' {- n; q. h/ k$ h5 P0 ^$ G2 |Mao's Great Famine wins Samuel Johnson Prize6 ]# A! D3 X" ]. X4 t7 v4 o* e
0 D# r! c9 d OA book about China's disastrous Great Leap Forward policy has won the £20,000 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction." h* F% f- Q! w8 |# p
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Mao's Great Famine, by Dutch historian Frank Dikotter, beat five other short-listed titles to the award. 5 `# B' T0 t) r% v( Y: S! H/ Z0 l( @: a/ K' A: e1 {4 ?/ ?% F( H
Chair of the judges Ben Macintyre praised the book as an "epic record of human folly". + M6 p- [- }$ m% a2 V+ |% f) k" @. \
He added it was "essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the history of the 20th Century".( P. {& \' G! B- p. k" h" `* S- k
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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. : }# k) c8 e" z, m & N' ]* O! k) W x6 rThe 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.: D' u( ]. P1 R0 c( S$ W: b
/ K$ H* y- f/ ^" MThis 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. ! w$ a; @1 s7 v4 H& j+ z) F+ j9 O3 ^% R, m' ?$ e
They each received £1,000. 0 p7 V' r8 X/ I) H) }% t2 ?4 s S7 Q
The prize was open to non-fiction books published in English by writers of any nationality between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2011.