Club Lunch: Book Talk – ‘China’s Russian Princess: The Silent Wife of Chiang Ching-kuo’
Date: 28 Sep 2021 12:30 PM — 02:00 PM | Venue: Dining Room
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| LUNCH TALK Book Talk – ‘China’s Russian Princess: The Silent Wife of Chiang Ching-kuo’ |
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| In China’s Russian Princess: The Silent Wife of Chiang Ching-kuo, author Mark O’Neill tells the extraordinary and largely unknown story of how a factory worker named Faina Ipat’evna Vakhreva ended up married to the son of Chiang Kai-shek. They first met at a heavy machinery plant in Yekaterinburg in the Soviet Union in the 1930s, when Ching-kuo was effectively a hostage of Josef Stalin. Though Faina expected to spend the rest of her life in the USSR with her husband, O’Neill recounts how the couple moved to China in 1937 and endured World War II and civil war before fleeing to Taiwan in 1949. In this FCC lunchtime talk, the author will delve into this surprising and often overlooked chapter of 20th-century history. Moderated by FCC President Keith Richburg. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Mark O’Neill was born in London, England and educated at Marlborough College and New College, Oxford. He worked in Washington, DC, Manchester and Belfast before coming to Hong Kong in 1978. He has lived in Asia ever since. He worked as a journalist for 30 years here, in Taiwan, India, the PRC and Japan, for Reuters, SCMP and many other publications. Since 2006, he has been writing books on Chinese history and society. China’s Russian Princess is number 12 and others are in the works. Eight have editions in Chinese, simplified and traditional, as well as English. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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