一起读书 2 （ 无聊文慎入）

The Singapore Story

— the memoirs of Lee Kuan Yew

      I had not intended to write my memoirs and keep a diary. To do so would inhibited my work.

      Five years after I stepped down as Prime Minister, my old friend and my colleague, Lim Kim Sam, chair man of Singapore Press Holding ( SPH) convinced me that young would read my memoirs since they were interested in a book of my old speeches that SPH had published in Chinese. I was trouble by the apparent over-confidence of a generation that has only known stability, growth and prosperity. I thought our people should understand how vulnerable Singapore was and is. The dangers that beset us. The nearly did not make it. Most of all, I hope they will know that honest and effective government, public order and personal security, economic and special progress did not come about as a natural course events.

    This book is not a official history. It is the story of Singapore I grew up in. The placid of years of British colonial rule, the shock of war, the cruel of Japanese occupation, the communist insurrection and terrorism against the returning British, the communal riots and intimidation during Malaysia, the perils of independence. This book deals with the early years which ended with sudden independence in 1956. My next book will describe the long, hard climes over the next 25 years from poverty to prosperity.

See all of you tomorrow!