The Catastrophes of Chinese Leftism

[foodtarget]

I recently read about this book, The Catastrophes of Chinese Leftism, in the book China Wakes. But when I searched for it online, I got absolutely nothing. Has anyone else heard of this book, know its Chinese name, or know where I could get a copy? It was originally written in Chinese and published in 1993.

On that note, does anyone know of other books written in Chinese that objectively examine modern Chinese history (since the commies took over)? I've recently been arguing with a close Chinese friend who has a rather rosy, uninformed view of China's condition under Communist rule. And I guess you can't blame him, since the Chinese certainly don't learn anything in school that might reflect negatively on the party. But he is completely unaware of major events like the famine of 1958-1961, the Anti-Rightist campaign, the Long March rocket explosions, and the 1989 massacre. So I was hoping to find one or more books to give him that could fill in the gaps, sort of like a Chinese version of Lies My Teacher Told Me, or in this case Lies the Government Told Me....

I appreciate any and all help and suggestions

[adrianlondon]

I'm normally a whizz with google but this took me a couple of minutes; ie 119 seconds longer than usual ;)

http://us.yesasia.com/b5/PrdDept.aspx/section-books/code-c/version-hk/shop-cosmos/did-2789/pid-1004149835/

Is that what you're after? The problem is that the English title is probably "Leftist Catastrophe of China".

[Senzhi]

http://us.yesasia.com/b5/PrdDept.asp...id-1004149835/

Adrian, you could be right on target, as for me it's blocked.

[adrianlondon]

I've probably got it right, then

ISBN 9622577164

[foodtarget]

Yes that does seem to be it, thank you so much Adrian!

Surprisingly, I found a couple people selling this book on Taobao (the Chinese eBay) even though the book is supposedly banned in China...

[gato]

You can try these essay by Li Rui 李锐, Mao's old secretary who was branded a rightist.

http://hi.baidu.com/%CB%AB%D0%C2%CA%C0%BC%CD/blog/item/54e68f1e9b84771c413417ac.html

李锐《如何看待毛泽东？》

Zhang Yihe's book 《往事并不如烟》 below about the anti-rightist movement is also very good and deeply moving.

http://www.chinese-thought.org/zttg/0490_zyh/

往事并不如烟

Or read Xu Youyu, who's written quite a bit about the Cultural Revolution and political reform.

http://blog.sina.com.cn/xuyouyu

徐友渔

[Lu]

Or try Li Zhisui's (I think that was his name) book on Mao. Li was Mao's personal doctor, and tells some shocking stories (shocking if you didn't already expect that kind of stuff from Mao).

[gato]

That might be a little hard to find in Xiamen, where the OP seems to be.