When Mao Zedong set out for Beijing in March 1949, he carried with him two ancient texts: Annals of History (史记, c.100 BCE) and Comprehensive Mirror for Aid in Government (资治通鉴, c.1050 CE). Never short of words, the Chairman also carried tow modern Chinese dictionaries, the Ciyuan (辞源, Commercial Press 1915) and the Cihai (辞海, Zhonghua Books 1936).
Mao’s choice of reading material is no trifling matter for Christopher Reed, author of Gutenberg in Shanghai: Chinese Print Capitalism, 1876-1937. Rather, it symbolizes the importance of the two modern industrialized publishing firms and the development of print capitalism, the origin and culmination of which reveals one of history’s most striking shifts.
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