China from a new perspective
Personally: I have never been to China, but I am very interested in all the new developments in the news on China, and so this book has given me a feeling of knowing more about China than I learn from news reports, even though I cannot visit that great, fascinating country personally. The authors report on their experiences in visiting the areas they write about, and also present research reports to help interpret their eyewitness accounts. I was especially impressed by the creativity of the photography. It falls within the category of everyday life photography, say works by Walker Evans or Henri Cartier-Bresson. It is fascinating to find out the details of particular lives, people who are often neglected in history from above. The synthesis of history from the bottom, street photography, sociology and history is fascinating and holds my interest much more than dry historical works.
Generally: This book is a combination of travelogue, history and contemporary history. Its eight main chapters follow the border of China both on the land and the seas. The authors traveled to all these countries or the neighboring areas of China. The over 400 pages present a vast panoramic view of ordinary life on the borders of China in both photos and text. The interviews and travel stories are combined with a vast range of informative discussions of history and politics, economics, everyday life, social developments, international projects (e.g. OBOR) and culture. In short, China's rise to a superpower is largely explained from the country's borderlands. Besides the authors' own pictures, there are copies of historical documents, photos, paintings, artworks, maps, etc. The authors also have a number of pictures they call collages with insertions of photographs from other contexts
In all, I give this book a very high rating.
