; K8 |3 P4 T& i/ Q# m: k S5 C ^冯克现任香港大学教授，是不多的几个获准可以利用中国官方历史档案的学者之一。 8 F/ z+ U3 |& x' S+ h# @8 t. X3 d5 D* J2 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。5 y8 r- T" U2 g8 z4 E
$ y7 f, c: D. b7 v0 k% E4 e. O* z8 X k U4 A5 S+ D( D; @! Z , c; B; w, |! }( s5 Z冯克是为数不多获准使用中国历史档案的外国学者之一。 $ X- V7 b- X% y: `" r& a2 d/ l, o x, p4 N
Mao's Great Famine wins Samuel Johnson Prize # B& F0 d4 C$ ]' c+ v9 b' O2 ]* w * q* u$ d8 @9 U. R5 tA book about China's disastrous Great Leap Forward policy has won the £20,000 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction. 3 \- u& ?5 C4 B# O* |& M1 T1 }; K $ I1 H& f1 ]8 r! @Mao's Great Famine, by Dutch historian Frank Dikotter, beat five other short-listed titles to the award.# }: M# I% e0 K* [5 [; A2 ]
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Chair of the judges Ben Macintyre praised the book as an "epic record of human folly". : [+ z. k7 I& F4 K4 A# T : O$ W5 E2 c# Y3 M# gHe added it was "essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the history of the 20th Century". + O1 l# I# x ^' o( h , ^% M+ w2 s: G9 h/ ?& r$ X ~, B6 TMao'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.+ V8 Q4 J- U; u
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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.0 B7 N$ i5 F$ X8 y! @* R# z
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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.8 F1 u$ h) \+ l
, G7 e' ?4 Y- c* s1 Q0 v4 \They each received £1,000.; z. |& K+ u. v7 S
5 S: C8 |) \; s& C/ h& zThe prize was open to non-fiction books published in English by writers of any nationality between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2011.
