one of the best-selling and best-loved books of recent years, with a new introduction by the author. The publication of Wild Swans in 1991 was a worldwide phenomenon. Not only did it become the best-selling non-fiction book in British publishing history, with sales of well over two million, it was received with unanimous critical acclaim, and was named the winner of the 1992 NCR Book Award and the 1993 British Book of the Year Award. Few books have ever had such an impact on their readers. Through the story of three generations of women -- grandmother, mother and daughter -- Wild Swans tells nothing less than the whole tumultuous history of China's tragic twentieth century, from sword-bearing warlords to Chairman Mao, from the Manchu Empire to the Cultural Revolution. At times terrifying, at times astonishing, always deeply moving, Wild Swans is a book in a million, a true story with all the passion and grandeur of a great novel. For this new edition, Jung Chang has written a new introduction, bringing her own story up to date, and describing the effect Wild Swans' success has had on her life.

From the Publisher
The publication of Wild Swans in 1991 was a worldwide phenomenon. Not only did it become the best-selling non-fiction book in British publishing history, with sales of well over two million, it was received with unanimous critical acclaim, and was named the winner of the 1992 NCR Book Award and the 1993 British Book of the Year Award.

Customer Reviews

A Captivating Read
This book tells 150 years history of China through the personal lives of 3 generations of women from one family.

Wild Swans is a beautifully written book, that is desperately sad, desperately hopeful and shocking. The plight of these 3 women captures the reader and transports them to different periods in China's history. The 3 women and the people around them come to life through Changs beautiful way with words.

I have come away from this book with a greater understanding of China and Mao's absolute rule. The power, control and violence Mao inflicted on the Chinese people is horrific. 10's of millions of innocent people died under his rule and this book heroically describes the terror and fear the Chinese faced every day.

If you only read one book this year, make it Wild Swans.

A Story of Courage and Tyranny
Wild Swans is a candid and harrowing account of three remarkable Chinese women -grandmother, mother and daughter- but also gives us a very good picture of what China was like from the turn of the Century to the 1980's
We learn about the ancient culture of the Chinese which included much that was beautiful and some that seems cruel. We learn of the hope of so many Chinese that the overthrow of the Kuomintang would lead to a' just social order' but how it soon became clear that the worst excesses of the Kuomintang and those of Imperial China before that paled into insignificance compared to the hell on earth created by Mao's Chinese Communist Party
One is left aghast that a system can destroy even the most basic human instincts of decency and compassion while turning people into inhumane monsters totally possessed -as if by a demon - by a cruel and totally destructive system
It sends shivers down one's spine to realise that 'The Great Helmsman' Mao Ze Dong -who ranks with Hitler and Stalin as among the most evil men of the 20th century-had his image worn on T-shirts by 'progressive' students and youth in the west and these same young 'champions of equality' hung large pictures of Mao in their dormitory rooms .This at the same time as millions of Chinese were being slaughtered and physically and psychologically maimed on the orders of Mao and his Chinese Communist Party -as described in this book.
Today many in the West laud the economic 'reforms' towards a type of totalitarian 'capitalist' system but fail to remember that human rights have not improved at all and China is still a hideous and inhuman hell for hundreds of millions of its inhabitants. And the world turns a blind eye and wards Beijing the 2008 Olympic While we a re left asking how much longer the people of China will remain enslaved by their inhumane Communist masters. How Long?
But the book is also about the strength of the human spirit , about wonderful people-especially the three remarkable women who are the central characters of this book- as well as the cruel ones
It is a story of love and hate, strength and weakness , the beautiful and the ugly
But more than anything it is about how the human spirit can never in the end be crushed by cruelty, evil and tyranny

The stuff of nightmares
Jung Chang's autobiographical story of three generations of women living through China's tumultuous 20th century is fascinating and terrifying. Given that it is a subjective account of the key events in modern Chinese history, 'Wild Swans' provides a compelling and informative narrative that brings to life complex socio-historic transformations in ways that a straight historical account could not.

'Wild Swans' is most interesting when it deals with Jung Chang's firsthand experiences during Chairman Mao's cultural revolution, where a climate of paranoia and political denouncement caused society to practically implode. It seems almost beyond comprehension how Mao could have held such God-like power over his people when the very communist principals he espoused seemed to contradict such form of deification as undignified. Even more extraordinary is how he succeeded in maintaining his grip on power without the assistance of a KGB-type secret police, but by turning the people against each other. By making himself a god, he subtly provoked his populace to fight vendettas in his name while remaining aloof and almost mythical. In effect he presided over a kind of controlled civil war, only reigning in the violence when he perceived his own position to be under threat.

While not particularly literary - it doesn't need to be - Jung Chang keeps the style relatively factual for an autobiography. But the facts speak horrifically for themselves, with individuals competing for the largely imagined grace of Mao driven to acts of extreme cruelty and humiliation. While 'Wild Swans' often shows a dispiritingly brutal side of people when put in particular conditions, the acts of bravery, kindness and incredible physical and emotional endurance allow a little faith in human nature to persist. Absolutely essential reading.