Lester Knox Little (1892-1981) kept a detailed journal of his time in China and Taiwan. Covering the years 1943 to 1954 it provides rich new materials for understanding conditions in Chongqing and post-war Shanghai, as well as allowing a unique insight into the heart of government during a time of intense social and political change.
Lester Little, the last chief of the Chinese Maritime Customs Service, was a close observer of the death throes of a cosmopolitan Nationalist China and the emergence of a Cold War East Asia. Determined to the best for his staff and shepherd the Service through a period of intense upheaval, Little recorded his impressions of many leading figures as well as key moments as the world in which he served in high office came apart at the seams. Carefully edited, comprehensively annotated, and thoughtfully introduced, all historians of modern China and of the emergence of the USA as a world power will be grateful to Dr Chang Chih-yun's painstaking efforts to make the Little diary available in convenient form. It provides us with a rich and intimate record of one of the great shifts in Chinese and world history.'Lester Little, the last chief of the Chinese Maritime Customs Service, was a close observer of the death throes of a cosmopolitan Nationalist China and the emergence of a Cold War East Asia. Determined to the best for his staff and shepherd the Service through a period of intense upheaval, Little recorded his impressions of many leading figures as well as key moments as the world in which he served in high office came apart at the seams. Carefully edited, comprehensively annotated, and thoughtfully introduced, all historians of modern China and of the emergence of the USA as a world power will be grateful to Dr Chang Chih-yun's painstaking efforts to make the Little diary available in convenient form. It provides us with a rich and intimate record of one of the great shifts in Chinese and world history. Hans van de Ven (Professor of History, Cambridge)
