• xiaohongshu [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    1 month ago

    I strongly recommend Ezra Vogel’s biography on Deng Xiaoping as an authoritative source on the subject matter.

    The biography is officially endorsed by the CPC, although certain controversial parts (such as the Zhuhai coup) had to be censored in the PRC edition. If you read the Hong Kong edition or the original English edition, those parts were not censored.

    It does not escape the irony that the best biography on Deng happened to be written by a foreigner, an American no less. I’ll leave you to decide why the CPC would endorse such a work (which included first hand interviews with Deng’s family members and close associates), even though they had to censor parts of it to maintain continuity with the party line. I consider the work to be authoritative in this regard.

    • Fishroot [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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      1 month ago

      It does not escape the irony that the best biography on Deng happened to be written by a foreigner, an American no less.

      This is not too different from how the reason why Deng went for a progressive reform according to Isabel webber’s how China escape shock therapy. Deng initially wanted to initiate reform resembling USSR’s shock therapy, in opposition to the more Conservative (read left wing) of the part of the party and specialists who traveled to Eastern Europe countries to see the ravages of shock therapy. Ironically, it was George Soros who convinced the Party higher ups that it might not be a good idea