The Origins of the Cultural Revolution: 2 - The Great Leap Forward 1958-1960 by Roderick MacFarquhar The Royal Institute of International Affairs/Oxford University Press 1983 1st ed, 470pp., text generally in decent order albeit with slight browning to pages & creasing to the bottom corners of some of the pages, slight browning & staining to front & rear end papers, browning/staining rubbing to the page extremities at the very top, side & bottom, rear board very slightly warped, front board more so & boards also very slightly bowed, slight bumping & rubbing to board corners at the bottom - heavier to those at the top, some bumping/rubbing/staining to the top, sides & bottom of both boards - much heavier to the top (which also has some scuffing) & bottom of the spine, small patch of staining to the bottom right hand side of the front board, elsewhere both boards & spine slightly marked, the dust jacket is stained, browned, worn & marked. Book = acceptable+; jacket = fair. The second volume in a trilogy which examines the politics, economics, culture and international relations of China from the mid-1950's to he mid-1960's, this volume tells the story of the Great Leap Forward - Mao's utopian attempt to propel China economically and socially into the 21st Century by mobilizing his nation's greatest asset: its disciplined manpower. The effort produced economic disaster and political dissension, and helped to precipitate the Sino-Soviet split. Today's leaders point to it as the beginning of two decades of national trauma, which ended only after the death of Mao and the purge of the Gang of Four. Those leaders have recently authorized the release of a mass of new documentation in the form of political reminiscences, economic statistics, and leaders' speeches. This volume is the first scholarly work to use the new material comprehensively, weaving it into the narrative along with the contemporary record and the revelations published in Red Guard newspapers during the cultural revolution. The result is the most detailed account and analysis to date of what went wrong and why. Will ship by Royal Mail 1st Class Signed for, well packaged. (£5.39/burma)