Histoire de Shanghai. By MARIE-CLAIRE BERGÈRE. [Paris: Fayard, 2002. 520 pp. €25.00. ISBN 2-21360-955-1.]

Marie-Claire Bergère has written a remarkable and much needed history of modern Shanghai. Modern in this context is defined as the period that began with the arrival of foreigners in Shanghai after the Treaty of Nanjing (1842). The study concludes with the 1990s and China's imminent entry into the WTO.

This book is the result of more than forty years of research and thought. The author first encountered Shanghai in 1957, on a visit described as being on a ‘fishbowl’ basis. That is to say she saw what her hosts wished her to see, but remained totally unaware of the violent anti-rightist struggle then raging around her. She was, however, drawn to the fascination of this extraordinary city, ‘submerged by the storms of history.’