Ancestors - 900 Years In The Life Of A Chinese Family - Softcover

Frank Ching

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0330309897 ISBN 13: 9780330309899

Publisher: Pan Books, 1989

Synopsis

This true celebration of Chinese life begins and ends with the author as he traces his family back thirty-four generations to the eleventh century. Through illuminating family portraits, the history of China comes magically alive.

About this title

About the Author

Frank Ching worked as a journalist for the New York Times before setting up the Wall Street Journal's first bureau in Beijing. He also worked for Far Eastern Economic Review and the South China Morning Post. He is the author of China: The Truth About Its Human Rights Record.

From Publishers Weekly

In Chinese tradition, to forget one's ancestors is contemptibleyet to trace them back to the 11th century, as the author has done, is quite a feat. Ching, who grew up in Hong Kong and is now an American citizen, began his quest in 1979, when he was the Wall Street Journal's Peking correspondent. Focusing on some 20 members of his family, prominent figures all, and with the aid of a 17-volume family record that survived the Cultural Revolution, Ching has produced what virtually amounts to a social and political history of China. Among the family members are a romantic poet, a military hero, an imperial ghost-writer, a minister of punishments and a woman noted for her skills in both poetry and the martial arts. And there's scarcely an aspect of Chinese life, from shamanism to bloody rebellion, that Ching doesn't touch upon in this engrossing narrative. Photos.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Pan Books
• Publication date: 1989
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0330309897
• ISBN 13: 9780330309899
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 528