Great Books of China

Discover - or rediscover - the major achievements of Chinese culture and civilization.
Great Books of China offers concise introductions - each of them accompanied by generous quotation (in English) from the book in question - to sixty-six works in the canon of Chinese literature.
The books chosen reflect the chronological and thematic breadth of Chinese literary tradition, ranging from such classics as The Book of Songs and the Confucian Analects, through popular dramas and novels (The Romance of the Western Chamber; The Water Margin), twentieth-century political and biographical works (Quotations from Chairman Mao, the autobiography of the last emperor) and modern novels that are little known in the West (Memories of South Peking, Six Chapters from a Cadre School Life).
Frances Wood presents a comprehensive, accessible and richly informative primer for the uninitiated; a box of delights that opens up an entire literary culture to the inquisitive reader.

Frances Wood is a distinguished historian of China and Chinese culture, was for many years head of the Chinese collections at the British Library. She has lectured widely, created exhibitions, and written a number of books including China's First Emperor and His Terracotta Warriors, The Silk Road, and the Blue Guide to China.