Zhou Enlai: The Last Perfect Revolutionary
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 2008 first edition | |
| Author | Gao Wenqian |
|---|---|
| Language | English (Translated from Chinese (晚年周恩来) by Peter Rand and Lawrence R. Sullivan) |
| Genre | Biography |
| Publisher | New York: Public Affairs |
Publication date | 2008 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback) |
| Pages | 344 |
| ISBN | 1-58648-645-4 |
Zhou Enlai: The Last Perfect Revolutionary is a book written by Gao Wenqian. Before moving to the United States in 1993, Gao had been a researcher at CPC Central Party Literature Research Center, where he penned the official biographies of Zhou Enlai and Mao Zedong. The book was published in 2008 by Public Affair in English. As the book is based on secret and classified Chinese archives, upon emigrating to the United States Gao realized it would not be possible to take all the necessary documents and notes with him, so for a decade he had friends of his in China send and smuggle them out in chunks.
The book is a biography of Zhou Enlai, the Premier of China from 1949 to 1976, one of the most important Chinese leaders of his generation. Zhou is portrayed as "a conflicted, even tragic, figure",[1] succeeding in remaining at the center stage of Chinese politics for fifty years, through the troubled years of the Long March and Cultural Revolution. In 2003 Gao wrote a similar book in Chinese, Zhou Enlai's Later Years (晚年周恩来), using similar research materials.