Rana Mitter is Lecturer in the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of St. Cross College. In addition to many books and journal articles, Mitter has contributed to documentaries on the History Channel and is involved in a forthcoming documentary on Kublai Khan.

Runner-Up, 2005 Longman/History Today Book of the Year
A Foreign Affairs "Must Read" Book on China for 2005

"A fascinating look at a pivotal time in the formation of the culture of modern China...What is most intriguing about Mitters account is not what was lost in the dark decades that followed, but how much endured."--Publishers Weekly

"Rana Mitter's A Bitter Revolution is an ambitious and thoughtful study of China in the 20th century through the light of the modernising, anti-foreigner movement known as the May 4th movement, which draws illuminating parallels between China and Japan, Weimar Germany and much else."--History Today

"Fresh and interesting."--Library Journal

"In his impressive and inventively researched book, Rana Mitter uses the May Fourth movement as a theme around which to explore China's bitter 20th century, with its repeated upheavals, foreign invasion and the death of more than 100 million people from man-made and natural disasters. He brings alive the promise felt by the intellectuals, journalists, writers and entrepreneurs who subscribed to the movement."--Financial Times

"More novel insights and findings than...most general histories of modern China, illustrating the complexity and intractability of the difficulties China has faced in its struggle with the modern world."--Foreign Affairs

"Well-written and impressively argued, A Bitter Revolution is essential for anyone interested in understanding China and its place in our world."--History Book Club

"Imaginative and interesting...[A] very useful book."--New York Sun