Mao: A Biography

Terrill is one of the best writers on China, and this is a pretty good biography of Mao; although after June 4th, Terrill came to a much less idealized view of Chinese history. See his book CHINA IN OUR TIME.

I decided to read a biography of Mao after seeing "Nixon in China," the opera by John Adams, in a live-at-the-met" production a couple of months ago. Seeing the opera made me realize how little I knew about Mao, although I'd taken two terms of Chinese/Japanese history in college in the mid-60s. (Those covered mostly the ancient cultural history and certainly didn't go beyond mid-19th century at all.) Reviews led me to this revised 1999 edition of Terrill's biography.I was somewhat alarmed by what seemed to me a tendency to uncritical acceptance of Mao's own recollections of his childhood and early youth, but I suppose that that's almost inevitable when dealing with the very early life of someone completely unknown and insignificant at show more that stage of life. Documentation, naturally enough, steadily improves as the book goes along.I do think it's well-written and I found it kept my interest keen after the childhood section. I haven't read enough about Mao and modern Chinese history to judge how accurate it is, but it certainly has been praised by those who know more. And it's heightened my interest sufficiently so that I expect to read more about the history of the era and today's China as well. show less