The Chinese Cultural Revolution: A History

Average Customer Rating: List Price: $22.99 Asia Trips Trips Price: $20.69 Your Savings: $ 2.30 ( 10% ) Subject To Change Without Notice Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
Binding: Paperback Dewey Decimal Number: 951.056 EAN: 9780521697866 ISBN: 0521697867 Label: Cambridge University Press Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 368 Publication Date: 2008-03-31 Publisher: Cambridge University Press Studio: Cambridge University Press
Related Items The Battle for China's Past: Mao and the Cultural Revolution Mao's Last Revolution Chinese Posters: Art from the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution China's Cultural Revolution As History (Studies of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center) May '68 and Its Afterlives
Editorial Reviews: A groundbreaking study of cultural life during a turbulent and formative decade in contemporary China, this book seeks to explode several myths about the Cultural Revolution (officially 1966-1976). Through national and local examination of the full range of cultural forms (film, operas, dance, other stage arts, music, fine arts, literature, and even architecture), Clark argues against characterizing this decade as one of chaos and destruction. Rather, he finds that innovation and creativity, promotion of participation in cultural production, and a vigorous promotion of the modern were all typical of the Cultural Revolution. Using a range of previously little-used materials, Clark forces us to fundamentally reassess our understanding of the Cultural Revolution, a period which he sees as the product of innovation in conflict with the effort by political leaders to enforce a top-down modernity.
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Groundbreaking study Comment: This is a truly groundbreaking study that completely overturns the conventional wisdom on the Cultural Revolution. By focusing on culture rather than politics -- that is, on music, fine art, opera, films, and architecture -- the author demonstrates convincingly and in fascinating new ways, that the years of the Cultural Revolution, 1966-1976 -- were a period of great innovation as artists and ordinary Chinese reached back to the past and recast it in radical new ways. They did this behind formulaic acknowledgments of political orthodoxy, often with a wink and a nod and a tone. Clark brings out the complexities of the Cultural revolution, and the occasional pleasures that people made for themselves in daily life, a view quite different from the usual accounts that focus almost without exception on high politics and suffering. Moreover, its a great read. More Reviews