Zhou Enlai: The Power Behind Mao Zedong

Zhou Enlai: The Enigma Behind Chairman Mao

Zhou Enlai, one of the founding fathers of the Communist Party of China, was a key figure in the People's Republic of China's global standing.
While other CCP leaders of the same era hardly ever met a good end,
Only Zhou Enlai remained by Mao Zedong's side, holding on to power and escaping unscathed.
Is he an accomplice to the crimes of the Chinese Communist Party?
Or is it the last moral bottom line?
There have been many different opinions throughout history.

Michael Dillon brilliantly reinterprets Zhou Enlai's mysterious and complex life from a third-party perspective.

Mysterious, noble, and the power behind the throne - these few words are enough to represent Zhou Enlai's image and political career, which are completely different from other contemporary senior CCP leaders.

Born in 1898, he was a close associate of both Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong. He served as the first Prime Minister of the People's Republic of China, from 1949 until his death in 1976. He was also a key ally of Deng Xiaoping, significantly influencing his "Four Modernizations" in agriculture, industry, science and technology, and the military. As such, he is widely recognized as the primary architect of China's rise to superpower status and a key figure in China's central role in the modern world.

Zhou Enlai doesn't fit any stereotype of a communist leader. Educated and gentle, he was a compassionate and intellectual figure, beloved by non-communists, foreigners, and his own people. He is one of the most complex figures in contemporary Chinese politics, and perhaps one of the most interesting, though his influence has never been as palpable as that of Mao Zedong. In this book, Mike Dillon restores him to his rightful place in history and analyzes the role of a man who was more than just a political operator.

Highly recommended

Mike Dillon's masterful biography of Deng Xiaoping secured him a place among the finest accounts of Chinese Communist Party leaders. Now, he writes about Zhou Enlai, Mao's longest-serving colleague. This book can also be seen as a history of Mao's era as a whole. A well-regarded and beloved politician, Zhou Enlai weathered crises that forced other leaders to step down. Dillon paints a portrait of a sympathetic figure amidst the devastation wrought by Mao's extreme measures, a glimpse into the human face of China at that time. This portrait reveals Zhou Enlai's need to demonstrate loyalty to Mao while also feeling a sense of responsibility to remedy the excesses Mao had fostered. Dylan captures this complex and fraught tension vividly. With its wide range of multilingual references, this book is both comprehensive and clear, and is the best work you can read on the relationships behind Mao Zedong's rule.
~~Ban Guorui, Professor Emeritus of Cardiff University

2022-01-04

時報出版

464

9789571398365