The Search for Modern China (Part I)

Rating:
Summary: THIS BOOKS SUCKS!
Review: I found over 200 better books. Wow! For Intellectuals and butt kissers this book is ideal. Spencer doesn't follow any specific CHRONOLOGY of the significant events that evolved during the periods covered in the book. The Maps Suck as well. I can't find anything good to say about this book. Infact, I burned it! My Instructor should be shot and fired for picking this book! I'm not a PhD. but, I casn certainly write a better book and in language that is understandable. Hey! Keep Yale for the Yalie's and the rest of mankind from such an atrocious book. It's like living Tiananmen all over again. No one should be put through this absolutely boring book. The only decent Chapter was the last one in summary, besides it is to EXPENSIVE! I would give this book Zero Stars.

Rating:
Summary: A Cogent Analysis of Modern Chinese History
Review: I have been to China now 3 times, if you include the time I went to Taiwan. Its the most (but also interesting) complicated culture you will ever find on this planet. But also the longest in its exsistence. They soke to the rest of the world as they were all Barbarians and with no doubt they had the right to do so. And then we westerns thing we have the right to judge about a culture thats nearly one time as old as our. Get out of here !!!

I still remember I left Shang-Hai in the summer of 2001, having seen the most amazing things in a few places in China, but not only that I also tried to get an idea of the culture. No wonder I left China that day with only one thing in my mind. Piles of questions, questions that had to be answered !! I read a few things here and there, and had a bit of help from my travelguide, but in the end I was not making any progress. Till I deceide to write an article for school in which I explain and try to find out why the Chinese emppire fell in 1911. I soon fell on this book and began to read certain things. But since I was under high pressure I could only read what I needed. Later on I began to read it before I left China again, and finnished by the time I left China again in sept 2002. Now I had the feeling I understood China, that I could see through this amazing culture. Finally I could picture in my head what in all heaven was going on before the communists took power in 1949. Who was where, fighting for what and with who. You will all learn it. The book is mainly a historical research throught the last century of the history of China. You will begin in 1644, but the explenations of the Qing time only was asking for one thing "MORE" The part about the Cultural revolution was to terrible for me, and I was glad it was over. I read this soon after I watched Blue Kite & Farewell My Concubine, both movies dealing about the same tragic period. And in Beijing I saw several things of destroyed monuments that are the living prove of this terrible 1966. But what the book tells is is the truth, it was terrible !!!

I read alot of other books about China, but none gave me such a good view on things than this book was offering me. Be sure to take a copy with you on your way to China. You dont want to hang around there without knowing who Qianlong was, I felt deeply ashamed that I didn't the first time, thank god I did knew it the last time.

Rating:
Summary: not the stellar book it's purported to be
Review: J. Spence is simply awesome. I haven't found a book by him i didn't really like, a lot. His writing is clear, well documented, interesting-yes interesting in a history textbook. Amazing. The book will grab your attention from the first page and hold it until the last. If you have any interest in China, and have a few evenings to devote to it, there is no better, imho, introduction to modern Chinese history available in English. Thanks J.S. now i have to find another book by him to read *grin*, never thought i'd finish this volume.

Rating:
Summary: reprint of 1st ed?
Review: This apparently is a reprint of the 1st ed., I don't know of any reason to prefer it over the 2nd ed.

Rating:
Summary: A Revised Look at Modern China
Review: This book, now in its second edition, has been quite successful and has in one sense managed to fill a perceived need among literate westerners, particulaarly Americans, to know something about modern Chinese history.

However, few people appreciate what a ground-breaking book this was, at least in its first edition. That it was a popular history of China ("popular" in the sense that it was not primarily designed to be a college text) was not unique; reasonably well-researched surveys of Chinese history have been around since the nineteenth century. But for those of us who sat through an undergraduate course on Chinese history prior to 1980, Spence's approach was refreshingly un-Eurocentered.

Once upon a time, Chinese history was presented in two neat halves: the first half was "traditional" China from prehistoric times to the Opium Wars (1840's). The second half was everything else going forward. The overall impression was that everything changed when the white man appeared - which is, of course, a misperception, to put it mildly. Spence conceives of "modern" Chinese history as beginning with the Ming Dynasty, and treated the Western intervention as just one theme among many.

Thus, Spence was able to present a new view of China to a new generation, and it was a viewpoint that explains a great deal more than previous ones did. That he does it in such a compelling way, opening new vistas up to us in the process, is what makes this a great book. A great deal of thought and sensitivity has gone into this work, and it deserves to be appreciated for that.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent introduction to modern Chinese history
Review: This is probably the most accessible history of modern China written so far. Jonathan Spence, a Yale professor of history, has written extensively on Chinese history and his insights into the culture and people are invaluable.

Overall the reader is presented with a picture of the nature of change in Chinese civilization and how those changes are sometimes culture specific. Chinese intellectual, political and social organizations are presented. Importantly Spence shows the difficulty in incorporating Western concepts both technological and philisophical into Chinese society and the sometime rejection of these concepts for political and cultural reasons.

Spence's scholarship is second to none and this is a very readable history, both enjoyable and informative. No better praise can be given than besides a college text on Chinese history "The Search For Modern China" is just as well suited as an informative and entertaining read for the layperson. The integration of scholarship and writing makes this a good standard to judge other general histories.

Rating:
Summary: The perfect introduction to Chinese history
Review: This textbook is the perfect introduction for students interested in an overview of modern Chinese history and a valuable reference for scholars already immersed in the subject. Drawing on his many years of teaching the survey course at Yale on Chinese history, Spence covers the major events and themes of the past four hundred years with scholarly thoroughness and a light literary hand. Although the amount of material is daunting - even Spence doesn't use it all in his course- Search for Modern China is written to be accessible to the layperson as well as the academic. Highly recommended for anyone interested in China today.

Rating:
Summary: The perfect introduction to Chinese history
Review: This textbook is the perfect introduction for students interested in an overview of modern Chinese history and a valuable reference for scholars already immersed in the subject. Drawing on his many years of teaching the survey course at Yale on Chinese history, Spence covers the major events and themes of the past four hundred years with scholarly thoroughness and a light literary hand. Although the amount of material is daunting - even Spence doesn't use it all in his course- Search for Modern China is written to be accessible to the layperson as well as the academic. Highly recommended for anyone interested in China today.

Rating:
Summary: Everything you Wanted to Know
Review: This was used as the main textbook in my modern Chinese history course in college. A lot of information makes it heady and dense, but it's worth it. It's the book to turn to for China's history since the fall of the Ming in 1615, and shows why Spence is the man to turn to for modern Chinese history.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent, readable introduction
Review: When I started studying Chinese, I wanted a book that would give me some background on Chinese history. I asked several experts in Chinese history, and they recommended this book. I'm grateful they did.

Though long, it held my interest throughout. After all, no matter how good a history book is, if you don't read it, you won't learn a thing.

Though it sometimes goes off on tangents that seem a bit superfluous, overall it's a tightly written book that will really help you explore an interest in Chinese history.