How to review what can be considered a historical monument of Tibet? One Hundred Thousand Moons: An Advanced Political History of Tibet written by Tsepon Wangchuk Deden Shakabpa (Rtsis dpon Dbang phyug bde ldan zhwa sgab pa, 1908–89) and translated and annotated by Derek F. Maher, is a monument in all senses of the term. First by its length: running 1,184 pages in two volumes, it covers the history of Tibet from the origin of the Tibetans until 1959. Second, it is the first full-scale history of Tibet written by a Tibetan who had access to sources unknown to Westerners or available only now. While an abridged English version was published in 1967, Shakabpa finished writing this larger Tibetan version, Bod kyi srid don rgyal rabs, in 1976. The more detailed work has acquired almost mythic status, and it is finally available to the wider public with Maher's English translation.

Third, the history is written by a Tibetan who was an observer and privileged actor in the mid-twentieth-century politics of Tibet. Shakabpa, born in a noble family with an uncle who served as a minister of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama, was finance minister of the Tibetan government in Lhasa from 1939 to 1951. In 1947–48, Shakabpa led the Tibetan Trade Mission that traveled to Europe and the United States to start commercial negotiations; on this occasion, they were issued the first and last Tibetan passports. Indeed, Shakabpa was an insider to the complex politics of Tibet, but he was also a scholar, which this work amply demonstrates. It was his uncle, Trimon Norbu Wangyal, then a minister, who in 1931 encouraged the young man by giving him maps and papers of the 1914 Shimla conference. Shakabpa did not start writing until the 1950s, but his career as a high official certainly helped forge his sense of national identity.

Because of his background, participant role, and objectives, it would be vain to compare the work of Shakabpa with subsequent histories, such as those by Melvyn C. Goldstein (A History of Modern Tibet, 1913–1951: The Demise of the Lamaist State [Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1989]; A History of Modern Tibet: The Calm before the Storm, 1951–1955 [Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2007]), Tsering Shakya (The Dragon in the Land of Snows: A History of Modern Tibet since 1947 [London: Pimlico, 1999]), or Warren W. Smith (Tibetan Nation [Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1996]), to name a prominent few. Suffice it to say that Shakabpa's work complements these books while offering other perspectives on the same events; it is a truly rich resource by a skillful writer who firmly believed in an independent Tibet and was disappointed by the British and Chinese positions.

“Seeing the advanced living standards of people and the powerful resources of these countries, I came to realize that through the deceptive strategies of China and Britain, Tibet had remained isolated from the world, due to which, the political and economic status of the country has declined” (p. xl), writes Shakabpa. He further observes, “During the Manchu and thereafter under the nationalist government, a perverse understanding of the preceptor-patron relationship between China and Tibet developed” (p. xli). Interestingly, Shakabpa does not make a case against the high clergy or the government for keeping Tibet isolated, a theme that has been developed by contemporary historians; he squarely blames outside powers. Is this attitude attributable to his lack of self-criticism, or is it because what interests him is the international status of Tibet?

Shakabpa emerges as a highly literate person who combines a modern historical methodology and a traditional Tibetan attitude. While complaining about the lack of chronological consistency, which caused him much trouble, Shakabpa explains at length his methodology in his preface (pp. xli–xlii): “I have carefully studied whatever texts I have been able to obtain, including religious histories, dynastic histories, biographies of scholars and adepts, chronologies, annals and documents written by the learned authorities of the past. Whatever I have received on the political situation, I have gathered in one place; without concerning myself with anthologies, I have relied upon the original sources” (p. xlii). The Tibetan literary influence starts from the poetic title of the work to the introductory poem praising Buddhism and Tibet, together with Indian Buddhist masters' quotations and the humble yet assertive verses that are more or less compulsory in Tibetan literature:

Satisfaction with his achievement is visible in his quoting letters of praise from the Fourteenth Dalai Lama and high lamas (pp. xliv–xlvi).

The profusion of notes, illustrations, indexes and bibliographical references adds to the wealth of information already available in the body of the text. The notes are divided between endnotes, which are Shakabpa's, and footnotes, which are the translator's comments. However, one may regret that the maps are too few and too sketchy. A map of western Tibet, Ladakh, and adjoining areas, as well as a map showing the different states of eastern Tibet, would have been useful. One can always criticize Shakabpa for writing from the point of view of Lhasa and neglecting the history of the states of eastern Tibet and their tangled relations to both the Manchu dynasty and the Dalai Lama government. His book was, as expected, criticized in China in Shakabpa's “Political History” and the Real History of Tibet—published in Chinese in Beijing and simultaneously in Tibetan in Lhasa. The translator has examined these responses in a separate work (Derek Maher, “An Examination of a Critical Appraisal of Tsepon Shakabpa's One Hundred Thousand Moons,” in The Rise of the Modern in Tibet, ed. Gray Tuttle [Sankt Augustin: Beiträge zur Zentralasienforschung, International Institute for Tibetan, and Buddhist Studies-Wissenschaftsverlag GmbH, 2010]).

One Hundred Thousand Moons is what can be called “a labor of love.” Maher states, “[Shakabpa] wrote this book not as an objective neutral observer but as an engaged and motivated participant in the struggle for how Tibet will be depicted and understood in the international arena… . Shakabpa primarily narrates those episodes that contribute to his main agenda of making the historical case for Tibetan independence” (p. xvii). The translator's long preface also explains the difficulties, both historical and textual, that Maher had to face, the hermit-like life he led while going through the 1,200-plus pages, and the friends and academic who helped him: “I struggle with the issue all translators confront: how to balance precision with readability … I have worked through each section of the translation several times and as time has passed, my translation has drifted from a more rigid programmatic effort to capture all those features of the Tibetan text to a voice that I hope is more fluid and readable” (pp. xxviii–xxix). He also credits for some chapters “a very rough and incomplete translation that had been prepared by someone for whom English was apparently not a first language” (p. xxi), calling it “a sort of Rosetta stone.” Bhuchung Tsering may provide further details in a blog dated April 11, 2010, recalling that he and a few other Tibetans working in Dharamsala in the early 1990s were approached about translating Shakabpa's two-volume work. Though they submitted a translation and were paid, the project later “got shelved” (see http://tibetreport.wordpress.com/2010/04/11/did-i-have-a-hand-in-translating-shakabpa%E2%80%99s-new-book-on-tibetan-history/).

No book review can do justice to this overwhelming and almost intimidating sum of detailed scholarship and careful translation and editing. This book, not only for its historical contents and the point of view of its author, but also for its academic “tour de force,” is a great contribution to the history of Tibet and will benefit Tibetans and Westerners alike.