& Z, F5 s$ V1 g7 K * m) `0 D% X# T, P$ z e 1 r( Q, M! W# ?8 \冯克是为数不多获准使用中国历史档案的外国学者之一。 / P$ |: f: O. }3 u- | 5 S. k8 ]* q5 ?, B+ m/ uMao's Great Famine wins Samuel Johnson Prize7 I% E+ H$ `7 z" H
, S6 h" {2 G3 I! m! jA book about China's disastrous Great Leap Forward policy has won the £20,000 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction., _( w7 l8 m' P5 y! B# {! c7 {1 L
. x9 i/ d8 f! d0 J. `Mao's Great Famine, by Dutch historian Frank Dikotter, beat five other short-listed titles to the award. ) N- C b8 ~1 K1 x) l; E5 @3 v8 \4 U3 w3 m( L% h4 u
Chair of the judges Ben Macintyre praised the book as an "epic record of human folly".# T+ ]- P! p- a0 j# e+ }3 B
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He added it was "essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the history of the 20th Century".9 c( m# @' c0 }) ?, X( I6 A
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Mao's Great Famine reveals new details of the period from 1958-1962, providing fresh historical perspectives on Mao's campaign to increase industrial production during which tens of millions starved to death. h1 N$ |, K; u+ `; i
; B6 [" l* u$ w$ p4 @The academic - currently chair of professor of humanities at the University of Hong Kong - was one of a small number of historians to be given access into the Chinese archives.* O& v, o& [$ g, r
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This year's runners-up were Andrew Graham Dixon's Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane, Maya Jasanoff's Liberty's Exiles, Matt Ridley's The Rational Optimist, Jonathan Steinberg's Bismarck: A Life, and John Stubbs' Reprobates.: Z4 A) M8 Q* m$ A
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They each received £1,000. * J+ `) b, V3 n# A! h. i$ U" `) u# z$ @. |) T5 K# c* A
The prize was open to non-fiction books published in English by writers of any nationality between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2011.
