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冯克是为数不多获准使用中国历史档案的外国学者之一。 * ?* A- N- u [& x' o8 D1 a : o: l4 [( j. F% p$ z. cMao's Great Famine wins Samuel Johnson Prize7 D! u( n7 G" G+ J
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A book about China's disastrous Great Leap Forward policy has won the £20,000 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction. , l. F4 @3 ~, X' o4 C- j8 _" o- `2 G7 |! C, O3 d
Mao's Great Famine, by Dutch historian Frank Dikotter, beat five other short-listed titles to the award.5 b- K! w5 K$ ~: p
3 F* `# a1 a4 [; lChair of the judges Ben Macintyre praised the book as an "epic record of human folly". 3 X2 { i* O6 m+ Z/ d' @: Z * o, [: F; ^: yHe added it was "essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the history of the 20th Century". 8 T1 w0 F" f/ R z, J8 r& R) Q! o; b. {* A9 Z5 i6 n' J6 o
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.4 Z/ ?* D! u+ _8 W' D
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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.; g! A5 U! d" V# B: ]
* @2 X2 `7 W% S! `% C9 uThis 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.$ ]7 H$ B: b- E6 D( g
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They each received £1,000. d9 F, U; X ]8 }- ^( m
& y8 o1 v# y& M; o: s5 P TThe prize was open to non-fiction books published in English by writers of any nationality between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2011.
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