SIAN: A COUP D'ETAT. A FORTNIGHT IN SIAN: EXTRACTS FROM A DIARY CHIANG KAI-SHEK

[CHIANG, Mayling Soonji & Chiang Kai-Shek]. Sian: A Coup D'état. A Fortnight in Sian: Extracts From a Diary. Shanghai: China Publishing Company, 1938.

First edition, sixth impression. Cloth-bound. Hardcover. Large octavo (250 x 160 x 25 mm.). Pp. x, 119. Original red patterned silk brocade, blue xianzhuang-style stitching, spine reinforced with patterned silk, front board gilt lettered with gilt calligraphic inscription by Chiang Kai-shek, text printed on handmade bamboo fibre paper. Condition: GOOD to VERY GOOD. Front cover lightly faded, else well-preserved, page edges foxed, else bright. A nice copy.

Notes: This account of the Xi'an Incident was published just months after the crisis itself, when "the fate of a great nation was literally trembling in the balance and the whole world was awaiting the outcome with puzzled bewilderment and anxious forebodings" (p. vii). During the Xi'an Incident, forces under General Zhang Xueliang detained Chiang Kai-shek in the city of Xi'an, with the goal of pressuring him to form an anti-Japanese alliance with the Chinese Communist Party. After a fortnight of tense negotiations, Chiang agreed to adopt a unitary policy, and consolidated his authority over rival factions in the Republic of China. The intervention of his wife, Soong Mei-ling, was pivotal in resolving the crisis. The present work includes Madame Chiang Kai-shek's recollections of the December 1936 crisis and material from the journals of her husband, an assiduous diarist. John Leighton Stuart, future US Ambassador to China, contributed the foreword.