PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION

 

I’m grateful to Steve Catalano of Westview Press for encouraging me to prepare this edition of a book that was first published in 1983. Mr. Catalano is the latest in a series of talented and helpful editors at West- view who have worked with me on this book. I’m also grateful to Kay Mareia, the project editor, and to Tom Lacey for his assiduous and help- ful copyediting. Like the previous editions, this one is dedicated to my children.

The structure and the general approach of the book remain un- changed, but I have revised Chapters 2, 3, 4, and 5 to reflect the valu- able research that has been published since the 3rd edition appeared in 2000. I refer especially to the pioneering work of the Greater Angkor Project, Claude Jacques, Christophe Pottier, Ashley Thompson, and Michael Vickery. In the rest of the book I have tried to keep abreast of significant new scholarship. The closing pages, which deal with events since 2000, benefit from several visits to Cambodia and from discus- sions with many people including Erik Davis, Youk Chhang, Penny Ed- wards, Kate Frieson, Steve Heder, Don Jameson, John Marston, Un Kheang, and Kim Sedara.

After almost a half-century of being interested in Cambodia, I have contracted many other intellectual debts which it’s a pleasure to ac- knowledge. The deepest ones are to my wife, Susan, who first encour- aged me to write this book, and to the late Paul Mus, who inspired my first two years of graduate study. I’m grateful also to my former students​ Ben Kiernan and John Tully, and to a multitude of colleagues and friends, including Joyce Clark, Christopher Goscha, Anne Hansen, Alexander Hinton, Helen Jessup, Alexandra Kent, Charles Keyes, Judy Ledgerwood, Ian Mabbett, Milton Osborne, Saveros Pou, Lionel Va- iron, John Weeks, and Hiram Woodward. The list could be much longer. As Paul Mus has tellingly written, “People build themselves out of what is brought to them by friends.”

In 2005 the third edition was ably translated into Khmer under the auspices of the Center for Khmer Studies. The interest that the transla- tion aroused among Cambodians has been very gratifying to me, and I hope that some of the men and women who read the translation will be- come historians of Cambodia themselves.

Finally, these lines provide a sad but suitable occasion for me to mourn the recent loss of five amiable and talented compagnons de route: May Ebihara, Richard Melville, Ingrid Muan, Jacques Népote, and David Wyatt. I miss their friendship, their company, and their in- sights into Cambodia’s history and culture.

Melbourne, Australia

February 2007 David Chandler