The Thumbnail Book Reviews
by John Q McDonald --- 8 March 2010
by Lijia Zhang
China appears to be a country and a culture that wishes to accomodate profound economic and social change without also enduring any change in identity. The nation perpetuates its founding myths and its self-image from five thousand years of history, but also from its humiliation at the hands of European colonial powers. It operates in the world from the point of view of wounded pride along with its otherwise justifiably significant cultural history. China's posture to outsiders can appear arrogant, insular and bullheaded. (Then again, America often looks a lot like that from within.) The self-inflicted tortures of the Cultural Revolution continue to reverberate in China today, even while the country becomes the most powerful economic engine in the world, and as it positions itself as a global cultural force. These economic changes are straining the model of Communist command economy and strict controls on personal freedoms. Remind the Chinese of this, and we are likely to receive an answer along the lines of "Buzz off. Mind your own business!" So, along with many memoirs and histories of the Cultural Revolution, this book comes along, telling one woman's low-key story of living through the 70s and 80s, as China began a rapid opening-up.
Lijia Zhang's story opens when she is a teenager with hopes of intellectual advancement. Taking advantage of a policy that lets children essentially inherit their parents' jobs, her mother turns hers over to Zhang. The girl has no choice in the matter, and her life turns upside down when, as a result, she goes to work in a factory that manufactures rockets. Over the ensuing years, Zhang attempts to take advantage of the few opportunities to break free of this workers' life. But as the narrative progresses, we subtly see those opportunities increase as China's society opens up within and to the world without. We also see Zhang try to break free from her family and government controls over one's sex life. She engages in several affairs, a couple of which could have landed her in jail, or at least ruined her career. She pushes against all of the strictures that surround her. She organizes a protest in support of student protesters and is interrogated for it. She longs to travel to America and she writes essays and stories for Chinese literary magazines. The key element seems to be the normality of this life. Her story is extraordinary in her discovery of the paths that lead her from her constricted existence, but also in the sense that this is one normal young Chinese woman's story in a profoundly changing environment. The reader may wonder how this memoir plays within China, or among the community of Chinese abroad. Changes have continued in Chinese culture. Much of what Zhang writes has, no doubt, continued to evolve as economic freedom pushes at the limits of individual freedom. The book is low-key, but full of little clues for the outsider (like this reader) curious about the character of the Chinese. The twenty-first century may ultimately become the Chinese century, much like the twentieth was the American century. This book is just one small slice of the changes afoot over there.
See Also: [Cousin Felix Meets the Buddha by Lincoln Kaye]