Best Selling Books by Harrison E. Salisbury

The concept of emperor in China is intimately associated with that of the dragon. China''s dragons, guardians of the throne, are unlike those of the West. They are benign and protective but can turn like terrible emperors on the people. If they do so, it is the fault of the people, not the dragons. They breathe fire and thrash their tail only if betrayed, a convenient concept for an emperor.

His first assignment in Russia was as head of the United Press bureau in Moscow in 1944. After joining The New York Times in 1949 he became their Moscow correspondent and remained there for the next five years. Out of his observations during this period grew his celebrated series for the Times, "Russia Re-Viewed," which brought him the 1955 Pulitzer Prize. He subsequently wrote two books dealing with the same period, American in Russia (1955) and Moscow Journal--The End of Stalin (1961). His recently published The 900 Days: The Siege of Leningrad was widely acclaimed and an important best-seller. As a result of his reports Mr. Salisbury was barred from Russia for five years, and was not allowed to return to the country until 1959. At that time he stayed for nearly six months, traveling thousands of miles within the Soviet Union. His 1960 book, To Moscow and Beyond, was a result of this trip. He has since revisited Russia in 1961-62, 1966, 1967, and 1969.

The Nazi siege of Leningrad from 1941 to 1943, during which time the city was cut off from the rest of the world, was one of the most gruesome episodes of World War II. In scale, the tragedy of Leningrad dwarfs even the Warsaw ghetto or Hiroshima. Nearly three million people endured it; just under half of them died, starving or freezing to death, most in the six months from October 1941 to April 1942 when the temperature often stayed at 30 degrees below zero. For twenty-five years the distinguished journalist and historian Harrison Salisbury has assembled material for this story. He has interviewed survivors, sifted through the Russian archives, and drawn on his vast experience as a correspondent in the Soviet Union. What he has discovered and imparted in The 900 Days is an epic narrative of villainy and survival, in which the city had as much to fear from Stalin as from Hitler. He concludes his story with the culminating disaster of the Leningrad Affair, a plot hatched by Stalin three years after the war had ended. Almost every official who had been instrumental in the city''s survival was implicated, convicted, and executed. Harrison Salisbury has told this overwhelming story boldly, unforgettably, and definitively.

The noted journalist, who has covered most of the crucial stories of his time--in Russia, China, Southeast Asia, and at home in the United States--records his personal views on public and private matters