HKU Chair Professor of Humanities Frank Dikötter Awarded Honorary Doctorate by Leiden University

HKU Chair Professor of Humanities Frank Dikötter has been awarded an Honorary Doctorate by Leiden University, the Netherlands' oldest university, in recognition of the tremendous importance of his work for scholars in the area of the history of the Chinese Republican period and for both the scholarly and social significance of his work on the history of the People's Republic of China under Mao. Professor Dikötter was presented with this honour at Leiden University's Dies Natalis celebrations on February 8, 2017.

Professor Dikötter joined the Department of History at the University of Hong Kong in 2006. He is the author of the internationally-acclaimed People's Trilogy about the Great Leap Forward (Mao's Great Famine, 2010), the initial years of the People's Republic (The Tragedy of Liberation, 2013) and the Cultural Revolution (The Cultural Revolution, 2016). The People's Trilogy is based on painstaking archival research by Professor Dikötter in dozens of party archives, most of which had hitherto never been seen by historians, whether local or foreign. The first part of the trilogy, Mao's Great Famine, won the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction in 2011, the most prestigious British award for non-fiction.

Leiden University was founded in 1575 and is one of Europe's leading international research universities. For further details of Professor Dikötter's award please visit: https://www.universiteitleiden.nl/en/news/2016/12/frank-dikotter-to-receive-honorary-doctorate.

For media enquiries or individual interview requests, please contact Ms Eva Yung, Events Assistant, Faculty of Arts, Tel: (852) 3917 4633 / email: evaffy@hku.hk.

For the online press release and photos, please visit:
http://www.hku.hk/press/news_detail_15947.html

香港大學人文學院講座教授馮客獲荷蘭萊登大學頒授榮譽博士

香港大學人文學院講座教授馮客 (Frank Dikötter) 獲荷蘭萊登大學頒授榮譽博士，以表彰他對中國近代民國史學術研究的重大貢獻，及他對毛澤東領導下的中國歷史研究的學術和社會意義。頒授儀式已於2017年2月8日在萊登大學442周年校慶活動中舉行。

馮客教授自 2006 年加入香港大學歷史學系，曾編寫國際知名的「人民三部曲」──《毛澤東的大饑荒》(2010)、《解放的悲劇》(2013)、《文化大革命》(2016)。此三部曲是馮教授艱辛查證下的研究成果，當中大部分黨史檔案是本地和外國歷史學者未曾接觸過的。第一部《毛澤東的大饑荒》榮獲2011年塞繆爾·約翰遜獎，為全英國非小說類作品之最高榮譽獎項。

萊登大學於1575成立，為荷蘭歷史最悠久的大學，亦是歐洲領先的國際研究型大學之一。
有關馮客教授獲頒榮譽博士之詳情，請瀏覽以下網頁：https://www.universiteitleiden.nl/en/news/2016/12/frank-dikotter-to-receive-honorary-doctorate

傳媒綵訪及查詢
請聯絡文學院活動助理翁小姐 (電話: 3917 4633 / 電郵: evaffy@hku.hk)

新聞稿網上版及照片，請瀏覽:
http://www.hku.hk/press/c_news_detail_15947.html