Simon Winchester recounts life of Sinophile Joseph Needham [video 62min]

Historian Simon Winchester discusses his new book, The Man Who Loved China: The Fantastic Story of the Eccentric Scientist Who Unlocked the Mysteries of the Middle Kingdom. This is the story of Joseph Needham (1900-1995), a Cambridge University biochemist who became obsessed with China and wrote Science and Civilization of China, a 24-volume study of Chinese history and culture that assisted in introducing the West to the East. Winchester has written for several publications, including National Geographic and Smithsonian and is the author of numerous books, including The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary and The Map That Changed the World: William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology. Winchester discusses The Man Who Loved China with John Major, senior lecturer of the China Institute at the Asia Society in New York City.