Paperback. Orange cover with white title.

•   A £3 reduction when collected from FBA shop

This is an absorbing book that looks back on the impact 30 years of Chinese destruction in Tibet by a man, Heinrich Harrer who died ten years ago, and who knew it better than most foreigners having lived for seven years in Lhasa, as recounted in his previous book, with insight from his friend, the 14th Dalai Lama. In some ways it is a disheartening read as Harrer revisits people whom he previously knew, monasteries, temples, buildings of historic importance and records for posterity the destruction, the desecration, the despair – and a religious and ceremonial world that no longer exists. And yes, while it does not have the linear narrative of his previous book, which really has to be read first, it shows us something important and universal through the resilience of the Tibetan people: that inner confidence and hope, even when contending with loss (and not only from without but also within, from the go niypa, the ‘two-headed-ones’, the collaborators) cannot be destroyed.