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Loading... Black Dragon River: A Journey Down the Amur River at the Borderlands of Empires (original 2015; edition 2015)by Dominic Ziegler (Author)
Work InformationBlack Dragon River: A Journey Down the Amur River at the Borderlands of Empires by Dominic Ziegler (2015)
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. The Black Dragon River has a long history, reaching as far back as Genghis Khan and the Mongolian empire around 1000 years ago. This was the beginning of its tumultuous history of conflict and war that has lasted pretty much until the present day. Also called the Amur, it is a river that I had never heard of until I picked this book up. Turns out it is the world’s ninth longest and forms part of the border between Russia and China and has been a focal point for each country’s expansion plans over the years. It has seen more than it fair share of death and destruction from both sides Ziegler begins his journey along the river as Khan would have done, on a horse, from the Mongolian steppe into the taiga to what is thought to be the source of the river. His journey along the river is not always easy so he is forced to take the Trans-Siberian Railway through a valley of water meadows. He does return to the river and the people and places along it, but it almost seems to be a aside. I was hoping this was going to be a fascinating travel book about a relatively unknown part of the world, but sadly there was much more history than travel, and this is a place that has had a lot of brutal events happen. Not bad, but not great. Joy's review: Ziegler describes a trip on and around the Amur River including a sweeping and detailed history of the area. It's a very interesting history and area, but unfortunately, Ziegler does a poor job of writing about it. I found his narrative structure weak to non existent which made following his often convoluted sentences even more difficult. I was expecting a lot more from a reporter for the Economist. By the time that the narrative of this travelogue comes into focus it turned out not to be the book I was expecting. From the way it starts I was expecting more of a natural history study. What you really wind up with is a meditation on the rise and fall of Russian dreams of empire in the Far East, with the question being whether the shabby present is just a portal to a new age of Chinese expansion. Though the author actually doubts that the winds of Chinese revanchism are going to blow west; the Sino-Russian relationship is just different from Beijing's adversarial history with the Pacific powers. no reviews | add a review
"Black Dragon River is a personal journey down one of Asia's great rivers that reveals the region's essential history and culture. The world's ninth largest river, the Amur serves as a large part of the border between Russia and China. As a crossroads for the great empires of Asia, this area offers journalist Dominic Ziegler a lens with which to examine the societies at Europe's only borderland with east Asia. He follows a journey from the river's top to bottom, and weaves the history, ecology and peoples to show a region obsessed with the past--and to show how this region holds a key to the complex and critical relationship between Russia and China today"--NoveList. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)915.7History and Geography Geography and Travel Geography of and travel in Asia SiberiaLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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The way he treated the material makes it a valuable anti-Russian propaganda piece. All is filth, greed, hate, decrepitude, drunkenness, etc. Vast majority of warm and compassionate words are addressed to the wildlife of the area and somewhat grudgingly to China, when compared to Russia.
Don't take me wrong, I'm not an apologetic of Russian chauvinism or Putin, but this work could be vividly contrasted with another book I'm reading at the moment, the one that covers another much maligned Russian misdeed - 'Afghan' by Sir Roderic Braithwaite. He deals with a far more controversial topic, yet manages to produce an unbiased narrative, finding bad and good in actions of all sides, even tangentially involved in the conflict. Not that he forcefully balances good with evils, but he tries to be objective: he calls sadists sadists, but he never slaps labels and cliches left and right. Being able not to ride through on a high moral horse is apparently a talent not everyone's born with.
I gave it 3 stars mostly for driving attention to this God forsaken region. It's a unique and beautiful area, rich in wildlife and cultures. ( )