Jung Chang

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Jung Chang's book Wild Swans catapulted her onto the international stage, a harrowing story of her own family focusing on three generations of women. The Chinese author then tackled a mammoth task of rethinking what we should think about Chairman Mao in her book Mao: The Unknown Story and has now written a biography of the Empress Dowager Cixi, who ruled China from 1860 to her death in 1908. In front of an audience on the main stage at Hay Festival she talks to Razia Iqbal about this woman who, she says, went from concubine to laying the foundations of modern China.