The Death of Mao

The Tangshan Earthquake and the Birth of the New China

James Palmer

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English

Faber & Faber
01 February 2013

History; Asian history; Postwar 20th century history, from c 1945 to c 2000

In the summer of 1976, Mao lay dying, and China was struck by a great natural disaster. The earthquake that struck Tangshan, a shoddily built mining city, was one of the worst in recorded history, killing half a million people.

But the Chinese Communist rulers in Beijing were distracted, paralysed by in-fighting over who would take control after Mao finally died. Would Mao's fanatical wife and her collaborators, the Gang of Four, be allowed to continue the Cultural Revolution, which had shut China off from the world and reduced it to poverty and chaos?

Or would Deng Xiaoping and his reformist friends be able to take control and open China up to the market, and end the near permanent state of civil war? Palmer recreates the tensions of that fateful summer, when the fate of China and the world were in the balance -as injured and starving people crawled among the ruins of a stricken city.

By: James Palmer
Imprint: Faber & Faber
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 198mm, Width: 126mm, Spine: 19mm
Weight: 230g
ISBN: 9780571244003
ISBN 10: 0571244009
Pages: 288
Publication Date: 01 February 2013
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

James Palmer lives in Beijing. He has interviewed many survivors of the Tangshan earthquake and of the Communist Party struggles of that crucial year.