Synopsis

Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China is a sweeping memoir that tells the intertwined stories of three generations of women living through some of the most turbulent periods in modern Chinese history. Beginning with the author’s grandmother in pre-communist China, continuing through her mother’s experiences under Mao, and culminating in the author’s own life during the Cultural Revolution, the book traces how political upheaval shaped private lives. Vivid, personal, and deeply moving, the narrative blends family history with national history, offering rare insight into the human cost of ideology, power, and social transformation.

About the Author

Jung Chang was born in Yibin, Sichuan Province, China, in 1952. She was briefly a Red Guard, and then a peasant, a ‘barefoot doctor’, a steelworker and an electrician. She came to Britain in 1978, and became the first person from the People’s Republic of China to receive a doctorate from a British university. Her books include ‘Wild Swans’, which won the 1992 NCR Book Award and the 1993 British Book of the Year, and sold over 10 million copies. She lives in London.