RCTC 2004-2006 Common Book Gang of One: Memoirs of a Red Guard Study Guide by Lori Halverson-Wente and Mark Halverson-Wente Link to Study Questions Link to Sample Assignment Works Cited for this Guide

As a memoir of the author’s profound experience of living and struggling through China’s Cultural Revolution and its aftermath, Fan Shen’s Gang of One contains many terms, philosophical and literary concepts, and specific historical and cultural references that may be unfamiliar to the average reader.  Now, having some familiarity with such terms and concepts is indispensable to understanding the memoir—the progress and setbacks, the many twists, turns, surprises, perils, and pitfalls of Fan Shen’s remarkable journey.  Moreover, given that Gang of One is one man’s personal memoir, the terms and concepts are especially important and relevant to understanding Fan’s inner thoughts, emotions, aspirations, disappointments, and dilemmas chronicled in his book.  I hope that this guide will provide the reader with an easily accessible “ready reference” and overall “context” for the terms and the concepts that Fan alludes to in his book. 

This study guide, then, consists of four interrelated parts.  First, the guide will provide a glossary of important terms, concepts, and historical references found in Gang of One, beginning with the “dust-jacket,” and concluding with the book’s last page.  This section will also address questions a reader might have in a “Q/A” format for the more complex terms.  Second, there is a series of study questions and points to ponder for each section, and/or chapter, of the book respectively.  Third, it will display two historical timelines for the reader—one of the United States and one of China—so that the reader can more easily place and register the events and happenings in China during the period covered by Fan’s memoir into a broader and more familiar context.  Finally, the guide will give a variety of resources for further reading and study, e.g., books, articles, Internet addresses, and original historical and cultural resources.

Glossary of Terms, Concepts, and Study Words:

1.      “Gang of One:  Memoirs of a Red Guard” (Dust jacket): 

Fan Shen entitles his memoir, Gang of One, an ironical reference to the historical Chinese political “Gang of Four,” consisting of Mao’s wife (his fourth), Jiang Qing, and her allies, Wang Hongwen, Zhang Chungiao, and Yao Wenyuan, and a number of lesser associates.  They played a major role in the Cultural Revolution as censors of culture, i.e., policing Chinese culture for influences counter to revolutionary beliefs and principles.  During Chairman Mao’s last years, Jiang and her cohorts attempted to exert more control over the Chinese government and Party (Chinese Communist Party) with the hope of peacefully assuming power once Mao passed away.  Unfortunately for Jiang (Madame Mao) and her allies, Mao left China without a clear indication of who would succeed him, and the great turmoil and unrest of the Chinese Cultural Revolution had not yet played itself out.  Thus, the government arrested Jiang and her “gang” in October of 1976 for treason and counter-revolutionary activities. 

Over the course of the Cultural Revolution, Jiang, in her efforts to transform Chinese culture, had made many bitter enemies.  Most recently, there was the “Tiananmen incident” of April 1976 in which public protest over Jiang’s  (and Mao’s, too) decision not to allow public mourning in Tiananmen Square over the death of the beloved Zhou Enlai was brutally suppressed.  In particular, Jiang used her control over the Chinese mass media to resist and stifle public mourning—especially irksome to Zhou’s admirers. 

The injustice, irrationality, and monumental cruelty of the Cultural Revolution was evident to all, and someone had to be blamed—of course, that “someone” could not be Chairman Mao, who was still greatly revered, and, after his death on September 9, 1976, intensely mourned.  Thus, the “Gang of Four,” who had exerted considerable influence on Mao and the Chinese Communist Party during the past ten years, was blamed for the excesses of the Cultural Revolution, which was still viewed as noble in its purpose and ends.  As it turned out, the government (under Deng Xiaoping, Mao’s successor) “Gang of Four” was not actually tried until 1980, when they were given a public show trial—Jiang was convicted and sentenced to death, with her sentence changed to life imprisonment in 1983.  Reportedly, she committed suicide in prison in 1991. (See “Gang of Four” at http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Gang%20of%20Four%20%28China%29).

Notice again the title of Fan Shen’s memoir—Gang of One.  In addition to his play on words with “Gang of Four,” there is obviously an ironic contradiction between the word “gang,” denoting more than two people banded together for an agreed upon purpose, and “one,” meaning solitary or alone.  With his title, Fan Shen emphasizes the fact that his journey is very often a solitary and lonely one (notice, too, that on the dust jacket his family are holding red books while he is holding blue, further stressing his alienation).  Throughout his book, Fan makes clear his feelings of alienation and being different from others and his environment, as he begins to see firsthand the irrationality and brutality of the Revolution and its leaders.  He becomes a “gang of one” in his efforts to fight his environment, and he firmly resolves to eventually escape no matter what the consequences. 

2.      “Red Guard” (Dust Jacket):

The “Red Guards” were Mao’s express agents, or “shock troops,” for carrying out the Cultural Revolution.  The millions of youth that made up the Red Guards were at first mostly from family backgrounds of the “five red types.”  The five red types were:  workers; poor and lower middle class peasants; revolutionary cadres (or revolutionary leaders within the hierarchy who mediate between the party leadership and the people); revolutionary soldiers; and dependents of revolutionary martyrs (Lu Xiuyuan, 1994, p. 534).  The birth of the Red Guards is officially given as August 18, 1966 when Chairman Mao, in the People’s Daily (the official newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party), announced that he would order the masses, especially the young, to carry out the threefold aims of the Revolution.  These three aims were articulated in the “Sixteen Points” of the Central Committee of the Chinese Party and included:  (1) smash the 5,000 year old Chinese traditional culture and transform education, literature and art (the “superstructure”) to correspond to and fit with the all-important and now revitalized economic base; (2) criticize and topple the bourgeois (or “middle class”) ideology of the academic, economic, and political authorities who have taken the capitalist road; and (3) rid the country of all foreign influence (Baum, 1971).  According to Mao, the bourgeoisie, or middle class, was using the “four olds”—old thought, old culture, old customs, and old practices—to corrupt the minds of the masses (Ann Malaspina, 2004).  Mao attempted to institute these measures in order to build a wholly new, revolutionary Communist culture (For more information, see Gang of One pages 10-11).

Q:  Why did Mao initially turn to the youth rather than an established “army” to carry out his Revolution?

A:  Mao turned to the youth for a number of reasons.  First, and perhaps foremost, Mao lacked sufficient support among the established elite in the Party and in economic and academic circles.  After the failure of his “Great Leap Forward” program in the late 1950’s, many among the elite had lost considerable faith in Mao.  Mao, to incite the youth, called for a dramatic “right to rebel” against “revisionist leadership” that was leading China astray from the true principles of the revolution.  Indeed, the Red Guards proclaimed “four big rights”—the right to speak out freely, air views fully, hold great debates, and write “big character posters” (Malaspina, 2004, p. 91).  The young in China were ripe for undertaking such a task—the average age of the million called to Tiananmen Square on August 18, 1966 was 17—and they possessed the energy, fanaticism, and naiveté necessary for the task. 

Furthermore, the youth symbolized and represented Communism’s rebirth and rejuvenation within the whole of government and society.  There existed a wider symbolism to the Red Guard movement—the old order was corrupt to the core.  Mao saw an opportunity to refashion society as he saw fit; this process required struggle and, unavoidably, death and destruction.  Hence, as the Gang of One emphasizes, Mao encouraged the Red Guards to “harden their hearts;” after all, said the Great Leader, “Revolution is not a dinner party, not painting or embroidery, and cannot be gentle and polite” (Shen, 2004, p. 18).  Pity, or empathy for one’s victims, is not a revolutionary virtue.  Biographer Philip Short writes, “Mao had found his new guerilla army to assault the political heights.  A whole generation of young Chinese was ready to die, and to kill, for him, with unquestioning obedience.  And kill they did” (Short, 1999, p. 543). 

Q:  What was the Red Guards’ purpose?

A:  Fan Shen chronicles on a personal level the true nature, character, and purpose of the Red Guard.  It is no accident that Fan entitles his first chapter, “Burn the Old World!” and begins by describing his participation in an enormous public book burning at his school.  As Fan mentions, a popular slogan of the Cultural Revolution was, “The new society will be built upon the ashes of the old!”  It was the task of the Red Guards to render the old society to ashes—and Fan vividly outlines what this entails.  His description of the book burning, the three massive, thousand-man “struggle rallies” he attends with his friends, the raid of the “Red Action Committee” upon the family of Li Ling (who still dared to live a bourgeois lifestyle in opposition to the Revolution), and the cruelty of “Whiskers” all provide the reader with ample understanding of the nature and purpose of the Red Guards.

Q:  What accounts for the factionalism and discord among various factions of the Red Guards?

A:  The Red Guard Movement, as Fan Shen (2004) shows, turned very quickly to inner conflict, factionalism, and violence (p. 30-47).  Much of the violence and factionalism, ironically, resulted from the very mission of the Red Guards—to witch-hunt; it was part of their purpose to find hidden enemies who were not yet detected.  There was, it seemed, hidden enemies everywhere:  many who were apparently Mao supporters and waving flags, shouting slogans, and wearing red armbands were in reality secretly working against the Revolution.  However, the key question was how to distinguish between those who were false to the revolution from those who were true.  As Fan Shen’s experience shows, determining between those true and those false to the Revolution came to depend largely upon the claims and counterclaims of rival Red Guard leaders.  Thus, factions quickly formed and quarrels and conflicts began which soon intensified and often resulted in full-blown violence.  By the end of 1966 and into 1967, the Cultural Revolution was in danger of being subverted by factionalism and conflict within the Red Guards (Fitzgerald, 1977, p. 141-43).  Mao was alarmed by Red Guard factionalism and after a number of clashes between Red Guard factions and the People’s Liberation Army the Red Guards were disbanded in 1968 and millions of Red Guards were sent into the countryside to help with public works projects, agriculture, and learn the true revolutionary mindset from the peasants.

 3. “This is what life is made of:  Fire, Earth, Metal, Wood, and Water.”  —Lao Tzu (p. v):

Fan Shen prefaces his book with a quote from the Chinese mystic and philosopher, Lao Tzu, a name that means, literally, “old Master.”  Lao Tzu is regarded as the traditional founder of “Taoism” (the “Way” or the “universal principle”), which, along with Confucianism, has exerted a profound influence upon Chinese thought and culture through the ages.  Lao Tzu is reputedly the author of the classic work of Taoism, the Tao Te Ching (literally, “The Book of the Way and its Virtue”), though no historical evidence exists of his life (Blakney, p. 9).    

Q:  What is Taoism?

A:  Probably the central concept in the Tao Te Ching, and for Lao Tzu and Taoism in general, is the notion of the “Tao,” or the “Way.”  The Tao is the spiritual road or path of life that people travel (notice the parallel journey or path that Fan Shen travels in his memoir); it is the “way of nature and finally the Way of ultimate reality” (Blakney, p. 37).  As Blakney puts it, the Tao not only refers to the way the whole world of nature operates, but [signifies] the original undifferentiated Reality from which the universe evolved” (p. 37).

Taoism is not regarded, strictly speaking, as a religion (e.g., prescribing a particular of worship, possessing a religious hierarchy, praying to a Supreme Deity, or any special incarnation of God, or gods).   However, over the ages, Taoism has definitely developed a religious as well as a philosophical slant or component in that it establishes a way of life that is at once a mystical religion and a philosophical world view (e.g., see concepts like the “Way”).  One example is the role of paradox or contradiction at work in Taoism.  To begin with, the Tao Te Ching, and many Taoist sages write that the Tao cannot be spoken or written of:  yet this is precisely what they proceed to do.  Moreover, in the Tao Te Ching, paradox and contradictions are found on almost every page.  Yet, it is important to remember that paradox and contradiction somehow eventually come together in the Universal, the Way, the Tao.  Still, it is contrary to the Tao to treat it in a rational, discursive fashion—to do so is not to talk about Taoism—hence its very mystical nature.

Q:  How it Tao related to the Ying and Yang?

A:  Another important concept of Taoism is the “five elements or agents;” they are the agents of change for the yin and yang.  Richard Hooker defines it as follows:   

“…two forces, yin and yang, bring about change through the ‘Five Material Agents.’  The five material agents (fire, earth, metal, wood, water) each produce one another cyclically and overcome one another cyclically.  All change in the universe, whether it by physical, astronomical, historical, governmental, ethical, or whatever, can be explained by the orderly progression of yin and yang and the five material agents.  These cycles, when ordered across the whole of the universe, make up the Tao” (China Glossary:  Tao, http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~ dee/GLOSSARY/TAO.HTM).    

Q:  Why did Fan Shen preface his book with the reference to Lao Tzu and the five agents, or elements, of life (fire, earth, metal, water, and wood)? 

A:  First, notice that Fan divides his book into five parts, each corresponding to one of the five agents or elements, respectively, beginning with “fire.”  He leads one to wonder, then, about the relationship of each of the five elements or agents with a corresponding time in Fan Shen’s personal life journey.  How do each of the five elements and their corresponding section in Fan’s memoir come together to form one sensible whole?  The answer to this question can be found by reading the book further.

However, in order to begin to understand the relevance and importance of Fan Shen’s reference to Loa Tzu and the five agents, or elements, of Taoism, consider the first part or section of Gang of One – the section characterized with the Taoist agent of “Fire” (Shen, 2004, p. 1).  Here, one can readily see a correlation between “Fire” and this particular portion of Fan’s memoir.  Fan immediately sets the tone by engaging the reader first with the feel of Beijing’s sizzling and stifling August heat, and then by offering a vivid and dramatic picture of the fire and the flames jumping from a second story tall heap of burning books (sees Gang of One pages 3-4).  As mentioned above in this study guide’s section of the “Red Guards,” the title of the first chapter, reflecting the expressed mission of the Red Guards, is to “Burn the Old World!” The metaphor and symbolism of “Fire,” then, represents this portion of Fan Shen’s life and journey.  Too, it is interesting that each of the five elements or agents of the Tao are used to symbolize different things.  “Fire,” for example, represents or is associated with:  Direction – South; Season – Summer; Color – Red (Daoist Depot, www.edepot.com/taocosmology.html).  As a Red Guard complete with a red armband and wholly swept up in the eruption of the Cultural Revolution during the hot summer of 1966, it is evident how this stage of Fan Shen’s path or journey is symbolized by the element of “Fire”—“Even though I love books as a child, I loved the fire and the revolution even more” (Shen, p. 6).  Of course, the Tao is cyclical, and as Fan Shen’s path continues his life will reflect in some fashion the other elements.  Still, in Part I of his memoir, “Fire” is what Fan Shen’s life if made of.

As you read Fan Shen’s Gang of One, try to think of just how Fan’s journey, or “Way,” might reflect Lao Tzu’s five elements.

4.  “Chairman Mao” (p. ix)

Fan Shen first alludes to Chairman Mao (called “chairman” because of his chairmanship of the Chinese Communist party) in the context of his decision to write his book, or memoir, and divulge certain long-held secrets kept deep within his heart since the Cultural Revolution—secrets that he suspected would greatly upset his parents who had given their lives and fortunes to the Revolution.  Fan Shen is able to mention Mao in the context of his decision to reveal his anti-revolutionary secrets because Mao Zedong (or Mao Tse-Tung) had, by the time of Fan’s burgeoning awareness of political and cultural change and his growing participation in the Red Guard’s, become the very embodiment of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.  Mao personally represented China’s effort to transform itself into a great and united new land.  One effect of the Cultural Revolution was to solidify a “cult of personality” surrounding Mao that remained, though not perhaps with the same zeal and fervor, until his death in 1976. 

Who, then was this man whose image was placed everywhere in China (billboards, airports, walls, village squares, postage stamps, family rooms, etc.), whose very words and writings were kept by bedsides and in heart-pockets (Mao’s Little Red Book), whose blessing was asked for at weddings and births, and whose name and ideas were used to condemn and vilify those suspected of betraying the Revolution (and hence of betraying Mao himself)?

Mao Zedong was born on December 26, 1893 in the Hunan province of China, known its fertile farms and picturesque hills and villages.  As a middle class peasant of a landowning family, Mao was able to receive an education in the Chinese classics (Confucius and Chinese literature) as well as obtain a modern education.  As a youngster, Mao was made aware of, and witnessed, many injustices and oppressions (e.g., during an organized demonstration against the governor of the province – there was a severe famine going on – protesters were beheaded and their heads publicly displayed on posts) (Malaspina, 2004, p. 14-21).  Mao, spurred on by a desire to end such oppression, became one of the original members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 1921.  During the 1920’s, Mao and the Communist Party worked closely with the Kuomintang sponsored peasant and worker movements (led partly by Sun-Yat-Sen) in order to topple the many warlords who reigned throughout the country.  The Kuomintang, after the death of Sun-Yat-Sen and the defeat of the warlords, would be led by Chiang Kai-shek and, thereafter known as the Nationalist “White Army,” would vehemently oppose Mao and the Communist “Red Army.”  As the split between the Communists and the Nationalists worsened, Mao, in the fall of 1927, led the unsuccessful “Autumn Harvest Uprising” against the Nationalists in Hunan.  After this disaster, Mao was expelled from the Central Committee of the Communist Party.  In the face of the Nationalists defeat of the warlords, crushing of the Communists, and reuniting of the country, the Communists were forced to flee into the countryside (ibid, p. 41). 

From 1928 until 1931, Mao, along with other Communist leaders, worked very hard among the peasants in the countryside in order to build rural soviets (or communes).  At this time, too, Mao helped to create the Red Army.  Mao, through his generosity and unique, newly formed tactics of guerrilla warfare won the confidence and loyalty of the rural peasants.  As a result, in 1931, Mao was elected chair of the first “All-China Soviet Government” (ibid, p. 46).  

After forming the Red Army, Mao fought off, or escaped, many different encirclement campaigns launched by Chiang Kai-Shek and his Nationalist “White Army.”  Finally, the Red Army attempted a lengthy retreat, called the famous “Long March,” in which they eluded the Kuomingtang and, at Mao’s urging, turned the “retreat” into a “crusade” by turning north to fight the Japanese, who had invaded northern China in the 1930’s.  “March north to fight Japan!” became the slogan of the “Long March” (ibid. p.50).  During and after this march, because of his leadership and inspiration along with the self-sacrifice and determination of the marchers, Mao’s reputation was enhanced and he became the primary Communist Leader.  The “Long March” would later inspire the Red Guards, when millions of them would make long pilgrimages to Beijing to see Mao.

In 1937, the Japanese launched a full-scale war against China that lasted through World War II (1939-1945).  The Kuomintang and the Communists decided to form an alliance or “United Front” against the Japanese threat.  Of course, the two never truly trusted one another and there was constant in fighting throughout their alliance—in fact, Mao’s brother was killed in an anti-communist purge in 1942 (ibid, 57).  In any case, hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Chinese were killed during the war with Japan, and the country was in chaos and shambles.

With the Japanese defeat in August of 1945, China was no longer “united” against a common foe and the civil war quickly resumed full-force.  Because of Mao’s seemingly benevolent and generous attitude towards the peasants, who had suffered much during the war with Japan, they began to lose faith in the Kuomintang and favor the Communists.  As a result, by 1949, the Communists had finally defeated the Kuomintang, and Chiang Kai-Shek fled with some two million refugees to Taiwan, where he established the Republic of China, which became known as Nationalist China.

After the Communists took control of Mainland China, Mao became Chairman of the Central Government Council and announced the formation of the “People’s Republic of China” (PRC).  The new government of the PRC was led by three bodies:  the Communist Party; the State Council that runs the government; and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), formerly known as the Red Army.  By 1954, after the Korean War of which China was an ally of North Korea, sending over 2 million troops to fight, Mao was head of all three.  He was, “Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party, Chief of State of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and Chairman of the Military” (Malspina, 2004, pp. 70-71).  Now that he was firmly in control, Mao began his many reforms to transform China into a Communist utopia of his own making. 

Between1954 and 1958, when he launched the ill-fated Great Leap Forward, Mao instituted a number of revolutionary reforms and changes that would deeply reshape Chinese society and whose effects would remain even to this day.  First of all, Mao began to reform and rebuild China’s economy which was left in complete shambles by the civil war – in fact, when Chiang Kai-shek retreated to Taiwan, he took with him almost all of China’s gold reserves and many business and economic leaders followed him (Malaspina, p. 69).  Mao, of course, nationalized the whole economy; railways, shipping, factories, and industry were owned by the government and the state became virtually the only employer. 

Mao also set about reforming the agricultural system.  Redistribution of land proceeded with land being taken away from the landlords, often along with great bloodshed, and given to the peasants to be managed in agricultural collectives. 

Further, Mao initiated reforms in public health, religion (the Communist Party regarded religion as a threat to state authority and, essentially, a waste of time and resources) and, most important, a reform of people’s liberties (personal liberty were absolutely denied) and extreme thought reform (e.g., strict control of political and the media, campaigns to modify and control people’s thought and behavior, etc.).  Above all, Mao wanted to change and mold society.  It was during the 1950’s that Mao launched the “Four Old Campaign” to “wipe out old ideas, habits, customs and culture” (Malaspina, p. 77).  Criticism and protest against the government or against Mao was not allowed.  The will of Mao and the Party was absolute.  As Malasprina puts it:

Under Mao, the lives of the Chinese people changed in many ways.  People were assigned where to live and what work to do.  They needed permission to marry and, later, to have children.  This system seemed to offer a great security net [what with free public education and public heath measures]. However, in exchange for the promise of security, the people of China lost many personal freedoms.  It did not take long for the optimism that swept through China in 1949 [and again after the Korean War in 1953-54] to be replaced by a more complicated reality (p. 78).

The “more complicated reality” came to the fore in 1957-58.  Despite having some success with the socialist system, Mao realized and admitted that many Chinese were still hungry and that hundreds and thousands had died during the revolution.  Given this, Mao reasoned that perhaps opening up the society and government by allowing some free speech and criticism might prove fruitful and beneficial for China.  Thus, for a brief period in 1957 (the “Hundred Flowers Campaign”), Mao decided to “let a hundred flowers bloom and let a hundred scholars of thought contend” by encouraging intellectuals and the people at large to speak freely about the government and the economy (Spence, 1999, p. 31).  Of course, both the intellectuals and the people were at first reluctant, but then released such an outpouring of criticism and complaints (mostly from intellectuals) that Mao was taken aback and quickly labeled those who complained as “rightists” and “enemies of the people.”  As a result of Mao’s backlash against those who took a chance by speaking openly, hundreds of thousands lost their jobs, were sent to prison, or were confined to hard labor camps (Malaspina, p. 80-81).  Thus, the “hundred flowers” wilted as suddenly as they had bloomed.

Next, concerned about the economy, the dissension of the “Hundred Flowers Movement,” and wanting to distinguish the economic path of China from that of the Soviet Union, Mao instituted the “Great Leap Forward.”  The “Great Leap Forward” placed even more peasants into centralized communes, instituted massive public works programs, and pushed many odd economic strategies, e.g., in an effort to bolster steel production, Mao ordered people in the countryside to build steel furnaces in their backyards.  All of this led to great disaster.  The Great Leap Forward, along with a couple of untimely droughts and devastating floods, resulted in millions of people starving—by 1962, up to 30 million people were dead from starvation (Malaspina, p.84; Meisner, 1999, p.236-37; FitzGerald, 1977, p.119).  Because of this monumental failure, Mao relinquished administration of the government.  In 1959, Mao was replaced by Liu Shaoqi, an opponent of the Great Leap Forward, as Chairman of the Government Council, though he retained his chairmanship of the Communist Party Politburo.  In any case, Mao retired somewhat from public life, but he was soon to make a bold reappearance in a new grab for power and effort to revitalize the Revolution (Cheek, 2002, p.25-26).

By the mid-1960’s, Mao was ready.  For Mao, the nature of revolution was a never-ending struggle and he saw a need for a reinvigoration of China’s revolutionary path.  In the summer of 1966, along with the help of the People’ Liberation Army (PLA) commanded by his friend and advocate, Lin Biao, and especially the newly formed Red Guards, Mao began the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) in an effort to destroy his enemies and set China back on the proper revolutionary path.  The people (especially the young of peasant, working class, army, and revolutionary cadre backgrounds) responded to Mao’s plea and over the next two years China was thrown into disturbing struggle and chaos.  Finally, Mao became alarmed by the upheaval and chaos between rival Red Guard factions—they became like a “headless dragon”, fighting among themselves with no direction or purpose—and called in the military (PLA) to restore order.  Mao felt that it had become necessary to “cool down” the revolution now that, in his view, it had attained its purpose of refashioning Chinese culture (Snow, 1973, p.65-72).  Thus, Mao disbanded the Red Guards and, in 1968-69 began sending some ten million Red Guards into the countryside to work as peasants in rural villages, participate in public works projects, provide medical resources to peasants, etc.

During the mass mobilization and refashioning of Chinese society during the Cultural Revolution, Mao reorganized the Communist Party, largely through the efforts of his wife, Jian Qing, which allowed him to further solidify his power.  However, in 1971 Lin Biao, the army commander, allegedly plotted an assassination of Mao in order to take over power.  Apparently, the plot was discovered, and Lin and his family were shot down as they were attempting to escape to Mongolia on an air force plane.  Mao, then, remained firmly in control of the Party and government.  However, even the “Great Helmsman” cannot control the ravages of aging, and Mao, whose health was deteriorating (complication of ALS or “Lou Gehrig’s” disease), died on September 9, 1976, leaving China leaderless and needing to find its way.

For further information on Chairman Mao, see:

http://www.geocities.com/franith/; http://www.newton.mec.edu/Angier/DimSum/Mao%20Zedong%20Bio.html;   http://www.cbv.ns.ca/dictator/Mao.html; http://www.chairmanmao.org/eng/others/02.htm.

5. “Qing Dynasty” (p. x):

China’s last dynasty, the Qing (or Manchu) Dynasty ruled from 1644 to 1912, when the emperor Pu Yi, gave up his title.  Pu Yi was just seven years old at the time of his abdication but was allowed to live in Bejing in the Imperial City.  In 1924, a warlord expelled him from the Imperial City and he fled to the Japanese, who set him up as Emperor of Manchuria (a Japanese controlled part of China) from 1935 until Japan’s defeat in World War II in 1945 (Malaspina, p.26).

To begin with, the rulers of the Qing Dynasty were not Chinese.  The ruling class was of the Nuchen Tribes, or “Manchu;” they were called in ostensibly to help suppress rebel peasants by a Ming general but then swept their way through the Great Wall into Beijing, and set up a new government that lasted about 268 years (www.chinatown-online.co.uk/pages/culture/history/manchu.html).

After their initial expansion of Chinese territory in order to set up a protective buffer during the first 100 years or so of Manchu rule, China became larger than ever before or since.  The Qing Dynasty was characterized in succession by periods of security, prosperity, laziness, stagnation, corruption and decay, foreign crises and challenges, and revolution.  The Manchus effectively isolated China from the rest of the world and China quickly fell behind the West in terms of modernization and industrialization.  China, then, quickly became an easy target for foreign exploitation when many Western nations (e.g. England, Germany, and France) began to show interest in Asia in the 19^th Century.  The Opium Trade Wars with Britain (1835-1858), the war with Japan in 1894, and the Boxer Rebellion of 1900, along with almost continuous internal uprisings, all led to an increasing destabilization and weakening of the Qing Dynasty until finally, after the revolution in 1911, the last Qing emperor abdicated in 1912 (ibid.).

6. “World War II” (p. x):

World War II is usually reckoned as beginning on September 1, 1939 with Germany’s invasion of Poland, and ending on August 14, 1945 (Germany had surrendered in May) with the surrender of Japan to Allied forces after suffering atomic bomb strikes at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It was the most destructive and costly war in human history, with a death toll in the hundred of millions.

While World War I (the “War to End All Wars”) is often viewed as a war that could have been avoided, World War II, fought against the brutal dictatorships of Germany (under Adolf Hitler), Italy (under Benito Mussolini), and Japan (under Emperor Hirohito)—all of which formed an alliance called, the “Axis Powers”—is thought to have been almost unavoidable.  In many ways, the war was waged by the Allied nations (all those fighting against the Axis, e.g., Britain, France, Soviet Union, United States, Canada, Australia, etc.), as a struggle for freedom and a crusade against evil.

 In China, World War II was fought between the Japanese and an uneasy alliance between the Chinese Communists (the “Red Army,” of which Fan Shen’s parents were a part) under Chairman Mao and the Nationalists, or “Kuomintang,” led by Chaing Kai-shek.  The Japanese had been slowly creeping into Chinese territory since the 1920’s, and had begun fighting a full-scale war with China in 1937.  Millions died.  After the Japanese surrender in 1945, the civil war between the Communists and the Nationalists resumed full force, resulting in the eventual expulsion of the Nationalists to the island of Taiwan in 1949.

7. “Communism” (p. x):

Fan Shen refers to “communism” while pointing out his own uniqueness and eccentricity in the face of his revolutionary origin and background.  As a child of revolutionary parents, Fan was given a revolutionary name (“Fan,” meaning “ordinary,” or “one among millions”), brought up in a thoroughly revolutionary environment (the “Big Courtyard” in Beijing where the People’s Liberation Army is headquartered), and provided with a revolutionary education or indoctrination full of all the proper revolutionary thoughts that a normal Chinese youth should have.  In short, Fan was taught “love of the Great Leader, love of communism, [and] hatred of capitalism” (Fan Shen, p.x).  Yet, despite his revolutionary background and “ordinary” origins, Fan was far from ordinary—hence his remarkable journey.  Fan’s life journey centered on a thought, an “evil” idea that had been “condemned most rigorously over and over again.”  It was the “most dangerous thought a revolutionary could have…a thought that goes against everything a true revolutionary is supposed to stand for [e.g.] completely selfless, free of personal ambition, and should only obey the call of the Communist Party and the call of the Great Leader (Ibid.).  The “evil thing” that so characterized Fan Shen’s identity and journey was “personal ambition.”  Somehow, Fan’s “personal ambition” stood in stark contrast and contradiction to the formalistic, conformist communist society in which he lived.  Given this context, then, what is “communism”?

Communism is commonly held to refer to that sort of government, economy, and society advocated in theory by Karl Marx and Fredrich Engels (e.g. The Communist Manifesto of 1848) and later in the writings of Lenin, and given real-life practical expression most notably in The Soviet Union (until its break-up in the early 1990’s, while still existing today in only a few countries, namely, the People’s Republic of China, the People’s Republic of North Korea, and Cuba.  On its face, communism is thought to mean public or government ownership and control of the economy or “means of production,” the restriction and/or “equitable” redistribution of private wealth and property, and almost inevitably, the limitation of certain private rights and freedoms, all in the interest of the “people” or the “common good.”  At this point, one can see part of the essential conflict experienced by Fan Shen—his personal aspirations and ambitions seemed to run counter to the demands and expectations of the revolutionary society in which he lived.  This contradiction lies at the center of Fan Shen’s memoir or journey, and perhaps lies at the heart of communism itself.

The definition of “communism” is quite broad and far ranging, and difficult to formulate.  Communism may refer to, singularly or all at once, a political philosophy, an organizing principle of culture and society, a system of economics, or a form of government.  The notion or concept of communism stretches at least as far back as Plato’s Republic (4^th century B.C.) in which, while constructing a “city in speech,” the participants in the discussion speak of the nature of justice and its connection or relationship with private property (indeed, all things private).  Throughout all of human intellectual history there has existed an understanding that injustice, inequality, or exploitation has sprung (for whatever reason) from private property.  This understanding lies at the heart of communism.  Thus, communism in its many forms (including Maoism), has, always sought to provide a remedy or solution, or at least an alternative, to private property and the injustice arising therefrom.  This remedy involves, in some fashion, the holding of property in common among all the members of the community (hence, “communism”) rather than private, individual ownership. 

The basis, at least theoretically, for communism in its most mature form was laid principally by Karl Marx in his German Ideology (1846), the Communist Manifesto (1848), the Critique of Political Economy (1859) and Capital vol.I(1867).  Communism, of course, was amended and adapted by later thinkers, theorists, and activists—most notably Vladamir Lenin in Russia and Mao Zedong (who in many ways tried to produce a communism that fit Chinese culture and society). 

The basic nature of communism, for Marx and for Mao, is in many ways revolutionary (notice, incidentally, the number of times Fan Shen uses the word “revolution” or its variants in the paragraph and surrounding paragraphs where he first mentions “communism”).  It is no accident that Marx begins his Communist Manifesto with the famous words:  “A spectre is haunting Europe—the spectre of Communism;” or ends the Manifesto with the plain declaration that the goals of the workers “can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.  Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution.  [They] have nothing to lose but their chains.  They have a world to win…Working men of all countries unite!”  (Marx, p. 201,241).  In fact, Communism itself for Marx is that political and social movement whose purpose is to plan and conduct the revolution which will overthrow completely the present order of things—bourgeois capitalism—and give the working class or proletariat the means to eventually create a society free of the subjugation and oppression so characteristic of all previous societies.  At this point, all of the means of production, distribution and exchange—the whole economy (which is most important, for it gives rise to the state, society, and the culture)—are commonly owned, without the state or any other form of oppression which had served to keep capitalism dominant.  It is interesting that nowhere does Marx describe in any detail what a future communistic state and society would be like.  Marx limits his discussion of communism per se mostly to the revolutionary means and converging forces that bring about the final communistic stage of human history, where true justice and equality might be realized.  Communism, then, is the “real movement that abolishes the present state of things” (German Ideology, 1983, p. 179). 

Regarding the revolution to communism, Marx mentions that it occurs in two stages.  The first stage is transitional, and involves the raising of the “proletariat [or working and peasant class] to the position of ruling class.”  Once this is accomplished, the proletariat I then able to use its political power to “wrest, by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralize all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organized as the ruling class; and to increase the total productive forces as rapidly as possible.”  Now, Marx openly admits that, in the beginning at least, this cannot be “effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, confiscation of the property of all “emigrants and rebels,” “centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State,” “extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State,” “equal obligation of all to work [and] establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture,” “free education for all children in public schools”, etc. (Communist Manifesto, 1983, p. 222-27).  These “despotic inroads” are made by what Marx terms elsewhere, the “dictatorship of the proletariat” (Letter to Joseph Weydemeyer, March 5, 1852, 1978, p. 220).  The “dictatorship of the proletariat, in this context, means simply that the proletariat is possessed of political power, the power of the state, the ruling power.

The second or final stage of communism is considerably less clear for Marx.  Marx reasons that, once class distinctions have disappeared and all the means of production are owned communally by the whole nation, public power will lose its political character, I.e., it will no longer be used by one class for oppressing another (presumably because classes no longer exist).  This allows the Marxian ideal of justice to be realized:  “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need” (Critique of the Gotha Programme, 1978, p.531).  This phase of communist society is one where humans are truly liberated from the economic influences and circumstances of life.  It is a society which “regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, to fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming a hunter, fisherman, shepherd, or critic” (The German Ideology, 1978, p. 160).

What, then, is so “revolutionary” about communism, and ties into the revolutionary society and environment in which Fan Shen, as an individual, found himself?  To begin with, one must keep in mind that, for communism, the individual exists solely as an ensemble of social relations.  That is, the individual is a creation of society and not endowed with any fixed nature or recognized freedoms and rights arising from nature.  Thus, there is necessarily no tension between the needs and demands of society and that of the individual.  This is because the individual simply reflects the society, and, for Marx, it is the economic means of production that provides the basis for society.  However, such a tension does exist, a tension, as Heilbroner puts it, “between the individuation of character and behavior, and the unity and conformity necessary for social cohesion” (1980, p.162).  In Communist China, the tension between individual and society was resolved almost wholly on the side of social cohesion and unity (and because of other cultural factors, e.g., Confucianism, this resolution has been particularly fierce).  In China, Mao, through his refashioning of the economy, culture, and society was trying to produce a new type of human.  Again, Marx’s view, and the view of all Marxists since, is that the individual is the product of his or her society.  Thus, Heilbroner continues, one would therefore “expect that a socialist order would attempt to realize this conception in its values, precepts, and social indoctrination as pervasively and insistently [if not more considering Mao’s role as the “Great Leader”] as a capitalist society proclaims the central importance of the individual” (1980, p. 166). 

Of course, we get a very vivid sense of just how pervasively and insistently the revolutionary order attempted to realize its values and form and control individual character and actions from Fan’s memoir.  As Mao mentions in the first of his “Sixteen Points”:  the revolution now unfolding “is a great revolution that touches people to their very souls and constitutes a new stage in the development of the socialist revolution in our country [remember that Mao was always concerned as to how to implement Marxist-communist principles into the particular Chinese culture and mind-set], a stage which is both broader and deeper” (Daubier, p.297).

The tension between the individual and the society/environment is touched upon and explored throughout Fan Shen’s memoir.  He oftentimes felt powerless because he wanted to have a successful life in an environment that regarded personal ambition as evil.  Fan had a burning “personal ambition” that reached beyond the life dictated by Chinese society and the Communist regime—and that was what was truly revolutionary. 

8. “People’s Liberation Army” (p. x):

Fan Shen grew up in what is known as the “Big Courtyard,” the headquarters of the “People’s Liberation Army,” at the west end of Beijing.  The People’s Liberation Army, or PLA, refers to China’s military—the army, navy, and air force—is led by the Military Commission of the Communist Party and the Central Military Commission of the government.  Thus, the PLA not only serves the traditional role of national defense, but it also plays an important political role in that it “enforces the Communist Party’s policies and programs” (Malaspina, 2004, p.73).

The role of the PLA stemmed directly from its origins (i.e. with the “Red Army”), which precluded the development of a military in the usual sense (e.g. professional, apolitical, non-ideological).  Jack Gray and Patrick Cavendish point out that:

      During the years of struggle against the Kuomintang [or Nationalists] and the Japanese, it was an indoctrinated army engaged in revolutionary and guerilla operations, an army in which military and political duties were inseparable.  Its relationship with the state (as represented by the party) was peculiarly close.  It operated as the political and military backbone of an armed population.  Its forces were dispersed and not in close touch with the ‘central’ communist government at Jenan.  In both these relationships, upwards to the party center and downwards to the population, success depended upon the political awareness of its cadre; while, as far as the rank and file were concerned, recruitment depended upon the indoctrination in that radical ‘mass nationalism’ with its revolutionary implications…(1968, pp.43-4).

Given its political character from the outset, it is not surprising that the PLS went on to play an important role in the Cultural Revolution.  First, it can be argued that it was Lin Biao, the head of the PLA, who helped to lay the basis for what would develop over the course of the Cultural Revolution into the “cult of Mao.”  In 1961, as minister of defense, Lin intensified political training in the military, basing it squarely upon the thought of Mao—a curious fact considering that Chaiman Mao’s influence in every other aspect of Chinese life was then at low ebb.  Mao, at that time, was somewhat out of favor because of his disastrous “Great Leap Forward” program of the late 1950’s.  Mao, though losing power within the Communist Party, saw an opportunity to build a base of support away from the Party among the PLA.  Lin Biao was, for whatever reason, a staunch supporter of Mao and gave great support for Mao’s ideas.  It was Lin who took the initiative and condensed Mao’s thoughts and writings into the famous “Little Red Book” or “Quotations from Chairman Mao Zedong,” which was first used as a training manual for the PLA and during the Cultural Revolution was elevated to the status of “sacred scripture” for all Chinese.

Second, the PLA helped lay the foundation of the Cultural Revolution through the “learn from the PLA” campaign through which political departments, industrial enterprises, schools, etc. were all to be modeled on the army (Stuart Schram, 1989, p.174).  Most important, the PLA was held up to the civilian population as a paragon of Communist virtue worthy of emulation in dress, behavior, thought, expression, etc.  It is no wonder that the Red Guards likened their many travels and migrations during the Cultural Revolution to “Long Marches,” thus evoking the image of Mao’s march in 1934-35 that solidified his position as head of the Red Army and served as a great inspiration for all fighting for the Chinese Communist cause.  In addition, later on in the Cultural Revolution, the PLA was again evoked as an example to be followed.  Mao, alarmed by factionalism and violent infighting, urged the Red Guards to “take on the spirit of the old Red Army.”  From now on, Mao continued, “China will become one big barrack and everyone will be a Red soldier” (Fan Shen, p.53).  To this end, then, many Red Guard groups were supervised and given training by the PLA.

Lastly, the PLA was personally called by Mao to take action once the charged situation of the Cultural Revolution got beyond Mao’s control.   Into 1967, with the Cultural Revolution in full swing, China itself had fallen into chaos, disrepair, and neglect.  The Red Guard had largely fulfilled its purpose of criticizing and exposing Party leaders and bureaucrats who had taken the “capitalist road” and had largely rendered inactive the Party apparatus.  However, the Red Guard had become a “headless dragon,” rife with factionalism (see Gang of One, ch. 4+5), and its vandalism and senseless violence led Mao and others in Beijing to conclude that its political usefulness was over.  Thus, in the increasingly chaotic situation where the Party, once the centralizing institution of society, had ceased to function as a national organization and the mass movement with the Red Guard as the vanguard was without control, Mao turned to the PLA for stability and as an arbiter of the struggles of the Cultural Revolution (Meisner, 1999, p.334). 

9. “Cultural Revolution” (p. xi):

The Cultural Revolution, or as Mao termed it, the “Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution,” was a pivotal event in the history of modern China.  The Cultural Revolution is generally reckoned as lasting from 1966 until Mao’s death in 1976—its “official” ending coming in April of 1969 at the meeting of the Ninth Party Congress in which it was declared a glorious triumph and a source of “unity and victory”—though exactly when it ended is still debated.  However, what cannot be debated is the fact that the period of the Cultural Revolution was one marked by tumult, violence, economic and political chaos, and cultural upheaval.  Both the personal and professional lives of the majority of Chinese were affected to an astonishing degree.  Fan Shen’s memoir provides a remarkable insight into the perils and pitfalls of the Cultural Revolution, allowing the reader to witness and draw lessons from a first hand account of its origins, progress, and pervasive effect.

The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution was a deep and complex event.  There are many unanswered questions and differing interpretations as to its origins, purposes, and lasting effects.  Interestingly, the term “cultural revolution” has a relatively long history in China.  As a term, “cultural revolution” has been current in China ever since the “May Fourth Movement of 1919,” when huge demonstrations by students and workers, held in Beijing and elsewhere, were sparked by the Chinese government’s acceptance of certain terms of the Treaty of Versailles (which ended World War I) giving the Japanese, instead of the Chinese, rights to former German holdings in Shantong.  This event aroused a strong nationalistic fervor among the Chinese protestors and, interestingly, provoked an understanding that traditional Chinese culture was an impediment to progress—hence, what was needed was a cultural revolution to transform Chinese culture to be more compatible with the goals of modernization.  This, too, would strengthen China.  According to Jack Gray and Patrick Cavendish, cultural revolution means:

…an accelerated and comprehensive change in all fields, from science, public health, education and academic research to personal mores entertainment and the arts.  It means, for example, the introduction and application of modern agricultural and medical sciences, the provision of universal education, the establishment of ‘popular’ literature and the substitution of late and free for early and arranged marriages.  In Maoist terms, all these aspects of life are part of the ‘superstructure’ of society [see glossary entry under ‘communism’]:  secondary social institutions which ultimately rest on the ‘economic base’, the prime factor determining social development (1968, pp. 69-70).

A cultural revolution is thus clearly a deep and wide-ranging event, and the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (henceforth “GPCR”), was intended by Mao as its principal instigator and coordinator to be so—and it was.  For Mao, the GPCR was considered as not just some additional measure instituted to “save” the revolution, the fruits of which were Mao’s founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949.  Rather, the GPCR was considered by Mao to be part and parcel of the revolutionary process itself.  According to Mao, the GPCR was a necessary stage in the process, the last stage, after first, the “political stage,” where the bourgeois state is overthrown and the Communist Party, the champion of the masses, comes into power and the “economic stage,” in which the capitalist economy and feudal land system is refashioned—in China, this culminated in the commune system and the nearly complete nationalization of industry and commerce.  Finally, the last stage of the Cultural Revolution emerges.  Though the government has been reformed and the economy transformed, the “Chinese themselves, their thoughts, their tastes, their outlook on life and their personal hopes and ambitions, remain largely unaltered.”  Therefore, the last stage of the Cultural Revolution produces new, genuine communists “to whom the way of life and thought of their ancestors would be as alien as those, for example, of the pagan world to the Christian era which followed it” (1977, pp.132-33).  Interestingly, however, once this last stage is reached, the process of revolution does not stop.  Mao envisioned the need for periodic cultural revolutions in order to keep society and the individual on the straight and narrow—a perpetual struggle.

Of course, the origins of the GPCR involved political intrigue and struggle and was, no doubt, motivated at least in part by Mao in order to eliminate rivals within the Chinese Communist Party (Liu Shaoqui, for example) and reestablish himself as its leading force.  The official declaration and launching of the GPCR occurred in August of 1966 with the release by the 11^th Plenum of the Central Committee in Beijing of a “communiqué” and the famous “A Declaration in Sixteen Points.”  At this point, Mao was somewhat frustrated, for a year earlier, in September of 1965, he issued a call to analyze and criticize “bourgeois reactionary thinking,” but found top Party leaders less than receptive to his urgings (New China News Agency in Baum, 1971, p.107).  The communiqué issued in 1966 was highly critical of the