BOOKS OF THE DAY
The New China
China Looks Forward. By Sun Fo. (Allen and Unwm. 12s. 6d.) The Making of Modern China. By Owen and Eleanor Lattimore. (Allen and Unwin. 8s. 6d.) I See a New China. By George Hogg. (Gollanez. 6s.)
THERE is every reason to be glad that Dr. Sun Fo—Sun Yat-sen's son—allowed himself to be persuaded by his friends to publish an English version of Chung-kuo Ch'ien-fu, China's Future, the title of a collection of addresses given in China between 1939 and 1942 and published in Chinese in the latter year. He appears at first to have doubted whether Western readers would be interested in what he had to say to his own people. Yet it is, surely, the ideas intended for domestic consumption that are most likely to illumine foreign minds in regard to China's thoughts and feelings. .
Indeed, it is a pity that China Looks Forward does not stick more closely to the Chinese version. The author tells us in his preface that "in its final form the bulk of this volume is taken from its Chinese original, with some new material added," this, the reader is given to understand, being two chapters specially written, "China Marching Towards Democracy" and "Writing China's Constitu- tion." While, however, a good deal of the material contained in the second chapter appears in the Chinese volume, the latter does not include a number of passages, some of considerable length, purporting to be the English counterpart of the addresses which it records. It may be, of course, that the passages in question are taken from the original notes of the addresses, and for some reason or other were not included in the Chinese volume. If that is so an explanatory note would have been helpful.
However, much if not most of the English text reproduces the Chinese version satisfactorily, and in any case presents us with a useful exposition of the author's ideas on democracy, capitalism, socialism, land-ownership, industrialisation, Korea, the Mikado and other lively topics. For "useful " exposition one 'would like to substitute " lucid." Yet while some of Dr. Sun's ideas are stated clearly enough, others remain somewhat obscure, perhaps because analysis does not run very comfortably in double harness with loyalty. His father's San Min Chu-i or Three Principles of the People, have acquired the sanctity of a gospel, the difficulties of which tend to be treated mystically.
Very different is the technique adopted by Mr. and Mrs. Latti- more in writing their brief history, The Making of Modern China. One might almost say, indeed, that one of its chief objects is to dispose of all puzzles, to leave nothing unexplained. Opinions will differ as to their success in this. Some will have difficulty, for example, in seeing how an attitude, or code of behaviour—" let those who wear the costume of barbarians be barbarians ; those who wear the costume of Chinese be Chinese "—can explain the high degree of physical uniformity which the Chinese display (p. 36). Nor will all concur in the view that the importance of "face" in China "comes from thousands of years of having to get along with each
other, often in crowded and uncomfortable surroundings." Some will be disposed to think that the Confucian doctrine of It has had a good deal to do with the matter. After all, was China so very crowded when "face" first asserted itself as a convention? The explanation given by the author and his wife of China's peculiar script—namely, that very probably it was purposely developed "in a way to make it as difficult as possible, because writing guarded the 'secret' of wealth and power in controlling the allotments of water and the apportioning of rents and taxes "—may seem rational to "debunkers." But does it square with what is known of the artistic values and history of the script?
Readers will be unanimous, however, in their praise of this book al. a masterly summary. An adequate yet brief background study to the China of today and tomorrow was badly needed and Mr. and Mrs. Lattimore are to be congratulated on providing it.
I See a New China fits in with the volumes just considered extremely well. Confirming much that they contain, it gives vivid pictures of the areas in which China's long history began and in which some of the springs of a new history are rising afresh. Mr. George Hogg has no axe to grind, no propaganda to "put across." Precisely why he went to China in 1938 we are not told, but having got there a sound instinct took him to its north-west. This book lA a straightforward, unpretentious but extremely interesting record of his travels. It teaches us a good deal about the guerilla warfare waged by the Communists against the Japanese, and also about the Co-operative movement, giving us a glimpse of the New Zealander who has been closely connected with it, Rewi Alley.
E. M. Guu..
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