Yu. V. CHUDODEEV. ON THE EYES OF CHANGING CHINA, MOSCOW: IV RAS, 2008, 160 p. The author of the book is a well-known Russian orientalist who has been studying the history and modern development of China for more than half a century. The book under review is the result of his direct observations during numerous trips around the country in the second half of the last century and the beginning of this century. The author tells a fascinating story about events of historical significance that he saw with his own eyes, which, of course, can not fail to interest a wide range of Russian readers who understand that the fate of China, where every fifth person on the planet lives, is of global significance. The book of Yu. V. Chudodeev is interesting for specialists in regional studies because it clearly concretizes and illustrates many historical phenomena and processes that took place in China in the recent past and are currently taking place there. It offers the reader a wide panorama of a huge, beautiful, but still poor country. The author recalls how he saw China a few decades ago: "The minimum number of cars, all the heavy loads were transported on huge carts harnessed to them by men and women... Extremely poor life of the bulk of the people. Poorly and monotonously dressed people, mostly miserable dwellings "(p. 7). Yu. V. Chudodeyev was lucky enough to personally see China at various stages of its difficult evolution, even in the midst of the"cultural revolution". He recalls being directly confronted by Red Guards who hurled curses at "Soviet revisionists", interspersed with expletives reading a quotation book of Mao Zedong's sayings. All the fences and walls of houses were hung with numerous "dajibao", calling to strike at those following the capitalist path, against the CPSU and the USSR. At that time, the street leading to the gates of the Soviet embassy in Beijing was renamed "Street of Struggle against Soviet Revisionism". Most of Yu. V. Chudodeyev's book is devot ... Read more