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The most authoritative life of the Chinese leader every written, Mao: The Unknown Story is based on a decade of research, and on interviews with many of Mao’s close circle in China who have never talked before — and with virtually everyone outside China who had significant dealings with him. It is full of startling revelations, exploding the myth of the Long March, and showing a completely unknown Mao: he was not driven by idealism or ideology; his intimate and intricate relationship with Stalin went back to the 1920s, ultimately bringing him to power; he welcomed Japanese occupation of much of China; and he schemed, poisoned, and blackmailed to get his way. After Mao conquered China in 1949, his secret goal was to dominate the world. In chasing this dream he caused the deaths of 38 million people in the greatest famine in history. In all, well over 70 million Chinese perished under Mao’s rule — in peacetime.Amazon.com Review
In the epilogue to her biography of Mao Tse-tung,Jung Chang and her husband and cowriter Jon Halliday lament that,"Today, Mao's portrait and his corpse still dominate Tiananmen Squarein the heart of the Chinese capital." For Chang, author of Wild Swans, this fact is an affront, not just to history, but to decency. Mao: The Unknown Storydoes not contain a formal dedication, but it is clear that Chang iswriting to honor the millions of Chinese who fell victim to Mao's drivefor absolute power in his 50-plus-year struggle to dominate China andthe 20th-century political landscape. From the outset, Chang andHalliday are determined to shatter the "myth" of Mao, and they succeedwith the force, not just of moral outrage, but of facts. The result isa book, more indictment than portrait, that paints Mao as a brutaltotalitarian, a thug, who unleashed Stalin-like purges of millions withrelish and without compunction, all for his personal gain. Through theauthors' unrelenting lens even his would-be heroism as the leader ofthe Long March and father of modern China is exposed as recklessopportunism, subjecting his charges to months of unnecessary hardshipin order to maintain the upper hand over his rival, Chang Kuo-tao, anexperienced military commander.

Using exhaustive research inarchives all over the world, Chang and Halliday recast Mao's ascent topower and subsequent grip on China in the context of global events.Sino-Soviet relations, the strengths and weakness of Chiang Kai-shek,the Japanese invasion of China, World War II, the Korean War, thedisastrous Great Leap Forward, the vicious Cultural Revolution, theVietnam War, Nixon's visit, and the constant, unending purges all,understandably, provide the backdrop for Mao's unscrupulous butinvincible political maneuverings and betrayals. No one escapedunharmed. Rivals, families, peasants, city dwellers, soldiers, andlifelong allies such as Chou En-lai were all sacrificed to Mao'sambition and paranoia. Appropriately, the authors' consciences areappalled. Their biggest fear is that Mao will escape the globalcondemnation and infamy he deserves. Their astonishing book will go along way to ensure that the pendulum of history will adjust itselfaccordingly. --Silvana Tropea

10 Second Interview: A Few Words with Jung Chang and Jon Halliday

Q: From idea to finished book, how long did Mao: The Unknown Story take to research and write?
A: Over a decade.

Q: What was your writing process like? How did you two collaborate on this project?
A: The research shook itself out by language. Jung did all the Chinese-language research, and Jon did the other languages, of which Russian was the most important, as Mao had a long-term intimate relationship with Stalin. After our research trips around the world, we would work in our separate studies in London. We would then rendezvous at lunch to exchange discoveries.

Q: Do you have any thoughts about how the book is, or will be received in China? Did that play a part in your writing of the book?
A: The book is banned in China, because the current Communist regime is fiercely perpetuating the myth of Mao. Today Mao's portrait and his corpse still dominate Tiananmen Square in the heart of Beijing, and the regime declares itself to be Mao's heir. The government blocked the distribution of an issue of The Far Eastern Economic Review, and told the magazine's owners, Dow Jones, that this was because that issue contained a review of our book. The regime also tore the review of our book out of The Economist magazine that was going to (very restricted) newsstands. We are not surprised that the book is banned. The regime's attitude had no influence on how we wrote the book. We hope many copies will find their way into China.

Q: What is the one thing you hope readers get from your book?
A: Mao was responsible for the deaths of well over 70 million Chinese in peacetime, and he was bent on dominating the world. As China is today emerging as an economic and military power, the world can never regard it as a benign force unless Beijing rejects Mao and all his legacies. We hope our book will help push China in this direction by telling the truth about Mao.

Breakdown of a BIG Book: 5 Things You'll Learn from Mao: The Unknown Story

1. Mao became a Communist at the age of 27 for purely pragmatic reasons: a job and income from the Russians.

2. Far from organizing the Long March in 1934, Mao was nearly left behind by his colleagues who could not stand him and had tried to oust him several times. The aim of the March was to link up with Russia to get arms. The Reds survived the March because Chiang Kai-shek let them, in a secret horse-trade for his son and heir, whom Stalin was holding hostage in Russia.

3. Mao grew opium on a large scale.

4. After he conquered China, Mao's over-riding goal was to become a superpower and dominate the world: "Control the Earth," as he put it.

5. Mao caused the greatest famine in history by exporting food to Russia to buy nuclear and arms industries: 38 million people were starved and slave-driven to death in 1958-61. Mao knew exactly what was happening, saying: "half of China may well have to die."

Customer Reviews (293)

The Best Book on Mao Currently Available
Finally, a massively researched book that paints an accurate portrait of one of the evilest men of the 20th century.Why so many others try to see the good in Mao baffles me.It is like trying to rehabilitate the legacy of Hitler or Stalin.Evil thugs are evil thugs.

Yes there are some factual errors in the book, but that is inescapable when someone writes such a massive work.It always bugs me when dilettantes who vastly overestimate how just how smart they are, point to a list of 5 or 10 factual errors and say 'so the rest of the 800 pages are wrong too.' The fact is most of this book is extremely well documented and accurate.And the authors interpretations of Mao's motivations are based on extensive knowledge of the man.Their picture of Mao is fundamentally accurate and consistent.

This book painful.Reading about real world nonfiction sadistic torture, mass starvation, the destruction of all works of art, the incitement of children to beat to death other children, and other crimes against humanity is not pleasant.But if you are interested in Mao, and communist China, this is THE book to get.

So why is there such a strong reaction against this monumental work?

1) Denial.One of the problems most have is not understanding that there exist people in this world with no consciences: that is, people who see other people as nothing more than chess pieces, cattle, and/or playthings.The actions and motivations of conscience-less people are hard to fathom for normal humans; and so when we see or hear about those without consciences,our automatic response is to dismiss the information or to try to rationalize the inhuman behaviour.

Seeing Mao as a normal person and trying to understand his actions and motivations as such means you will not understand Mao.It is like trying to understand Hitler, Stalin, or any other sociopath\psychopath\extreme narcissist without recognizing the fact that their personalities are deviant.

2) I also see the very human trait of believing what we were told as children as coming into play.That is why Muslim children for the most part grow up to be adult Muslims, and Christian children Christian adults.So people who have grown up in Maoist countries, being indoctrinated about Mao, are going to face a struggle coming to terms with just exactly who and what he was.

3) Our need for happy endings.Stories that have no resolution or where evil wins are hard for modern people to take.We look for silver linings where there are none, and in so doing distort history.

Must read
This book is a must for anyone interested in the modern history of China. The detail and documentation are phenomenal. If you are not at all familiar with Chinese geography, history or names it will be a little hard to follow but you have to start somewhere.

Disgusted and Saddened
I am utterly disgusted and saddened after I read the first few chapters of this book. I am perhaps a few years younger than the author but I also grew up during the Cultural Revolution. Unlike the author who left China in the late 70's, I lived in China all the way through Tienanmen Square massacre (1989). So I am not here to endorse Mao or Maoism or Communism by any means. However, the author has committed the same exact mistake/crime that wrecked hovac into millions of families and lives in China during Mao's reign. The logic, arguments and the premises upon which she built this huge book of hatred are the same exact things that sent my father to hard labor camp because he painted a picture of some western scenary, and that denied my seat in the college because my great grandfater was not "poor enough". I can go on. Reading this book brought back so many of those painful memories. By condamning him for every little thing he did or did not do even as a mere child and a young man seeking a future, the author has done a terrible disservice to those who suffered in his ruling. I will continue to read. But I hope that the author could see what she has done in no way has promoted truth, independent thinking or humanity.

Can a 1000 page book be shallow?
The question, as I said it above, is can a 1000 page book be shallow. Well Jung Chang and Jon Halliday have proven that it basically can. As a couple other reviews have pointed out, this book has an almost totalitarian interest in selling, no, cramming one single message down your (eyes?) page after page. That message is that Mao was a terrible person whose personality was about a half inch deep and completely evil for the entire half inch. Now don't get me wrong, I believe Mao did some awful things, some very awful things, but the problem with this book is that it is never satisfied to let you make your own conclusions on these issues. If a single sentence is written about a good deed from Mao, it is followed immediately, not even nearly immediately but immediately with an entire paragraph condemning the previous act as a freak occurrence or the element of some other evil plot. A lot of the points made are highly subjective. It is as though the authors are constantly afraid of letting the reader slip away and think that Mao was anything other than a manipulative psychopath. Honestly there is enough information in this book alone (otherwise) to make that point quite clearly without all of the aggressive hand holding. I had previously read the excellent biography of another 20th century red giant, 'Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar' by Simon Sebag Montefoire, which was a similar length. That book manages to convey a stronger messages about the negative qualities of Stalin's character while allowing the reader the respect to make these decisions on their own. It's basically the difference between saying 'Three thousand people were shot.' or 'Three thousand people were shot and this was a bad act of a bad man.' All that hand holding does is present a lengthy yet shallow, very shallow, portrait of Mao, and this over the course of nearly one thousand pages. As far as the history aspects of the book it is quite valuable. But I can't help feeling that the same information could be gathered elsewhere and in a more effective manner. This book was meticulously researched individually, especially throughout China, and that makes it valuable. I'm not familiar with the other works on Mao and his life, so I can't say if there is a better alternative. Though in spite of this I cannot really recommend this book to anyone except the Mao scholar who has read many sources and is capable of looking at a subjective viewpoint through objective eyes. Either they or someone who is looking to embolden their hatred of the man Mao, and who might be particularly scared of having their sentiments swayed by even an iota of positivity. It really seems that the authors had an axe to grind, either personally or by what they perceived as an obligation to the Chinese who died. Honestly for me I just wish the book offered more dimension to what must have been a very deep person. Though I could be wrong, Mao could simply be an automaton of evil and greed, which leads me to an alternative subtitle for this book: Mao: The Devil's Robot. Read at your own discretion, but honestly, you won't need to use it. The introduction should finalize with, 'Now please take off both your shoes and discretion and come inside, you will be taken care of from here.'

Profound academic challenge to glorification of Mao
Well written and meticulously researched, it is a fascinating history of both Mao and China during Mao's rule. It will certainly challenge any glorified images of Mao that one might harbor. This book has been accused of being too "one-sided", personalized, and "extreme". However, there is a great body of historical information that supports this history and view of Mao. The book is not extreme - Mao was extreme, in his narcissism and cruelty. Although he liked to portray himself as a Marx or Trotsky, in reality he was a Stalin. ... Read more

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