For ancient China, a civilization with a cultural tradition stretching back two thousand years, the harshest reality it faced in the last century or two was that “the foreign devils had come.” These “foreign devils” did not refer only to the “Japanese devils” who occupied half of China in those years. In a broader sense, they were the “Western devils” who arrived bearing the modern industrial civilization of the West.
Under the impact of this alien civilization, the old order began to fracture. Along the coast and inland, in cities and villages, among elites and ordinary people, and across different groups, behaviors, ideas, and ways of life increasingly diverged and collided. Social turmoil multiplied, conflicts emerged one after another, and the differences in people's thoughts and beliefs grew almost as vast as heaven and earth. More and more scholars spent “day and night rolling around between the new and the old, China and the West,” stumbling forward amid delusions and confusion.
Why are so many people unpatriotic? In different contexts, how do different forms of “nationalism” compare in value and merit? What is the difference between a “nation-state” and a “national state”? Who should China have looked to as a model for its modern development, and why does the teacher always bully the student? Why is the War of Resistance Against Japan said to be the pivot of national rejuvenation? Between “Chinese learning” and “Western learning,” which one is transforming the other? Is there a happy ending anywhere in this world?
China has one and only one way forward: modernization. The tide of the world surges on. From the perspective of joining the ranks of modern nations, perhaps “the foreign devils have come” was not necessarily a bad thing.
At 11:30 in the night, I finally finished reading this book that I had been thinking about for a long time. I couldn't help but open the review page immediately and give it five stars✨ without hesitation. This kind of hearty reading experience is really rare. The plot is compact and not procrastinating, and every foreshadowing is done just right. Although the interface prompts me to write a long article, at the moment I just want to say simply "It's so beautiful"😋. A good story is like this. After reading it for a long time, I still feel warm in my heart. I can sleep peacefully with this sense of satisfaction tonight.
The content of this book is very profound and made me think more deeply about China's modern history and society. The views in the book are unique, especially the discussion about "China", which reminded me of the changes in my own understanding of the country and nation when I was growing up. We need to be open-minded to learn and accept the advanced experience of the West, and at the same time maintain confidence in and inheritance of our own culture, in order to find China's unique development model on the road to modernization.
It clarified the faltering progress of society at that time.
Based on facts, we carefully study and interpret the historical changes in Chinese society in the past century to provide intellectual support for today's people in their pursuit of development.
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