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Jonathan D. Spence Discusses the "Search for Modern China."

Historian Jonathan D. Spence. His new book is "The Search for Modern China" (published by W.W. Norton & Company). Spence is a professor of History at Yale University. He's written eight other acclaimed works on China including "The Gate of Heavenly Peace," which was named one of the best nonfiction books of the year by the New York Times Book Review and, "The Question of Hu." In his new book Spence writes about four centuries of Chinese history, beginning with the waning days of the Ming dynasty and ending with last year's events on Tiananmen Square.

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Other segments from the episode on April 25, 1990

Fresh Air with Terry Gross, April 25, 1990: Interview with Jonathan D. Spence; Commentary on Dexter Gordon; Interview with Vikram Seth; Review of Hettie Jones's and Molly Haskell's memoirs "How I…
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06:20

Remembering Dexter Gordon.

Jazz tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon was one of the creators of bop and one of the most influential players of the 1940s and 1950s. Gordon received a Best Actor Academy Award nomination for his role in the 1986 film Round Midnight. He died this morning of kidney failure. Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead joins the show to remember Gordon.

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11:40

Poet Vikram Seth.

Poet VIikram Seth (VICK-ram SATE) He was born in India and has lived in England, China and the U.S. He's just completed his first novel -- a novel written in verse, "The Golden Gate" (published by Knopf). David Rieff of "Vanity Fair" says of the book, "At once a bittersweet love story, a wickedly funny novel of manners and an unsentimental meditation on mortality and the nuclear abyss."

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