Xinran Xue was born into a wealthy family subsequently undone by the Cultural Revolution; she has since carved out a prolific career documenting the experiences of ordinary people in China. Twenty people, near the end of their life expectancy, are selected as witnesses of the historical everyday, from Xinran’s oral compilations of two decades. As representatives of a generation silenced by inhibition and intimidation, they all lived through immense political and social changes in China over the twentieth century. A military teacher describes a prisoner-of-war city; a descendent of revolutionary martyrs describes life as a political prisoner; a retired acrobat describes the political bureaucratisation of the art; a career shoe-mender describes a central China street of 30 years. Faithfully interviewed narratives are introduced in concise background context.

The value of Xinran’s book is its contribution to a people’s history of China, where such histories are neither acknowledged nor dignified. Xinran’s work, unsurprisingly unavailable in China, is published in 30 languages in 30 locations. China Witness is her fifth book, all of which have been movingly captured in translation by Esther Tyldesley.