- q/ ?8 W6 K" y" F F1 _. Z塞缪尔·约翰逊奖是一个面对世界各国学者的非小说类英文作品的文学奖项，奖金为两万英镑。 r {* C" n+ h- C$ p! F! o
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6 E7 M& `0 ?+ U+ a) v1 B 3 a3 S8 Z. X2 J) d2 L* f冯克是为数不多获准使用中国历史档案的外国学者之一。) t \, O5 Y+ L/ O$ v5 A/ d* E3 M
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Mao's Great Famine wins Samuel Johnson Prize ! I) A9 b6 P4 S7 N . |" h* x4 ^8 B* G0 Z( RA book about China's disastrous Great Leap Forward policy has won the £20,000 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction. / s& N7 V% e" v `6 Y ) Z, U1 M* j+ [$ q& jMao's Great Famine, by Dutch historian Frank Dikotter, beat five other short-listed titles to the award.; g" R: K( J7 \, F* U+ O
- c) r4 S3 Y# O, O' s3 [Chair of the judges Ben Macintyre praised the book as an "epic record of human folly". ! d+ ~ }& j2 {% ~; o $ V! l x! w& CHe added it was "essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the history of the 20th Century".* P% H6 |3 S. ^0 f( ~% J
) I& B1 y- p% S: ?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.% H8 M" f9 B; F- I
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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.4 K. ?4 [6 o3 o$ m7 R9 M
/ g) l: p2 ]9 iThis 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 Z- b/ q& b( y$ C3 u8 N+ o3 A
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They each received £1,000.& q1 J8 C6 Z9 S# Y& [0 i9 _2 j
8 B& V3 u& f" x3 H1 sThe prize was open to non-fiction books published in English by writers of any nationality between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2011.
