The Great Wall
on March 28, 1968
China is so distant, big, and complex that each Marco Polo nowadays tells a different tale. The authors of the three books under review—a cool Swedish journalist, a passionate Chinese true-believer, and a philosophical Frenchman—give very different impressions of Chairman Mao’s revolution. Unencumbered by first-hand contact ourselves, we Americans can judge only at second-hand whether Mao’s China is working or in deep trouble, expansionist or merely defensive.
