Chinese premier Xi Jinping is on our screens and in our headlines on a regular basis, but after a decade in power, what do we really know about him? And what will he do next?

A world leader shrouded in mystery at the helm of the world’s largest economic powerhouse, historian and writer Michael Dillon’s We Need to Talk About Xi seeks to better understand this powerful man and what his reign means for the world’s present and future. Drawing on over fifty years of study and extensive travel throughout China, Dillon’s analysis cuts through the caricatures to reveal a balanced picture of the strengths and weaknesses of one of the world’s most powerful men.

Michael Dillon is a historian, writer, and regular contributor to the Times Literary Supplement and the London Review of Books. His recent books include China: A Modern History, China in the Age of Xi Jinping, Zhou Enlai: the Enigma behind Chairman Mao and Deng Xiaoping: the Man Who Made Modern China.

This event will be chaired by Naoíse Mac Sweeney, author of The West: A New History in Fourteen Lives and Professor of Classical Archaeology at the University of Vienna.