Fanshen: A Documentary of Revolution in a Chinese Village

When reading books, one hopes for either someone who shares the same outlook as you do, so you know you are not alone in your perspective, or on the other hand for a view into a world that is alien to yourself, so you can learn things from a book you are not able to firsthand. Fanshen is a look at a remote village in North-eastern China in the 1940's, which is an experience completely alien to the average reader in an industrialized... Read Full Review

A sweeping, nuanced, and deeply humane account of the changes in a single village during the land reform process that brought China out of feudalism in the 1940s. Hinton's saga immerses the reader in the shocking, brutal war of each against all that characterized life in rural China in the years before the revolution, and the struggles, challenges, excesses, and corrections that realized the equitable redistribution of agricultural... Read Full Review

This book is a classic and one of the most important accounts of land reform in the 1940s and 50s. The sequel _Shenfan_ is also good, and is also considered a classic in academic circles. Note that even conseravative scholars like Needham praise these books. I'm writing this review mainly in response to reviewer Smallchief's comment that the book is "naive" b/c it paints too positive a picture in light of the "starvation"... Read Full Review

You've heard the old joke about the guy who says he would rather be a drunk than an alcoholic because alcoholics have to go to all those meetings. That's what this book is about: meetings -- innumerable, endless meetings in a small village in revolutionary China. For three years (1946-1948, it seems that the peasants in this village met every day to discuss how to divvy up the land taken from the landlords, select their leaders,... Read Full Review

This book is a must read for all of those interested in getting a more in-depth view of the impetus for the revolution in China, namely the absolutely horrific living and working conditions of poor peasants which included years of famine, exploitation by the landlords and barbaric victimization at the hands of the ruling gentry. Also gives an in-depth view of the committment and work of both Communists and non-Communists... Read Full Review