Think of three or four of the biggest events in world history.
You’ve got them?
OK. Now think: how many directly involved China? If you’re like me, the answer is probably “none”. There are two reasons for this: 1) China has been relatively isolationist (but not completely) for most of its history, and 2) most people reading this have been taught a Westernized version of world history. For a lot, it was called “Western Civ” and didn’t attempt to incorporate Eastern civilizations into the curriculum.

As far as I remember, the only Chinese history I learned before college was the 20th century Nationalist/Communist struggle, in which I got the idea that Chiang Kai-Shek and the Nationalists were great people (they were not). In college, I jumped straight into a course on the Song dynasty of China (one I wish I could take again now) with no background. It wasn’t until I started teaching world history that I learned anything substantial about the narrative of Chinese history, and now it is my absolute favorite civilization to study.

That is one reason I must so highly recommend Michael Schuman’s new book Superpower Interrupted: The Chinese History of the World. Schuman has created a history of China that both investigates the important events and analyzes China’s perspective on its past, thereby informing their modern mindset. If you’ve ever wondered “What does China want on the world stage?”, Schuman answers that question in the most comprehensive way possible. While not a true “history of the world” as the title suggests, it is a Chinese history that does veer into its effects on East Asia and sometimes enlarges the scope a little bit more. However, Schuman contends (and I agree) that it is a strand of world history, just as valuable as Western Civ and just as much of a “history of the world” as is focusing on Western Europeans and their progeny.

Schuman traces Chinese history from the previously-thought-to-be-fictional Xia dynasty through each subsequent dynasty in fairly quick succession. I felt that each dynasty was covered in enough depth for understanding but not too much to get bogged down. Sometimes it reads like a political history of China, but as soon as I thought that there would be a significantly-sized section (or even a chapter) on the economic, cultural, or technological aspects of Chinese society. At one point I thought that the Silk Road trade, Indian Ocean trade, and all of the significant Chinese inventions had been skipped over, but that led to my favorite chapter, “Made in China”, which analyzed all of those in detail. The Ming and Qing dynasties seemed to get especially noteworthy time, which is understandable given the heights to which Chinese civilization rose and then fell under these two families.

Schuman zooms in on the imperialization of China in the mid-to-late 1800s and the subsequent revolts to remove Westerners from the country, as that informs China’s mindset today. He compares the old dynastic system to the new Communist regime, making the great point that there is much in common between the two (autocratic control by one personality, for one). But it is in these last few chapters that the reader begins to understand how China sees itself in the world and how its superpower status was simply interrupted, not ended.

Superpower Interrupted will probably make my “favorite books of 2020” list at the end of this year because of how much I enjoyed it and how important it is, but I don’t see it as perfect. There was no mention of the Taiping Rebellion between 1850 and 1871, which is socially and culturally jaw-dropping and killed at least 20 times as many people as the American civil war. Also, the Communist takeover and Mao’s entire period of rule felt rushed, and I would have enjoyed reading more of that. However, there are entire books on these subjects that I’ll be getting to before too long.

As broad as Chinese history is, Schuman did a remarkable job of doing justice to each part while staying focused on a broader thematic question: Why is China the way that it is? Whether you are new to Chinese history or you find it just as thrilling as I do, Superpower Interrupted is worthy of your time and attention.
I received a review copy of Superpower Interrupted courtesy of PublicAffairs and NetGalley, but my opinions are my own.

A highly readable and important overview of Chinese history, seen largely from Chinese eyes and memories. Michael Schuman brings journalistic eye for detail and anecdote to this competent account, though he doesn't provide a new picture for those familiar with the subject. The book would work well in classes on current events, especially those focused on the future of Chinese-Western relations, but it will probably work best for interested general readers seeking to start their study of the subject.

Superpower Interrupted is what you might call a throughline history book: a really focused work from an expert (Michael Schuman has written extensively about China for TIME, The Atlantic, and other pubs) that illustrates how accumulating events of the past make up our present, in this case how China's history has influenced their national identity and relationships with the rest of the world today. Very timely and well-written, it's a whirlwind tour of several thousand years of history that highlights:
-some of the key events that helped develop Chinese exceptionalism
-a non-Western foreign policy, both today and hundreds of years in the past
-the immense role China has played in world history, particularly in East Asia (though do not discount its influence on Europe hundreds of years ago— one of my favorite stats from the book is that 3/4 of the silver from the New World ended up in China)

There's only so much detail that can be included in a 400-page book that covers thousands of years of history, so I rather wish this had been twice as big or split into multiple volumes. That said, the main points of the book are loud and clear within the accessible length, and I can comb through the daunting bibliography at the end of the book if I really want more.

For who like Lies My Teacher Told Me and Zinn's A People's History of the United States: unlike your average high school textbook that also condenses a lot of history, Superpower Interrupted doesn't paint history as an inevitable march of progress— the messiness and ambiguity of events still remains.

Highly recommended to just about everyone interested in current events and world history.