Author: Dawa Norbu
Publisher: HarperCollins
Year: 1997
Language: English
Pages: 391
ISBN/UPC (if available): 8172233612
Description
An authentic and highly readable account of a people facing an overwhelming tragedy - the possible extinction of its civilization.
Written by a gifted Tibetan writer of humble origin, the book engagingly tells the untold story of Tibetan commoners in the twentieth century. The author experienced the old and he new Tibet before his escape to India, and writes of both with admirable fairness.
Without being polemical, Dawa Norbu clearly refutes China's claim that Tibet has been a pat of China since the seventh century AD. He marshals the known facts of history to show that the tributary relationship was not only symbolic, but was characterize by ceremonialism rather than political domination, and that pre-1950 Tibet enjoyed complete and genuine freedom. He analyses the present happenings against the backdrop of a long and tortuous Sino-Tibetan relationship. In the process, he covers almost half a century of Tibetan history, and gives a comprehensive picture of Tibet's future.
COMMENT:
This is a brave testimony, almost a testament, and it will live. - Sir Olas Caroe