Compelling story including much history about China

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	• Wild Swans : Three Daughters of China Jung Chang Touchstone, 2003 - 544 pages average customer review:based on 347 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

good book, a little hard to follow

I read this book for my book club. I enjoyed the book, it was interesting to read about the lives of these three generations of women in China & how constricted their lives were. I learned a lot about communism in China that I did not know. The time line of the story was sometimes a little hard to follow. If you are not interested in history or politics at all this book is not for you. The character development was lost to the political story. I do wish I knew how the author met her husband & her life was in the US after she left china, I felt that was lacking.

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Amazingly Referenced

Beautifully written and amazingly referenced.
The referencing in this book rivals any educational text.
Following 3 generations of chinese women from Imperial China through to the cultural revolution and Communist China.
An absolute must read.

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Wild Swans

I am grateful for Mrs. Chang who took the time to write this book. After reading this book, I feel I more understand the history of China in the last century and a half. I am currently living in China and so to understand these beautiful people's history is invaluable. Many things have changed, obviously, but some mindsets have remained and this book has helped me to make China my home as a foreigner. If you are traveling to China for any period, or are interested in global affairs and reprecussions, this books is for you. It won't dissapoint. I'm currently reading it for the second time and it won't be my last, I'm sure.

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Compelling story including much history about China

I just finished this book and found it amazing - I was totally engrossed in it while reading it, finding the story and events to be fascinating. I feel like it taught me a tremendous amount about 20th century Chinese history in a form far far superior to a textbook - many of the events are described from first hand experience of them. Others are told as the author heard them from friends and family. Overall, the book is superb.

The gripes some (a small percentage of people) will have are probably the following: 1) the writing style is either too dry or to the point, 2) the book weaves in and out of too many stories and recollections and should have stayed more focussed, and 3) possibly that the book is too "negative", as one reviewer here put it. In response to these possible complaints. 1) I would say that the reader should be prepared for a frank and direct record of events surrounding the author - I actually liked this about the book, as it made it more convincing. 2) On getting sidetracked, I would agree that for a little bit during the last 75 pages of the book or so, there was a lull as the author described events happening around various family members and friends. It could have stayed a bit more focussed and been slightly shorter, but this complaint will probably be voiced mostly by those who can't handle reading a 500 page boook... 3) On being "negative" or grubby, I strongly disagree and believe readers simply need to see how uplifting the book really is. There is nothing negative and there is no winning in the book in my opinion, although there is a strong political message surrounding Mao that develops in the latter half of the book. This message is not a complaint though, and from my view the author is, as I am, struck by Mao and what he was capable of in China during his reign.

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Heart-breaking, touching, riveting, inspiring

Jung Chang tells the story of her family surviving the Mao years in China. An unexpected development - to me - was her father's character. While he was always moral and steadfast, I began by not liking him at all, and ended up venerating him for those very qualities. He exemplifies how a single human can maintain his dignity and standards in spite of the most horrific treatment. All his youthful ideals about the Communist party were trashed under Mao - as was his own reputation- yet Jung's father maintains his dignity and idealistic belief in what he perceived to be the humanistic goals of the Communist party until his very sad and unnecessary death. Jung's mother, who while under horrible treatment, was so kind to other people that she was called "Kuan Yin" or Goddess of Mercy. A true triumph of the human spirit.

Ms. Chang writes very dryly and dispassionately about her family's torment and trouble, I suspect because it is impossible for her to deal on an emotional level with the remembrance of such things as her mother's being made to kneel on broken glass. To write in a dry, these-are-the-facts style only enhances the horror of the treatment meted out not only to her family, but to many innocent people in China.

Yes, it IS history, and ought to be read as such, but it is also an affirmation of the survival of love, family, and the human spirit in incredibly tough times. It is not a romantic novel, nor a political polemic.

Read it if you want to know more about China and why she is how she is today, but also read it if you want to know the depths and heights to which human nature can plunge or soar.

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, page 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16

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