) W% Y& p7 f1 r w 2 R4 K& ^2 }+ l/ _7 p冯克是为数不多获准使用中国历史档案的外国学者之一。- H1 L& J! F/ f+ ]
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Mao's Great Famine wins Samuel Johnson Prize ) s- p* a" l; R" e" R! |1 X 8 ~7 q) Z/ W g1 x" k8 NA book about China's disastrous Great Leap Forward policy has won the £20,000 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction. + m# t; U4 }' b+ \* g& F2 A+ q7 l" I3 r" D2 ^ H4 I
Mao's Great Famine, by Dutch historian Frank Dikotter, beat five other short-listed titles to the award. - Q/ d, t9 m" m& U0 b( `8 i$ b- G6 O" a7 q# w
Chair of the judges Ben Macintyre praised the book as an "epic record of human folly".! M* g: f; o, G% G2 `
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He added it was "essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the history of the 20th Century".) g/ k) L {. y4 g( V2 _/ b* e
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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. 2 v8 E. J1 s8 b; L5 ]: N9 Y ) m* H6 x; J7 o) \. cThe 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. * ^$ n; c. g/ u9 b6 T0 A# m0 S9 O% n8 s( S) V% f% z+ E
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. ! J. r9 B# y, H! R; w! x9 @+ |: Y5 Z- w! b2 Q- H- J1 D
They each received £1,000. + F; c) ]4 l. E8 g8 R# U # t5 Z z' X2 X# aThe prize was open to non-fiction books published in English by writers of any nationality between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2011.
