This Generation: Dispatches from China's Most Popular Literary Star (and Race Car Driver)
“I started to glance through THIS GENERATION expecting the usual—and I could not put it down! What a voice and what a wit! But so wise and generous, too.” (AMY CHUA, Yale Law Professor and)"Han Han is a phenomenon of today's China who personifies a rapidly changing society." (Jonathan Fenby, author of Tiger Head, Snake Tails: China Today, How It Got There and Where It Is Heading)“China’s most popular blogger . . . His manicured, swaggering persona is a rebuke to the rumpled archetype of the Chinese intellectual, and owes equal debt to Kerouac and Timberlake.”—Evan Osnos,The New Yorker“Scaling the Great Firewall of China may be a tall order, but the 30-year-old Han Han has succeeded remarkably well. In fact,shock and awewill probably be the emotions that first register with readers unfamiliar with or ambivalent about Chinese culture. Yes, someone living inside Communist China is writing these things online—and, yes, has yet to face serious consequences. Prepare for even more enlightenment and entertainment, because the firebrand behind these invaluable posts is more Jon Stewart than John Brown. Thesly and often funnydispatches take on Communist Party corruption, inequality, injustice, censorship and more. But the author isn’t shy about taking on some of his other countrymen in the process . . . Han Han navigates around these and other cultural potholes with the same assuredness he shows on racetracks all over of the world. The finish line here is a relevant view of modern Chinese life, and Han Han’s commentary on events both large and small inside China drives past politics, outruns Sinophobia and brings Chinese society into sharp focus.A must-read for anyone, especially 20- and 30-somethings, itching to understand China today.”—Kirkus Reviews“This Generationis a pragmatic guide to public expression in China… [Han Han] dissects the latest news with gusto.” (Reuters)“Han Han does more than just put well-known complaints into clever form. On some topics he is uniquely astute….Elsewhere Han brings deep insight to the question of cultural insecurity….Han is especially perceptive on how language is used in Chinese politics…. Han Han’s large readership is the best evidence we have of a broad survival of common sense in China.” (Perry LinkThe New York Review of Books)