The River at the Center of the World

This is the fourth Winchester book I've read (the two OED books and the other China book being the first three). It's also the earliest, and while I enjoyed this book, I liked his later ones a little better. He seems rather fair in his assessments of China and its people, but how would I know?!? ( )

Painful and cliché-ridden. ( )

A wonderful book about a great river that packs many motifs into a great travel narrative. Starting in booming Shangai, we witness a newly liberated China which sheds the shackles of both colonialism and communism, only to colonize the poor Tibetans. Another classic motif is the river as a source of life and terror. Throughout history, mankind struggled to control the river, which often led and leads to ecological disasters and human folly. A third motif is the river's function of linking formerly isolated parts to the wider world, often with disastrous consequences to the hitherto unconnected. It is also a tale of (often British) explorers and navigators who devoted their lives in developing the Yangtze, a contribution the Chinese only grudgingly acknowledge (The often boorish and racist behavior of the British colonials certainly did not help their case.).

Finally, it is a personal travel journey of a British Don Quixote and a female Chinese Sancho Panza reluctantly following his mad whims, fighting the windmills of Chinese bureaucracy. A similar journey up the Rhine or the Danube would hold much less drama, as there would be no officials to bribe and little transportation challenges involved. A highly developed tourist infrastructure as well as the ubiquitous Chinese restaurants eliminate further obstacles to a Chinese Winchester. Hopefully, this Chinese Winchester would not follow his example of throwing himself at any Brit he meets. The clinginess of Winchester is really an obnoxious habit in his explorations. If the Westerner happens to be a Scotsman equipped with an alcoholic beverage, it will take almost physical force to send Winchester onwards.

Overall, highly recommended. I only wished he would have stopped at the Red Cliff and discussed the Three Kingdoms. ( )

Hands down the worst piece of travel writing I've read about China. An obnoxious idiotic traveler can only write a bad travel memoir. You can do a lot better than this book. ( )

WInchester has a gift for interspersing the story of his own experiences with a powerful retelling of centuries of history. Witty and erudite, the book gave me a powerful picture of what China is like and how it got that way. Winchester is unmistakably British, so you get the teeniest scosh of xenophobia with your cultural appreciation session, but that's what makes it so entertaining and readable. Winchester clearly loves China, and made me love it too. ( )