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Books

Why has China taken so long to make its mark?

Having invented gunpowder in the ninth century, China might easily have advanced through Europe. But its reluctance to wage war left it sidelined for centuries, according to Tonio Andrade

12 March 2016

9:00 AM

12 March 2016

9:00 AM

The Gunpowder Age: China, Military Invention and the Rise of the West in World History Tonio Andrade

Princeton, pp.432, £27.95, ISBN: 9780691135977

‘China is a sleeping lion,’ Napoleon reportedly remarked. ‘When it wakes, the world will tremble.’ There is no need to fear China, its current leaders are quick to stress — with President Xi Jinping claiming that the country’s rise will be ‘peaceful, pleasant and civilised’. Such words are of little comfort to hawks in the United States who watch the Asia-Pacific region with a growing sense of alarm — even if the Chinese economic slowdown of recent months has made it more likely that we will hear a growl rather than a blood-curdling roar as the lion awakes.

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