# ~ g6 M) C& \- ~ 3 k. h& {6 G& S$ K J: {* s冯克是为数不多获准使用中国历史档案的外国学者之一。$ I1 x1 j7 I5 P4 r- e1 V1 E
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Mao's Great Famine wins Samuel Johnson Prize2 K" }% g; T4 U! O+ h4 T
0 M3 W# i6 S s; S5 ~. X& s1 w! UA book about China's disastrous Great Leap Forward policy has won the £20,000 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction.6 J* G4 \. E: \
( }6 e% }2 d- g! I& i. \Mao's Great Famine, by Dutch historian Frank Dikotter, beat five other short-listed titles to the award. 5 H* p) b/ ^+ D6 K% k3 L! x" g5 y) Y. M" Z; g5 R
Chair of the judges Ben Macintyre praised the book as an "epic record of human folly". : a" y/ B9 o+ N7 a9 Y0 s3 u; Z ! J1 G$ S5 B' M7 ~He added it was "essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the history of the 20th Century". " ?9 A+ ^ c% ~/ q9 k% z- M- _0 K 8 V- Z5 ~% p! C5 t5 t0 BMao'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." J5 r+ R+ I+ Q* r- j$ h. j
" X0 j8 B8 e/ i0 }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. $ F7 G1 f: I: U4 l1 u5 K ) G0 O/ C7 H6 \3 k, H" @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. 2 H# x8 ^7 A- J# @1 O) o8 ?$ S' p C4 p, c! B
They each received £1,000. ' m& Y+ @, `6 }6 u , q0 L" L. ?2 n" B3 I2 M$ g& e/ RThe prize was open to non-fiction books published in English by writers of any nationality between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2011.
