China in Ten Words

Yu Hua begins by describing Mao Zedong’s singular status and the immense reverence with which he was treated, especially during the tumultuous years of the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s and 70s. He paints a vivid picture of how Mao would grandly wave to the massive crowds assembled in Tiananmen Square during National Day celebrations, while the other top officials flanking him could only stand stiffly and clap. Yu Hua also recounts the famous incident of Mao’s swim in the Yangtze River in 1966, and how images of a shirtless Mao waving to the people were used as propaganda for years afterward.

Yu Hua then delves into his own childhood experiences of growing up in the Mao era and his early perceptions of Mao. He describes his elementary school classroom, where reverential portraits of Mao and other exalted communist leaders like Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin hung on the walls. As a child, Yu Hua fervently believed that China was the greatest country on earth for two reasons: because it had by far the largest population and, more importantly, because it had Mao as its leader while other nations did not. He recalls how he would dream of meeting Mao and felt that Mao was a constant paternal presence always watching over him and monitoring his actions. If he did good deeds, Mao would be pleased, and if he misbehaved, Mao would be disappointed in him. The Communist Party was perceived as a maternal presence, so Yu Hua thought that “there has to be a father, so who is the people’s father? The answer was obvious: Chairman Mao. Logically, the Communist Party was Mao’s first lady, but where did that leave Madame Mao, Jiang Qing?” (21).

Yu Hua describes the sheer ubiquity of Mao’s image and the inescapable pervasiveness of Mao Zedong Thought during the Cultural Revolution. Mao’s poems and quotations were everywhere, even emblazoned on the most mundane everyday objects like eating bowls, tea mugs, pillow cases, bath towels, toilet stalls, and spittoons. Yu Hua also shares an anecdote of how a man in his town claimed to have personally shaken Mao’s hand during a trip to Beijing and then refused to wash that hallowed hand for an entire year afterward, allowing it to become black and grimy, while all the neighbors clamored to shake the hand that had touched their beloved leader. However, after hearing similar stories from other towns, Yu Hua later came to suspect the veracity of this account. He now believes that the man likely just imagined shaking Mao’s hand after seeing him in the far distance at Tiananmen.

Yu Hua expresses the incredible awe, yearning, and vicarious pride that provincial Chinese people like himself had toward Beijing, Tiananmen Square and Mao. Many could only dream of visiting the capital and Mao’s seat of power. To illustrate this, he shares that, as a boy, he had his photo taken while standing in front of a painted studio backdrop of Tiananmen, as if he was there in the famous square. Photos like these, he says, were common. Yu Hua explains that this photo exemplifies the vicarious desires of those living in the hinterlands far from the capital during that era.

Yu Hua observes that in the decades since Mao's death, the term “leader” has become drastically devalued in China. He notes with irony and dismay that there are now ubiquitous contests to select "leaders" in every field imaginable, from fashion and beauty to real estate and elevators. In Mao’s time, by contrast, the word “leader” was sacred and inviolable; the very term was synonymous with Mao and carried supreme authority.

Yu Hua recounts two anecdotes about childhood classmates. One young girl was branded a “little counterrevolutionary” because she accidentally folded a portrait of Mao in a way that creased his face. Another classmate was nearly condemned as reactionary for speculating that Marx might have been a woman based on his long hair. The boy barely escaped punishment by hedging that he “thought maybe” he had said this. These stories underscore the oppressive political atmosphere and arbitrary persecutions of the Cultural Revolution era, when the merest unintentional slight or misstep could lead to grave consequences.

Yu Hua interweaves his personal recollections with social and historical commentary on Mao’s complex and contested legacy, both within China and globally. He notes how in the decades since Mao’s death, China has undergone a sweeping and dramatic economic transformation, but one that has come at immense social costs, including environmental destruction, inequality, corruption, ruthless competition, and exploitation. Yu Hua posits that these acute problems and dislocations of contemporary Chinese society have led a significant number of Chinese people to feel genuine nostalgia for the vanished Mao era, when life was simpler, stabler, and more egalitarian, even if much poorer and more repressive politically. However, Yu Hua argues that most of these people don’t literally want to return to the past; they are merely expressing their discontent with the present. At the same time, while Mao’s legacy within China remains fraught and contradictory, Yu Hua contends that Mao’s international legacy as a third world revolutionary icon seems largely undiminished. He cites examples like Austrian communists holding up Mao’s portrait at rallies and Nepali Maoists venerating his image alongside those of Lenin and Stalin.

Yu Hua concludes the chapter by describing the momentous day in September 1976 when it was suddenly announced at his school that the 82-year-old Chairman Mao had passed away. His entire school assembled in an auditorium and broke down in mass weeping and wailing upon hearing the news. Although Yu Hua’s eyes filled with tears, he soon found himself inappropriately seized by an urge to laugh at the chaotic sound of a thousand people loudly crying in unison. He had to disguise his laughter as violent sobs by burying his head in his arms to avoid the dangerous fate of being labeled a counterrevolutionary. His shaking shoulders were misinterpreted by his classmates as a sign of his unmatched grief at Mao’s loss.