Zhou Enlai: A Life

The definitive biography of Zhou Enlai, the first premier and preeminent diplomat of the People's Republic of China, who protected his country against the excesses of his boss—Chairman Mao.
Zhou Enlai spent twenty-seven years as premier of the People's Republic of China and ten as its foreign minister. He was the architect of the country's administrative apparatus and its relationship to the world, as well as its legendary spymaster. Richard Nixon proclaimed him "the greatest statesman of our era." Yet Zhou has always been overshadowed by Chairman Mao. Chen Jian brings Zhou into the light, offering a nuanced portrait of his complex life as a revolutionary, a master diplomat, and a man with his own vision and aspirations who did much to make China, as well as the larger world, what it is today.
Born to a declining mandarin family in 1898, Zhou received a classical education and as a teenager spent time in Japan. As a young man, driven by the desire for China's...