China has fascinated the western imagination, from Jane Austen to Ezra Pound, and profoundly influenced western culture. But how far have we escaped the misconceptions and exotic distortions of history? Richard Coles talks to the acclaimed historian
Jonathan Spence , whose new book The Chan's Great Continent explores seven centuries of western thought on China, and argues that, to the West, China remains as elusive as ever. And, in the week the new
Welsh Assembly is officially opened, the second of three letters from
Welsh writers invited by Night Waves to air their hopes and concerns on cultural issues.
Producer Anthony Denselow