A Curtain of Ignorance
SIR.—As far as I remember I have never before challenged an adverse criticism of my books, but I must break this rule to protest at Mr Desmond Donnelly's so-called review of A Curtain of ignor- ance in your issue of August 27. No one reading this piece would have-thp faintest idea of what this book is 'really about; it appears to mc to be more a series of petulant and rather personal gibes than a critique of the book itself.
The impression your reviewer leaves is that A Curtain of ignorance is yet another book about contemporary China. It is, in fact, an historical survey of what has led to the present US—China impasse; the influence of McCarthy and the China Lobby on American policy decisions; and a fully documented account of misleading American press, reporting about China. 'It is not the purpose of this book' (I say in the foreword) `to examine the defects or virtues of the present 4ystem in China.... My purpose is . . . to show•how step-by-step mis- leading reports have created deeply set images . . . that are often unrelated to realities.' Thus essentially the book is not about China but America's response to China, which is a very different thing. This book has been widely reviewed in the United States. I cannot recall that any reviewer there, even in the small-town newspapers, failed to understand this elementary discrimination which seems to have escaped Mr. Donnelly.
Mr. Donnelly says: 'Mr. Greene appears to find all Americans now totally stupid about China.' Where have I said or implied this? I make precisely the opposite point: '1 know of no other country with as high a proportion of intelligent and con- cerned citizens as the United States.' I specifically rejected William Lederer's°. description of America as a 'nation, of sheep.' The people of America,' J wrote, 'have responded to world events in a per- fectly rational and predictable way given the in- , formation with which they have been provided. Certainly in regard to China [America] is not a nation of sheep but a nation that has been pro-
foundly misinformed.' •
I have spent a considerable amount of my time in the last few years at various American univer- sities, including the University of California at Berkeley mentioned by Mr. Donnelly which is near my home. Like Mr. Donnelly I have found the
students there eager and many of them are intelli- gent. Mr. Donnelly may, as he tells us, have lec- tured in America 'with the connivance of the British Foreign Office' (what a splendidly impartial spon- sor!), but he talks sheer nonsense when he suggests that students are well-informed about China.
Mr. Donnelly says with some justification that 'good American students of Chinese current affairs are more numerous and more knowledgeable than in any other country in the world.' I make much the same point when I say in my book: 'A great deal of scholarly research is being done on China today in the United States—probably more than ever before.' What he fails to point out is that this research, conducted in relatively small academic circles, has hardly at all influenced the vast mass of erroneous material—much of it utter rubbish— that is purveyed to the public by the mass media press and the politicians. It is this, and not the scholarly research, that has influenced national policy.
This book by `the soapiest seller of doctrine since Dr. Frank Buchman' (your reviewer's de- scription) was not casually or hurriedly prepared. It was checked and rechecked by a number of senior scholars in the field of Asian studies who (unlike Mr. Donnelly) arc only too sadly aware of how much the American public has been kept in ignor- ance.
FELIX GREENE
The Royal Societies Club, 100 Piccadilly, WI
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