Jonathan Mirsky
Crossing the Net
Ping-Pong Diplomacy: Ivor Montagu and the Astonishing Story Behind the Game That Changed the World
By Nicholas Griffin
Simon & Schuster 336pp £20 order from our bookshop
In April 1972, just after Nixon’s breakthrough conversations with Mao Zedong, 12 academics with an interest in the Chairman – of whom I was one – were invited to China. We knew that the meeting had been made possible by the encounters between the American and Chinese ping-pong teams the year before. Although what happened in 1971 at the world ping-pong championships in Japan, where the first invitation to the Americans to visit China was extended, is known already, Nicholas Griffin’s narrative – though shaky on a few of the details on the Chinese side – is a worthy contribution to our understanding of this spectacular event in Chinese–US relations.
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
'Thirkell was a product of her time and her class. For her there are no sacred cows, barring those that win ribbons at the Barchester Agricultural.'
The novelist Angela Thirkell is due a revival, says Patricia T O'Conner (£).
https://literaryreview.co.uk/good-gad
'Only in Britain, perhaps, could spy chiefs – conventionally viewed as masters of subterfuge – be so highly regarded as ethical guides.'
https://literaryreview.co.uk/the-spy-who-taught-me
In this month's Bookends, @AdamCSDouglas looks at the curious life of Henry Labouchere: a friend of Bram Stoker, 'loose cannon', and architect of the law that outlawed homosexual activity in Britain.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/a-gross-indecency