Has a real pacing issue, lot of fat to trim for the first 2/3rds of the book ( )

A nice, comprehensive history for someone looking into knowing more about china. Just good enough for being a primer, more informed readers should look elsewhere ( )

Definitely from the one damned thing after another school of history the author concentrates solely on the dynastic succession and military struggles accompanying it. I don't blame him since that reflects the sources available. Still, he's quite happy to report fiction, albeit with numerous and copious amounts of caveats. Fate of common people is hardly even a backdrop for these dynastic shenanigans at the top. How about offering some informed guesses if fictional accounts are enough for the dynastic history? There is also an assumption you are already familiar with the culture, geography and basic history of China. ( )

After reading Jonathan Fenby's History of Modern China, I felt the need to go further back into time and learn about The Middle Kingdom before the 1800s. As a single volume history of China covering thousands of years of history up to roughly 1949, John Keay's China: A History generally fits the bill.

Naturally, as with any single volume history, the level of detail is very cursory in parts. Keay quickly moves over the numerous emperors and dynasties of China and highlights some of the court intrigues and machinations that caused major convulsions in the land. Further mention is also given to the various minorities in Chinese history. What results is a continuous cycle of rise and fall that exchanged one dynasty for the next. Subsequently, we see that China was never some monolithic empire than stretched back, unbroken, for 5,000 years. Rather, it was a series of competing factions and kingdoms where occasionally one managed to conquer and hold large swathes of territory for some period of time. That is,until the next court disaster, rebellion, conqueror, or nomadic horde swept in.

My biggest problem with this book is that it's in need of more editing. Keay's writing is frequently wordy and often goes off on tangents. It's difficult to see where the overall narrative comes together because Keay jumps from topic to topic. It doesn't help that he's covering centuries (sometimes millennia) of history in a handful of pages. After a while, it seems like one rebellion, invasion, or backroom court intrigue is the same as the last. The final chapter of the book is an incredibly short glossing over of China from 1900-1949. Basically, WWII happened and the Communists beat the Nationalists. China has been Communist ever since, Mao was a walking disaster, and its economy is currently growing. It's almost like Keay planned to write another volume covering post-1900s China, but instead decided to give it lip service and cram in all in 50 pages. From my understanding, Keay is more of an expert on the history of India and his book on that country is better.

Overall, I'd say that the book will be a chore if you're not prepared for the wordiness of it. The writing and historiography is ok, but it seems more journalistic than scholarly. Not the greatest history I've read, but not the worst either. It just seems a bit mediocre. ( )

On the whole, I would say that this is a very good book. I have read a bit about Chinese history when I was living there, and was very confused by certain epochs in ancient Chinese History, like the period of the Warring States.

John Keay does a very good job in writing about this, and his use of maps makes this very clear. The reasons for the fall of the various dynasties is also detailed very well, and considerable space is given to the Qing. I would have personally wished for a little more detail on the Yuan, as well as some more detail on the period of China post 1946. This period has been extremely tumultuous, and the country has been transformed. Perhaps, a future edition will dwell more on this.

All in all, a very good introduction to the history of China in one volume. ( )