Chinese Looking Glass: A Brilliant Study of Chinese Psychology During 3000 Years of History and Culture

Those who think that three millennia of willow-pattern serenity are being crudely shattered by ideological fanaticism in the People's Communes and the Red Guard movement will be surprised and stimulated by this engaging national portrait, which doesn't gild the lotus in its presentation of the Chinese character. Dennis Bloodworth, the Far Eastern Correspondent of the Observer, sees in the Chinese looking glass a strangely topsy-turvy world, where family and clan are stronger than the state, where there are secret societies, guilds for beggars and insurance companies for pickpockets. What can you make of people who practise acupuncture, write in calligraphic shrink-think (on typewriters with 2500 keys) and actually like dragons? The answer is quite a lot; for this book unravels some of the knottiest Chinese puzzles and predicts the political future of a heritage which extends from the Confucian classics to the thoughts of Mao.