First published in 1956, From Opium War to Liberation is a historical and political account of China’s transformation from the mid-19th century, when it was forced open by foreign imperial powers, to the Communist victory in 1949. Written by Israel Epstein, a journalist and later Chinese citizen sympathetic to the Chinese Communist Party, the book presents China’s modern history as a struggle against foreign domination and internal feudalism, culminating in the 1949 Liberation led by Mao Zedong and the CCP.