The Great Flourishing

“Old Bei” in China

Sheila Melvin — Sat, 30 Mar 2013 21:03:28 +0000

The first time my husband, Jindong Cai, heard a Beethoven symphony was as a child in Cultural Revolution (1966-76) Beijing. His close friend, Wang Luyan, had somehow got hold of an old wind-up phonograph and a complete set of 78 RPM records containing Beethoven’s “Fifth Symphony;” each record held about five minutes of music per side. Because music by “Old Bei” was deemed subversive – all Western composers were lumped together as “bourgeois capitalists” and Chinese traditional music was banned in favor of “model revolutionary operas” – the two boys carefully closed and curtained the courtyard house windows before daring to play the scratchy recording at low volume. Afterwards, they kept silent about their transgression and resumed listening to revolutionary operas – but my husband never forgot Beethoven. #

Indeed, he went on to study violin and piano and eventually became a conductor – even once performing for Madame Mao. The music he played was revolutionary, with the exception of practice etudes, but by 1976 the cultural environment had eased enough that he was able to visit libraries across Beijing in search of a book on Beethoven’s life. That was the long, hot summer of the devastating Tang Shan earthquake and he and his family, like many Beijingers, were obliged to sleep outdoors in makeshift tents for several months while waiting for inspectors to declare their home safe. So when Jindong finally found a library that would lend him a book on Beethoven – a Chinese translation of “Beethoven: The Man Who Freed Music,” by Robert Haven Schauffler – he read it beneath the sweltering light of the sun and murky illumination of the street lamps on the sidewalk of Worker’s Stadium Road. #

Unsurprisingly, Beethoven has remained a vitally important part of my husband’s life. Indeed, he is this year conducting all nine Beethoven symphonies and five piano concertos at Stanford University, where he works, to inaugurate the school’s new state-of-the-art Bing Concert Hall. The US$ 111.9 million concert hall was a gift (from the eponymous Helen and Peter Bing) and in pondering how to commemorate a bequest of this magnitude, he had only one answer: Beethoven. #

While Jindong’s passion for Beethoven is personal, it is hardly unique. On the contrary, it is in many ways emblematic of China, where Beethoven has for more than a century been the best-loved Western composer. Needless to say, it is first and foremost Beethoven’s music that accounts for his enduring popularity – its overwhelming emotional content resounds with listeners in China, who are accustomed to hearing music tell a story and enthralled by the power, scale, and audacity with which Beethoven tells his. But, even beyond the force of his compositions, Beethoven occupies a special place. #

China first learned of Beethoven in the early 20th century, a tumultuous era in which the country was collapsing from within and being carved up from without by seemingly insatiable foreign powers. The nation’s intellectuals desperately needed inspiration, and Beethoven – portrayed as a tragic hero who struggled against fate his entire life, remaining indomitable despite ceaseless suffering and deafness – provided it. The first person to write about Beethoven for a Chinese audience was by Li Shutong (1880-1942), the renowned poet, artist, music educator, and monk. Li learned of Beethoven while studying in Japan and in 1906 published a short article called “A Biography of the Saint of Music: Beethoven.” #

The following year the writer Lu Xun, then a student in Japan, observed that China needed to learn more from great Western artists, like Beethoven. The opportunity to do so was provided by Feng Zikai, who wrote a lengthy introduction to Beethoven, describing him as a man who repeatedly overcame adversity and was a “hero” to all mankind. #

But the most influential early writings about Beethoven were undoubtedly the translations of Fu Lei, an art critic who studied in Paris from 1928-1932 and there became obsessed by Beethoven through the writing of Romain Rolland, winner of the 1915 Nobel Prize for Literature. Fu Lei wrote that after reading Rolland’s biography of Beethoven, “I burst into tears and suddenly felt as if I had been enlightened by the divine light and gained the power of rebirth. From that time on, I wonderfully took heart, which was indeed a great event in my whole life.” Fu Lei went on to translate many of Rolland’s works on Beethoven (and other artists), including his ten-volume novel “Jean-Christophe,” which is inspired by Beethoven’s life. #

Beethoven’s music spread in China alongside his biography. In the late 19th century, it was performed by what is now the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, but was then an ensemble comprised exclusively of foreigners who played for other foreigners. By the early 20th century, Chinese who had studied music overseas or at missionary schools were performing Beethoven, among them the young pianist Li Xianmin, who could play all 32 piano sonatas even before she was admitted to the Shanghai Conservatory in 1930. The Peking University Orchestra – organized by the German-educated president of the university, Cai Yuanpei – played the third movement of Beethoven’s Sixth (“Pastoral”) Symphony and the second movement of the Fifth (“Fate”) Symphony in 1923. Then, in 1927, a young violinist named Tan Shuzhen became the first Chinese to join the Shanghai Symphony, performing Beethoven’s “Fifth” – which he had never heard live – in his first concert. #

Beethoven prospered in China after 1949, in part because Soviet and East German musicologists had claimed the composer as a revolutionary who supported universal (socialist) brotherhood. Such writers emphasized the “Teplitz Incident,” in which Beethoven and Goethe were said to encounter the Empress while strolling in a park; Goethe bowed obsequiously but Beethoven kept his hat on and ignored the royal party. This story became popular in China, as did a portrait of Beethoven as a proto-socialist who aimed to “serve the people” and whose music could only be understood by fellow socialists. It was also widely known that Lenin himself had loved Beethoven, especially his “Appassionata” sonata. #

In April of 1957, a commemoration of the 130th anniversary of Beethoven’s death was held in Beijing. The East German conductor invited to conduct Beethoven’s “Fifth” prefaced it with a talk called “Beethoven’s Spirit Made All Progressive People Join Together.” In 1959, the Central Philharmonic performed Beethoven’s “Ninth” Symphony nearly a dozen times, including at a National Day celebration that was attended by Premier Zhou Enlai. #

Beethoven lost his special status during the Cultural Revolution – but he was the first western composer to be rehabilitated. Indeed, in 1971, when Henry Kissinger was making his second visit to Beijing, Zhou Enlai summoned Central Philharmonic conductor Li Delun and told him, “Kissinger’s German – you should play Beethoven.” Li happily agreed, suggesting first the “Fifth” and then the “Third” symphonies – choices vetoed by the Gang of Four because the former was deemed to be about fatalism and the latter about Napoleon. The Central Philharmonic thus played Beethoven’s “Sixth” – which was “about nature” – for Kissinger, and 500 other guests, in the Great Hall of the People. Two years later, the Philadelphia Orchestra visited Beijing and programmed Beethoven – they, too had planned to play the “Fifth,” but at the Gang of Four’s insistence performed the more politically correct “Sixth” instead. #

Soon after the Gang of Four was overthrown in the autumn of 1976, China’s Central Broadcasting Station played Beethoven’s “Appassionata” – noting that it was Lenin’s favorite – and then his “Fifth” Symphony. For many music lovers, these broadcasts signaled that the Cultural Revolution was truly over. Beethoven re-emerged – this time as a symbol of triumph over crushing sorrow and injustice – and a “Beethoven Fever” gripped China’s cities, as orchestras performed all his works and audiences lined up to hear them. Today, Beethoven is as integral to musical life in China as anywhere in the world. His music resounds in China’s concert halls, his bust adorns its parks, and his life continues to inspire its people, from one era to the next. #

(This was published first in Caixin http://english.caixin.com/2013-03-15/100501897.html) #

Pope Francis and the PRC

Sheila Melvin — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 21:14:28 +0000

The election last week of the first Jesuit pontiff in history brings to mind the storied China mission begun by Pope Francis’ Jesuit predecessor (and indirect namesake) St. Francis Xavier. Though undertaken for religious purposes, the Jesuit involvement in China was arguably most successful as a cultural exchange. #

It began in 1552, when Francis Xavier, frustrated at his inability to make Catholics out of the Japanese, concluded that his best hope was to convert the Chinese first. In a letter to Rome, he explained that when he preached the existence of God to the Japanese, they rebuffed him. If what you say is indeed true, they told him, the Chinese would have known about it first. #

“For the Japanese,” he wrote, “give the Chinese the pre-eminence in wisdom and prudence in everything relating either to religion or to political government.” #

Impressed by all he had heard of China’s bounty, wisdom and riches, and by the Chinese he himself had met, Francis decided, “China is that sort of kingdom, that if the seed of the Gospel is once sown, it may be propagated far and wide. And moreover, if the Chinese accept the Christian faith, the Japanese would give up the doctrines which the Chinese have taught them.” #

A little more than a decade later, in 1563, the Jesuits established a mission in the Portuguese colony of Macau. However, they made little headway in gaining converts – perhaps because they preached exclusively in Portuguese and required any converts to wear European dress, adopt European names and habits, and cease the traditional practice of honoring their ancestors and Confucius. (They also insisted on monogamy, but that was non-negotiable.) A far-sighted superior named Alessandro Valignano (Fan Lian, 1539-1606) realized that this Eurocentric approach was doomed to fail and called for recruits willing to learn Chinese language and culture. Two Italian Jesuits volunteered to take on this task, Michele Ruggieri (Luo Mingjian, 1543-1607) and Matteo Ricci (Li Madou, 1552-1610). #

Learning Chinese was never easy for Ruggieri, but Ricci was able to master it so thoroughly that he could debate with the most educated Chinese mandarins and write like a literati. His prodigiously trained memory enabled him to memorize long Chinese poems after a single reading; at one literati dinner party, he astonished everyone by quickly reading through a list of 500 randomly chosen Chinese characters prepared by his fellow guests and then reciting it from memory – first forwards and then backwards. Ricci had tremendous admiration for the learning and intellectual curiosity of the educated Chinese he encountered and decided that the best way to make friends – and, potentially, converts – was to share European scholarship. He translated Euclid’s “Elements” into Chinese, with his friend Xu Guangqi (Paul Xu, 1562-1633) – a Catholic convert and high-ranking official – and also built sundials, clocks, and astronomical orbs, created several spectacular world maps for the Wan Li Emperor and wrote important books on religion and frienship. #

Ricci’s gifts to the Wan Li Emperor (who he never met in person) included a clavichord that four eunuchs from the College of Musicians learned to play, thereby beginning a remarkable tradition of Western music performance in the imperial palace. The Qing Dynasty Kangxi Emperor (1654-1722) took music lessons from the Jesuit Thomas Pereira (Xu Risheng, 1645-1708) for a time, and even learned to play a few songs on the harpsichord. He also asked Pereira to give a series of lectures on Western music, which were attended by several of the Emperor’s 56 children. The most attentive student was Kangxi’s third son, Yinzhi, who later helped compile “The Elements of Music,” a book that explained Western musical notation, theory, scale, mode, harmony, and more. Kangxi’s grandson, the Qianlong Emperor (1711-1799), employed two Jesuits as palace music teachers and even ordered them to teach 18 eunuchs to sing in a chorus and play Western instruments in a European music ensemble while wearing Western-style suits and powdered wigs! (For more on Western music history in China, see our book “Rhapsody in Red.“) #

Jesuit priests also served as palace artists and architects. Giuseppe Castiglione (Lang Shining, 1688-1766), a favorite of Qianlong, was a court painter who created a new style that combined Chinese-style brushwork with Western concepts of perspective and dimensionality. He painted a number of important events and his paintings are considered priceless works of art and history, many of them held in the collection of Beijing’s Palace Museum. Castiglione was also involved in the design of the European-style structures and fountains at the Yuanmingyuan palace complex (which was looted by British and French troops in 1840 and then burnt to the ground by the British). The French Jesuit Father Amiot (Qian Deming, 1718-93) explained some of the Jesuit’s artistic work for Qianlong in a 1754 letter: #

“It was to please him [Qianlong] that Father Chalier invented the famous alarm-clock, a work which even in Europe would have passed as a marvel, or at least a masterpiece of art; that Father Benoit made, a few years ago, the celebrated hydraulic works (du Val de Saint Pierre) to furnish the greatest variety of pleasant fountains that embellish the surroundings of the European houses, built under the design and direction of Brother Castiglione; that Brother de Brossard made, in the way of glass, works in the best of taste and of the most difficult execution, works which shine today in the Throne Room together with those that are the best and have come from France and England; it was to please him again, and to obey orders, that Brother Thibaut has just finished an automatic lion which walks one hundred steps like a live animal, and conceals, under his skin, all the machinery that makes him move. It is astonishing that, with only the most elementary notions of watch-making, the dear Father was able, by himself, to invent and combine all the skill in a machine that encompasses everything that could be found in mechanics…” #

Jesuit contributions to the study of math and sciences – including astronomy, cartography, geography, mechanics, and geometry – were also great. Johann Adam Schall (Tang Ruowang, 1591-1666), for example, became head of the Board of Mathematics and with colleagues created a complete course in astronomy for which they wrote and published more than 100 books. Jesuits held this critical government post for years afterward. #

Even as they shared European culture with an elite Chinese audience, the Jesuits also explained Chinese culture to Europe – and reached many more people in the process. After Ricci died in Beijing in 1610 his colleagues edited his journals and added an introduction to Chinese history and culture. The book was published in 1620, with editions in Latin, Italian, German, French, and Spanish, and created significant interest in China. #

Ricci and his successors introduced Confucian philosophy to Europe – even coining the word “Confucius,” as well as the more narrow concept of “Confucianism,” which the Chinese called “literati thought” – alongside detailed explanations of Chinese history, customs, and rituals. To be sure, they had an agenda – to show that the basic tenets of Confucianism were compatible with Christianity, and to attract funding and staffing for their mission. But, they were nonetheless sincere in promoting their view that China’s millennial civilization and highly developed cultural traditions were in no way inferior to Europe’s and, in any case, would not be abandoned for Christianity. Indeed, in many cases when the Jesuits compared China to Europe, it was China that came out looking better. As Ricci wrote of China: #

“Though they have a well-equipped army and navy that could easily conquer the neighboring nations, neither the king nor his people ever think of waging a war of aggression. They are quite content with what they have and are not ambitious of conquest. In this respect they are much different from the people of Europe, who are frequently discontent with their own governments and covetous of what others enjoy. While the nations of the West seem to be entirely consumed with the idea of supreme domination, they cannot even preserve what their ancestors have bequeathed them, as the Chinese have done through a period of some thousands of years.”[i] #

The influence of Jesuit writings was great. As an example, the Jesuit Martino Martini (Wei Kuangguo, 1614-61) wrote a chronology of Chinese history that depicted, for the first time in Europe, the Yi Jing (I Ching) and its 64 hexagrams. Martini’s account was seen by the great German polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716), who today is perhaps best remembered for laying the foundations of binary math, which itself is the basis of modern computational architecture. Intrigued, Leibniz in turn began a correspondence with Joachim Bouvet (Bai Pu, 1656-1730) – tutor to the Kangxi Emperor’s children – and became convinced that the Chinese creators of the Yi Jing had been familiar with the concepts of binary arithmetic. This meant that he himself, in his own word, had only “rediscovered” it. #

Jesuit and other Catholic writings on China also presented a major challenge to European conceptions of world history, which were then rooted in the Bible. According to this view, the three historic events of global significance were creation, the great flood, and the fall of the Tower of Babel, each of which was given a date. Debate did exist – adherents of the Vulgate version of the Bible dated creation to 4004 BCE and the flood to 2348 BCE while those who used the earlier Septuagint version said creation took place before 5000 BCE and the flood around 3617. [ii] #

Both interpretations, however, were challenged by accounts of Chinese history, which stated that the first Chinese emperor, Fuxi, began to reign in 2952 BCE, when Chinese society was already so advanced that the Yi Jing had been written and astronomy was a developed science. Though some dismissed these claims, most scholars were persuaded by the authenticity of Chinese historic records and thus had to begin reconciling the two chronologies – often with great creativity. By some accounts, Fuxi was actually Adam; by others he (or another sage emperor, Yao) was Noah, or Enoch (the son of Cain). This led to debates as to whether – if Fuxi were Noah – the Chinese developed from Shem, his oldest son, or Ham, who was said to be the father of all idolaters. #

Efforts to reconcile Chinese history with the story of Babel were even more interesting. The British writer John Webb published an essay in 1669 suggesting that the Chinese had not been affected by the fall of the Tower of Babel, since they lived so far away – and that Chinese, rather than Hebrew, was the Primitive Language given to Adam by God and spoken by all the world’s people before the tower fell. Leibniz also became interested in the possibility that Chinese held the roots of a universal language and he began to search for a “clavis sinica” (which a man named Andreas Muller claimed to have devised) that would be the key to this language. #

Leibniz remained fascinated by China throughout his life, going out of his way to correspond with and even meet in person Jesuits who served there. He pushed for an extensive cultural exchange between two equals, China and Europe, writing in one letter, that the Chinese “are superior to us in observational skills, as we are superior in theoretical skills—thus let’s trade each other’s talents, and let us catch fire with fire!”[iii] On another occasion he suggested that the trade of “merchandise and spice” should become a “commerce… of light and wisdom,” with the Chinese and Europeans learning from each other. #

Such positive views of China and its culture became so widespread among the European intellectual elite that it gave rise to a period known as “Sinomania” in the 16^th and 17^th centuries. (Sinomania was especially strong in France and Germany, while it was weaker in England, which had remained Protestant and was thus less enamored of Jesuit viewpoints.) China entered popular culture, with educated people expected to have opinions on certain issues that related to it (especially those that intersected with Catholic missionary work). Confucianism, as explained by the Jesuits, was compelling to many – and, ironically, a source of inspiration to Enlightenment intellectuals who offered it as an example of a moral philosophy that did not need God or the Church. Voltaire was one of these intellectuals, and he wrote about China extensively between 1740-60, oftentimes using it as a weapon by which to criticize French politics. As he put it, “One need not be obsessed with the merits of the Chinese to recognize that their empire is the best that the world has ever seen.” Voltaire even adapted the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) play, “Orphan of Zhao,” which premiered in Paris on August 20, 1755, and wrote poems in honor of Qianlong. #

This enthusiasm for China spilled over into the arts and led to Chinoiserie, a quixotic blending of Chinese and European design elements. Chinese porcelain became so popular that tens of millions of pieces were sent to Europe on Dutch ships. Pagodas were built in European gardens, like London’s Kew Garden where a 160-foot high pagoda stands to this day. (For a fascinating account of Sino-European cultural exchange from 1500-1800 see D.E. Mungello’s The Great Encounter of China and the West.) #

But then, for a variety of reasons – the vicissitudes of fashion, the growing global economic and political power of European nations, the onset of the era of imperialism and colonialism, the internal decline of the Qing Dynasty – Sinomania came to an abrupt end. So too, did the Society of Jesus, which was dissolved by Pope Clement XIV in 1773, in part because of long-festering arguments over the appropriateness of the Jesuits’ accommodating approach to Chinese culture. The society was restored in 1814, but by then China-European relations had taken a completely different direction. #

Looking back, however, it is apparent that cultural exchange was the true base of productive Sino-Vatican relations for centuries – and perhaps it is culture that can provide a road forward, enabling both sides to get out of their current hostile impasse. In 2008, the China Philharmonic Orchestra, under Maestro Yu Long, made a step in this direction when it visited the Vatican and performed Mozart’s “Requiem” for Pope Benedict. Now, perhaps, the Vatican could reciprocate by working with one of China’s countless museums to hold an exhibition of some of its many treasures in China. #

St. Francis Xavier started the Jesuit China mission, but he never completed his journey. Instead, he died on a rocky island called Shangchuan, just off the shores of Guangdong, while trying to gain entrance to China. It would certainly be fitting if, five centuries later, Pope Francis could help heal the rift with China – and perhaps become the first pontiff to visit the nation so admired, and even loved, by hundreds of his Jesuit predecessors. #

[i] Western Views of China and the Far East, Volume I Ancient to Early Modern Times #

Edited by Henry A. Myers #

Asian Studies Monograph Series, Asian Research Service, Hong Kong 1982, #

Chapter IV Chong-kun Yoon, Sinophilism During the Age of Enlightenment: Jesuits, Philosophes and Physiocrats Discover Confucius, p. 152 #

[ii] Leibniz and China a Commerce of Light, p. 25 #

[iii] Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 2006 Issue 33 #

Wenchao Li and Hans Poser, p. 19 #

Tocqueville In China: The Communist Party Studies “The Old Regime”

Sheila Melvin — Sat, 09 Mar 2013 23:37:57 +0000

Newspapers and magazines have recently been filled with reports of the surprising popularity in China of Alexis de Tocqueville’s The Old Regime and the Revolution (旧制度与大革命) which was first published in 1856 and has now reached Chinese best-seller lists. #

Tocqueville, of course, was the French political historian whose best-known work is the classic Democracy in America, a staple of American high school history classes that is not only remarkably astute but also a delightful read. China Daily reports that The Old Regime is featured front and center in the bookstore at the Communist Party School, where China’s current and future leaders study for several weeks each year. Supplementary materials – with titles like “A Guide to Reading the Old Regime and the Revolution” and “Why Do We Read the Old Regime and the Revolution?” – are sold alongside it. #

The Old Regime and the Revolution analyzes French society before the French revolution (1789-99) and, as Naliene Chou Wiest writes in Caixin, “seems to speak to opinion leaders of every stripe [in China]. Tocqueville’s emphasis on order and conservative suspicion of the crowd argues for maintaining the status quo; while his ideas of equality and civil society appeal to the liberals. Shared by both camps is his dark anxiety of facing a brewing crisis.” #

The aspect of the book that most analysts have focused on is this threat of a brewing crisis, or what is sometimes called the Toqueville Paradox: that the most dangerous period faced by a governing regime is not when the people are most repressed, but when reforms are underway and life is getting better – as has been the case in China now for some years. #

“It is almost never when a state of things is the most detestable that it is smashed,” China Daily quotes Tocqueville, “but when, beginning to improve, it permits men to breathe, to reflect, to communicate their thoughts with each other, and to gauge by what they already have the extent of their rights and their grievances. The weight, although less heavy, seems then all the more unbearable.” #

Many writers then go on to speculate that China’s leaders are, essentially, afraid of getting “smashed” by those whom they have permitted to “breathe.” But James W. Ceaser, writing two years ago in an AEI Online essay called “Why Tocqueville on China?” notes that Tocqueville occasionally referenced China – four times in Democracy in America and once in The Old Regime and the Revolution, if you are wondering. China, in Tocqueville’s eyes, was the consummate “symbol” of a fully centralized administrative state. Many of Tocqueville’s contemporaries saw this as a positive; this was an era in which certain French intellectuals – known as the “physiocrats” – promoted China as a model of near-perfect government. (This idea had strong roots in France, where Voltaire (1694-1778) – who worked in a study with a portrait of Confucius on the wall – argued, “One need not be obsessed with the merits of the Chinese to recognize . . . that their empire is in truth the best that the world has ever seen.” Voltaire admired the absence of a feudal aristocracy and a powerful priesthood and the fact that civil servants were highly educated scholars – like himself – chosen by exam.) #

Tocqueville, however, saw little to admire in the Chinese system – or in the French physiocrats’ fascination with it. He argued, according to Ceaser, that highly centralized administration of the sort that China had then (and now) “sapped a society of its movement, creativity, and energy–to a point, as he once half joked, of dampening the erotic spirit…It produced subjects rather than citizens. The consequences extended far beyond the political realm, creating a society characterized by ‘tranquility without happiness, industry without progress, stability without force, and material order without public morality.’” #

Tocqueville’s ideas are certainly interesting food for thought – especially if you are a Chinese leader presiding over a nation in which the legislature (National People’s Congress) has 83 US$ billionaires who inhabit an increasingly rareified world in which, as Evan Osnos notes, even the air they breathe is specially purified, while ordinary citizens live in a capital where air quality indexes regularly reach the hazardous range and lung cancer rates are exploding. #

The person who brought Tocqueville’s work to the attention of the public is apparently Vice Premier Wang Qishan. Wang is a pragmatic, talented, no-nonsense politician who is known for successfully tackling big problems. He handled a major banking crisis in Guangdong in the late 1990s and in 2003 was made mayor of Beijing in a damage control situation during the SARS epidemic. He directly managed the 2008 Beijing Olympics and oversaw the 2010 Shanghai World Expo. His current job as chairman of the Communist Party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection may be his most challenging yet as he aims to combat corruption within the Party. We heard Wang speak when he was mayor of Beijing and were impressed by the frankness of his off-the-cuff remarks, which included a passionate lament on the crisis of faith in China and an envious aside as to how much easier it is to run a country that has religion, like the US. Because Wang is known for being both competent and blunt, he has credibility – while any book recommended by a high-level leader is going to find readers (the Meditiations of Marcus Aurelius became a bestseller in 2008, after then Premier Wen Jiabao revealed that he had read it more than a hundred times) but Wang’s recommendations are of particular interest to ordinary intellectuals, as well as to cadres wishing to impress their superiors. #

Joseph Fewsmith writes in China Leadership Monitor that word of Wang ‘s interest in Tocqueville was first revealed by the economist Hua Sheng, who tweeted: “I went to the sea [海, an apparent abbreviation for 中南海, the seat of Communist power] to see my old leader. He recommended I read Tocqueville’s Ancien Regime and the French Revolution. He believes that a big country like China that is playing such an important role in the world, whether viewed from the perspective of history or the external environment facing it today, will not modernize all that smoothly. The price the Chinese people have paid is still not enough.” #

It may take more than Tocqueville to keep the Chinese people from paying an ever higher price – but at least the widespread recognition of a problem, and the willingness to address it by learning from the great thinkers of history, is a start. #

The Three Highs Philharmonic

Sheila Melvin — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 04:54:04 +0000

Here is a story Sheila wrote about the “Three Highs” Philharmonic; the story was published today on Chinafile and is copied below. To see some video of the orchestra, go to Youku. #

Classical Music with Chinese Characteristics #

The Party Elites of the Three Highs Philharmonic Orchestra #

SHEILA MELVIN
02.28.13

On a frigid Friday morning at the end of 2012, a stream of expectant concertgoers poured through the cavernous lobby of the China National Center for the Performing Arts. They had come to the stunning, egg-shaped arts complex at this unusually early hour holding invitations to the dress rehearsal for what was arguably the hottest ticket in town: the Beijing premiere of the Three Highs Philharmonic Orchestra. #

The Three Highs—San Gao, in Chinese, or “3H” in colloquial English promotional materials—is an amateur ensemble named not for any notes its performers might reach in concert, but for the status they must possess simply to be members. Indeed, “three highs” refers to the bureaucratic ranking of the ninety-seven musicians and the accompanying 141-member chorus, all of whom are high-ranking members of China’s Communist Party, intelligentsia, or military. They include Minister of Foreign Affairs Yang Jiechi, who sang in the chorus (along with dozens of other ministry officials); Shanghai Communist Party Secretary Han Zheng and chairman of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region, Bate’er, both of whom played accordion; Shenzhen Party Secretary Wang Rong, who served as concertmaster; and retired astronaut Jing Haipeng, who played trombone. #

The invitation-only audience at the Beijing performances—held December 21 and 22—was nearly as exclusive as the ensemble. While the dress rehearsal was open to friends, family, and a few people (like me) who called on every connection they had to get in, the first formal performance was attended by former president Jiang Zemin, former vice premier Li Lanqing, and former vice premier Wu Yi, along with numerous central and city government officials. The audience at the second concert included foreign ambassadors and other diplomats, select schoolteachers, university professors, and arts professionals. #

It is near impossible to imagine any other nation on earth that would have the will, the wherewithal, or even the desire to create an ensemble like this—not to mention the moxy to call it the “Three Highs.” And, indeed, there was some tongue-wagging, as on the widely circulated post on the Twitter-like Weibo that joked “three highs” was actually a reference to the high blood pressure, blood sugar, and cholesterol of the orchestra’s mostly retired members. But, while the Three Highs is many things, it is most certainly no joke. On the contrary, it is yet another signifier of the seriousness with which the PRC government takes its mission—formally announced at the 2011 plenum of the Communist Party’s Central Committee—to promote the “great development and great flourishing” of Chinese culture. It is also evidence of the enduring belief that a good leader should be cultivated and cultured, and of the leadership’s willingness to put its money—and time and energy—where its mouth is. #

The creation of the Three Highs was a top-down effort of near-Herculean proportion undertaken in less than a year. It began, according to a report in China’s Southern Weekend newspaper, around Spring Festival of 2012 when Li Lanqing—a long-time promoter of classical music who has authored several books on the subject and even begun to compose for orchestra—discussed the idea with Ye Xiaowen, a cellist and a vice president of the Central Institute of Socialism, and Zhou Shuchun, vice president of Xinhua News Agency. Li and Ye reportedly donated their own salaries to the undertaking, while institutional support was obtained from the Ministries of Culture, Education, and Foreign Affairs, the Communist Party School, the Central Institute of Socialism, and the Central Conservatory of Music. Ye traveled around the country seeking amateur musicians of high bureaucratic rank and ultimately recruited participants from sixteen provinces and Hong Kong. #

The Three Highs began to rehearse in July and in August and gave its first internal performance in Beidaihe, the Communist Party’s seaside retreat. Because of distance and work obligations, orchestra members were only able to meet in various cities every few weeks and come together as an ensemble even more sporadically. Since many musicians had not played their instruments in decades, they felt obliged to practice day and night; Chen Jiabao, chairman of the standing committee of the Nanjing People’s Congress and a flutist, reportedly practiced so much that the tendons in his hands became inflamed. Members of the chorus were asked to sing Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” in its original language and thus had to study German; some singers were unfamiliar with five-line staff notation and so had to pencil in the numeric musical notation (jianpu) commonly used by choruses in China. #

Adding to the demands on the amateur orchestra was a repertoire so challenging—it included works by Strauss, Bizet, Mozart, Shostakovich, Massenet, Mussorgsky, Lloyd Weber, and Chou (as in a Jay Chou, the pop music heartthrob from Taiwan)—that composer and Three Highs artistic director Tang Jianping had to create simplified arrangements, a common practice for non-professional orchestras. Because it was decided that orchestra musicians would premiere the use of electronic music stands developed in China, musicians also had to accustom themselves to newfangled technology in lieu of reading their parts on paper. The electronic system failed at the dress rehearsal, leaving chagrined players without music during a performance of Li Lanqing’s musical caprice “The Monk Jianzhen Sails Eastward”; renowned conductor Chen Zuohuang, who had a paper score, gamely apologized to the audience and forged ahead, leading the musicians as they bravely played from memory. A rigorous concert schedule was set and followed, with the Three Highs performing to full houses in Shanghai, Suzhou, Nanjing, and Wuxi prior to its Beijing concerts. #

To pre-empt any who might question the Three High’s purpose, a video explained the orchestra’s mission—popularizing classical music among young people—and its motto, borrowed from the revered composer Xian Xinghai (1905-1945): Make China Musical (使中国音乐化). And, indeed, at its deepest level, the Three Highs is a reflection of the age-old Chinese belief in the power of music to make men moral and nations strong. #

Confucius (551-479 BCE) himself saw the study of music as the crowning glory of a proper upbringing: “To educate somebody, you should start from poems, emphasize ceremonies, and finish with music.” For the philosopher Xunzi (312-230 BCE), music was “the unifying center of the world, the key to peace and harmony, and an indispensable need of human emotions.” Because of these beliefs, for millennia Chinese leaders have invested vast sums of money supporting ensembles, collecting and censoring music, learning to play it themselves, and building elaborate instruments. The 2,500-year-old rack of elaborate bronze bells, called a bianzhong, found in the tomb of the Marquis Yi of Zeng, was a symbol of power so sacred that the seams of each of its sixty-four bells were sealed with human blood. By the cosmopolitan Tang Dynasty (618-907), the imperial court boasted multiple ensembles that performed ten different kinds of music, including that of Korea, India, and other foreign lands. #

In 1601, the Italian Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci presented a clavichord to the Wanli Emperor (r. 1572-1620), sparking an interest in Western classical music that simmered for centuries and boils today. The Kangxi Emperor (r. 1661-1722) took harpsichord lessons from Jesuit musicians, while the Qianlong Emperor (r. 1735-96) supported an ensemble of eighteen eunuchs who performed on Western instruments under the direction of two European priests—while dressed in specially-made Western-style suits, shoes, and powdered wigs. By the early 20th century, classical music was viewed as a tool of social reform and promoted by German-educated intellectuals like Cai Yuanpei (1868-1940) and Xiao Youmei (1884-1940). #

Future premier Zhou Enlai ordered the creation of an orchestra at the storied Communist base at Yan’an, in central China, for the purpose of entertaining foreign diplomats and providing music at the famed Saturday night dances attended by Party leaders. The composer He Luting and the conductor Li Delun undertook the task, recruiting young locals—most of whom had never even heard Western music—and teaching them how to play everything from piccolo to tuba. When Yan’an was abandoned, the orchestra walked north, performing both Bach and anti-landlord songs for peasants along the way. (It reached Beijing after two years, just in time to help liberate the city in 1949.) #

Professional orchestras and music conservatories were founded across China in the 1950s—often with the help of Soviet advisors—and Western classical music became ever more deeply rooted. Although it was banned outright during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76), as was most traditional Chinese music, Western musical instruments were used in all the “model revolutionary operas” that were promoted by Mao Zedong’s wife, Jiang Qing, and performed by amateur troupes in virtually every school and work unit in China. In this way, a whole new generation was trained on Western instruments, even though they played no Western music—doubtless including many of those leaders who, in their retirement, were recruited to the Three Highs. Classical music thus made a quick comeback after the Cultural Revolution ended and is today an integral part of China’s cultural fabric, as Chinese as the pipa or erhu (both of which were foreign imports)—the qualifying adjective “Western” has been rendered superfluous. #

In recent years, China’s leaders have continued to promote music—and, thereby, morality and might—by channeling resources into state-of-the-art concert halls and opera houses, the modern-day equivalent of bianzhong. The Three Highs, however, marks a high-water point in this effort, the first time in history that so many current and retired leaders have organized themselves into an orchestra for public performance. #

In late January it was reported that the Three Highs would not perform again (although participants noted the ensemble was never intended to be permanent). In speculating as to why—if this proves true—some suggested unease among the leadership at the existence of an ensemble comprising, and backed by, so many high-level retirees. Others noted the considerable expense involved and suggested that the Three Highs was at odds with the political zeitgeist, which now emphasizes Communist Party Secretary Xi Jinping’s eight new rules for curtailing official extravagance. In truth, however, the nexus binding music and politics in China is sometimes as fraught as it is fruitful. Arguments against state support of music are as old as those in support of it, but they have never won out. As the philosopher Mozi (480-420 BCE) wrote in “The Condemnation of Music”: If everybody loves and indulges in Music, neither the ruler and the nobles, nor the officials and scholars, nor the farmers and their wives, would be able to fulfill their duties. What is interfering with the affairs of the state? Music, of course! #

Go West, Young Orchestra

Sheila Melvin — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 23:09:57 +0000

It was not so very long ago that a concert tour in the United States was a dream come true for a Chinese orchestral musician – but times have changed. #

Indeed, the head of a major Chinese symphony recently told us that just a decade ago his main worry on a US tour was that one or more of his musicians wouldn’t come back to China. Nowadays, he said, laughing, his biggest problem is getting his musicians to agree to go to the US (or Europe) in the first place. They complain, he said, of jet lag, long flights, too little time for fun, language barriers, and accommodations and food that are sub-par compared to China. #

So, when a major Chinese symphony tours the US these days, it is not boondoggle, but hard work – as is the case with the ongoing self-proclaimed “commercial tour”(商演) of the China National Symphony Orchestra (CNSO), a 53-day, 30-performance slog that has taken it across sixteen states, mainly by bus. (Upcoming tour dates include March 2, in Ames, Iowa; March 6, in Las Vegas; and March 8, in North Ridge, California.) #

The CNSO tour includes a whopping 130 people, among them conductors Li Xincao and Shao En; concertmaster Liu Yunzhi; violin soloists Chen Xi and Li Chuanyun; and pianists Gong Pengpeng and Wu Muye. It is the largest scale tour ever undertaken by an orchestra from China, and also the longest in length with the most performances in the most cities – superlatives that explain why it has been dubbed the “Musical Long March.” The idea for the tour came from Columbia Artists Management, which saw the orchestra perform in Moscow in 2009 and offered to represent it in the US. Columbia initially suggested a 43- city tour, but CNSO management resisted, fearing that would be too much. And indeed, even in the shortened format, Chinese newspaper reports have stressed the exhausting nature of the tour; the “economy hotels on the side of the highway” in which musicians sleep; the winter storms in which the orchestra has been caught; and the endless hours spent on buses – including Chinese New Year’s eve, the most important family holiday of the year. #

Sheila caught the CNSO at Duke University earlier this month, where it performed the first movement of orchestra leader Guan Xia’s “Earth Requiem,” a powerful work written in response to the devastating 2008 earthquake in Sichuan; He Zhanhao and Chen Gang’s classic “Butterfly Lovers” violin concerto, performed by Li Chuanyun, who had arrived from China that day; and Beethoven’s “Seventh Symphony.” The orchestra appeared tired – not surprising, since it had spent most of the day travelling by bus from Virginia – but it rallied after the warm welcome given it by a house that was nearly full, despite heavy rain and a home basketball game. #

And, indeed, if the tour is commercial in nature, its goals are greater than the bottom line. A tour of this nature enhances the CNSO’s discipline, professionalization, and internationalization. Perhaps more importantly, it supports the political and cultural goal of “letting Chinese symphonic music go out into the world.” Chinese newspapers report that the CNSO has received standing ovations everywhere it goes and that American audiences in second-tier cities appear fascinated by the very existence – not to mention the quality – of a symphonic orchestra from China. The elderly woman seated next to Sheila at the Duke performance had driven two and a half hours to see the concert, and at the end – even facing the drive back home on a miserable night – deemed it more than worthwhile. #

“I am never going to get to China,” she said as she stood to applaud. “So if China comes to me – well, that’s just great.” #

Next Post: The China National Orchestra US tour #

Xu Bing: New Writing for a New Era

Sheila Melvin — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 18:21:52 +0000

Xu Bing continues to astound with his creativity and productivity. Here is an article that I wrote about one of his latest projects, “Book from the Ground.” The story was commissioned by the Asia Society’s terrific new website Chinafile and then picked up by The New York Times Chinese edition. Here it is, in English and Chinese: #

A New Tower of Babel #

SHEILA MELVIN December 04, 2012 #

用图标讲述城市白领自己的故事

SHEILA MELVIN 2012年12月04日

Xu Bing, the renowned Chinese artist whose many laurels include a MacArthur Foundation “genius” award and an appointment as vice president of China’s Central Academy of Fine Arts, has long demonstrated a fascination with the written word. #

著名中国艺术家徐冰获得过无数殊荣，包括一尊麦克阿瑟基金会“天才”奖，还被任命为中央美术学院副院长。多年来他一直向世人展示着一种对书面言语的迷恋。 #

His groundbreaking work, Book from the Sky, looked like Chinese calligraphy, but was actually nonsensical characters. Square Word Calligraphy, on the other hand, looked like Chinese but was actually English, while A Case Study of Transference was two live pigs—one inked with fake English and the other with fake Chinese—copulating in a book-strewn pen. #

他的成名作《天书》看上去像中国的书法艺术，但其实是一些无意义的字。《英文方块字》看上去像中文，实际是英文，而《文化动物》则是两只猪——一只身上写着假英文，另一支写着假中文——在一个铺满书籍的猪圈里交媾。 #

Now, after years creating art that explores, and upends, the power of the written word, Xu Bing has authored a novella, which was published in early summer. Formally titled Book from the Ground: From Point-to-Point, the tale recounts twenty-four hours in the life of a young white-collar worker in a major metropolis. #

在对文字的力量进行了多年的探索和颠覆后，徐冰写作了一本中篇小说，于今夏出版。这本书定名为《地书：从点到点》，详述了一个生活在大城市的年轻白领一天24小时的生活。 #

徐冰的《地书：从点到点》节选。 #

The man, who remains unnamed, seeks to advance his career and find love, but, like many of us, spends most of his time tending the minutiae of daily life: he battles constipation, burns his breakfast, dreads his boss, drinks too much beer, and spends too much money. The main prism through which he experiences the world is electronic—he compulsively checks Twitter, Google, and Facebook, spends his day making PowerPoint presentations (when not surreptitiously checking email), and searches online for romance. At night, characters from video games populate his anxious dreams. This prosaic existence is interspersed by a few device-free moments of genuine humanity, as when he contemplates marriage, yearns for nature, visits a friend who is sick, comforts another who is heart-broken, and brings a bouquet of roses to a blind date. #

这个我们始终不知道姓甚名谁的人在寻求事业的发展，还想找到爱情，但是和我们中的很多人一样，他要把大多数时间用在应付一些日常琐事上：他和便秘作斗争，早饭做糊了，害怕他的老板，喝太多啤酒，花太多钱。他主要通过电子设备来感受这个世界——他强迫性地刷Twitter、Google和Facebook，白天一直在做PPT（间或偷偷查一下email），在网上寻找爱情。到了晚上，游戏里的人物跑进了他焦虑的梦境。乏味的生活里，点缀着几个漫不经心中显露诚挚人性的瞬间，比如他盘算着结婚，遥想未来，探望生病的朋友，安慰另一个伤心的人，带着一束玫瑰赴第一次约会。 #

Like Leopold Bloom—the main character in James Joyce’s novelUlysses, which also takes place within a single day—the main character of From Point-to-Point is something of an Everyman. But, where Bloom is a hero, a latter-day Odysseus, Xu’s Everyman is an icon—that is, an actual icon. #

和利奥波德·布鲁姆——詹姆斯·乔伊斯(James Joyce)小说《尤利西斯》(Ulysses)中的主要人物——一样，《地书》中的人物也是个“普通人”。然而布鲁姆是个英雄，当代的奥德修斯，徐冰的普通人却是个图标——真的就是一个图标（图标即icon，除电脑图标等日常生活中发挥标志作用的图画外，icon在西方艺术史中又有宗教偶像的含义，这里强调图标的本意。——译注）。 #

Indeed, if this plot summary sounds slim, consider this: From Point-to-Point is “written” without a single word—at least as they are traditionally defined. Instead, it is composed with hundreds of icons, or pictograms, that Xu has been collecting for years. WhereBook from the Sky can be read by no one, Book from the Groundcan be read by any one. It is, in other words, a remarkable effort to create a universal form of written communication that transcends cultural, linguistic, class, and educational backgrounds. In Xu’s words, “The illiterate can enjoy the delight of reading just as the intellectual does.” #

实际上，如果这种情节概括显得过于简易，那么可以这样看：《地书》的写作没有用到任何一个词语——至少没有传统意义上的词语。它是用徐冰花了几年时间收集起来的成百上千个图标——或者说象形文字——组成的。《天书》没人能读懂，《地书》却是人人都能读的。也就是说，这是一次惊人的尝试，要用一种通用的书写形式来沟通，超越文化、语言、阶级和教育背景的局限。用徐冰的话说：“不识字的人也可以和知识分子一样接受阅读的启蒙。” #

Xu, in conversation with me and my husband, and in an essay he wrote about the Book from the Ground project, explains that the idea came to him during the many hours he spent in airports and on planes, where he regularly encountered pictograms. He began to study airline safety cards, which he calls “humanity’s earliest examples of common knowledge texts.” Then, in 2003, he saw a pack of chewing gum that had written on it, in pictograms, “after use, please wrap in paper and dispose in trash can,” and was inspired to begin collecting enough pictograms to tell a larger story. He argues that we are only now realizing the true significance of the Tower of Babel—our languages have stagnated and are utterly unsuited to the global village in which we live. Philosophers have long dreamed of a shared language (and in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, some of Europe’s greatest minds thought this language could be rooted in Chinese) but in today’s world, it is increasingly a necessity as much as an ideal. And, thanks to global marketing images and icon-based computer commands, we are increasingly primed to “read” visual symbols. #

在与我和我丈夫的谈话中，以及在一篇关于《地书》计划的文章中，徐冰都曾提到，之所以会产生做这个计划的想法，是因为他经常要待在机场和飞机里，被迫接触一些象形文字。他开始研究航空公司的安全须知卡，他称之为“人类最早的常识文本。”接着在2003年，他看到一包口香糖上用象形文字写着：“使用后请用纸包裹丢弃到垃圾桶中”，他因此而受到启发，开始收集足够的图标，用来讲一个长篇故事。他提出我们实际上到现在才意识到巴别塔的真正意义——我们的语言已经停滞不前，完全不适应我们现在的地球村生活。哲学家很久以前就开始设想一种共享的语言（在17和18世纪，欧洲的一些伟大思想家认为这种语言也许会以中文为基础发展出来），但到了今天，这样的语言已经不再是某种理想，而是一个越来越迫切的需要了。在全球市场推广图像和基于图标的电脑命令帮助下，我们越来越接近“可读”的视觉符号。 #

This all makes great sense and I certainly think the MacArthur committee got it right when it deemed Xu a “genius.” But for one who is as possessed as I am by the power of the written word,From Point-to-Point was a challenging read. I marveled at its beauty on the page but was frustrated by the absence of lyric and poetry, which are so anchored to sound, and annoyed by the clumsy manner in which my brain “translated” the pictographs into words and sentences I could comprehend. Simple though the plot is, there were also parts I frankly didn’t get because I didn’t understand the icons. (Fortunately, I had readily available translators in my eleven-year-old son and nine-year-old daughter, who instantly accepted the premise of a book of icons and had little problem following the story.) I also got a bit tired of story’s emphasis on bodily functions and bathroom humor, and the lack of big ideas—but, then again, I feel that way about much of contemporary fiction. #

这些都是能自圆其说的，我也相信麦克阿瑟基金会授予徐冰“天才”称号是个正确的决定。不过像我这样一个在文字的力量前毫无抵抗力的人，读起《地书》来还是有些困难。我沉醉于页面的美感，但是词意和诗意的缺失让我倍感折磨，这两样东西都是紧紧依附于声音之上的。此外，我不断需要用大脑去把象形文字“翻译”成我能理解的词语和句子，这种笨拙的方式也令人心烦。故事的情节并不复杂，但坦率地说有些地方我还是没看懂，因为我无法理解图标的含义（幸好我有个现成的翻译，就是我的11岁的儿子和9岁的女儿，他们第一时间就领会了图标书的概念，对情节理解没有任何问题）。另外还让我感到腻味的是，故事过多依赖身体功能和厕所幽默，缺乏大的构思——不过，话又说回来，当代虚构作品有很多都给我留下这种印象。 #

Xu shares this frustration—he professes embarrassment at having to resort to standard written language in order to explain the premise of his pictographic script. But, as he says, the significance of this effort is in the attempt and all written languages go through lengthy periods of development. Book from the Ground: From Point-to-Point is a work in progress—it is also a genuine work of art. #

徐冰自己也有这个困扰——他表示现在为了解释他的象形文本，还是不得不求助于标准的书面语言，这是很丢人的。但是他也说这个计划的意义在于尝试，任何书面语言都是要经历漫长的发展过程的。《地书：从点到点》是一本未完成的书——同时也是一件真正的艺术品。 #

This article was first published in English by ChinaFile, a new online magazine from the Center on U.S.-China Relations at the Asia Society in New York. #

本文最初2012年11月21日以英文发表于中参馆(ChinaFile)，这是亚洲协会(Asia Society)中美关系中心最新出版的在线杂志。 #

翻译：经雷 #

An “Ocean China” New Year Concert

Sheila Melvin — Sat, 05 Jan 2013 08:11:17 +0000

When the Communist Party of China held its annual plenum in the fall of 2011, it released a communiqué in which it announced its intention to become a major cultural power. This autumn, it held its five-yearly congress – the 18^th since it was founded in 1921 – and pledged to become a maritime power. So, to ring in the New Year at the Great Hall of the People – the same august venue in which these annual political gatherings were held – the Party combined both goals and held “The First Annual ‘Ocean China’ New Year’s Concert.” #

The New Year’s concert is by now an established tradition in China. State television started broadcasting the Vienna New Year’s Concert back in the 1980s and it was immensely popular for years. Shimmering images of the golden box that is the Musikavern and the gaiety of Strauss’ waltzes are thus as much a part of solar New Year celebrations as the boom and bang of firecrackers are of lunar New Year revelries. As the years passed, orchestras in China gradually started holding their own Christmas and New Year concerts. Then, as astonishing new concert halls sprang up like mushrooms, presenters began inviting foreign orchestras and ballets to tour during this period, especially from Russia. #

Today, there are hundreds of New Year concerts, held over a roughly two week period from mid-December to January 1, with the biggest events closest to New Year’s Eve. Chinese artists from around the world fly back to do multi-city concert tours –Lang Lang is a regular, holding recitals in 10,000 seat stadiums around the country. Orchestras nationwide earn their bread and butter by playing at corporate parties, which sometimes directly imitate an imagined version of 19^th century Vienna. Concert tickets have also become popular New Year’s gifts – the more expensive the ticket, the better. Prosperous companies and banks in interior cities that lack their own symphonies hire orchestras from coastal cities and fly them out to perform at private concerts. #

The Great Hall of the People, which stands on Tiananmen Square, is a massive marble monolith that was built to impress. Its main hall seats 10,000 people and has a red and gold star for a chandelier. Security is airport style and there is no fooling around – the ushers are soldiers in suits, their erect bearing, tall height, cropped hair, and unsmiling faces a dead give-away. To get from the front door into the hall requires traversing a red carpet the length of several football fields. Our seats were at wooden desks where Party and government delegates listen to speeches. The desks have little cubbies for papers and books, and in years gone by had red and green buttons that you could flip up and down while pretending to vote; after a renovation a few years ago these were replaced with an electronic system. Like pretty much everything in China, the Great Hall is available for rent, but this particular concert had official sponsorship from the Bureau of the Oceans. #

The Decemner 27 concert began with two well-known TV presenters reading from the 18^th Party Congress pronouncement regarding China’s determination to become a maritime power. The female presenter wore a blue gown, to emphasize the point, as did all female soloists. To underscore the size and global nature of China’s ambition, the orchestra was doubled to 160 people, with half the musicians from the China National Orchestra and half from the Russian National Orchestra, which is currently touring China. The program stuck to the theme – indeed, only ocean-themed pieces were permitted, with the exception of the encores (“Pleasant News from Beijing” and Strauss “Radetzky March”): Debussy’s “La Mer;” “Xisha – My Beloved Homeland,” a song from a late 1970s or early 1980s movie; “Making Nets By the Sea,” another movie song; Tchaikovsky’s “The Tempest:” an ocean-themed selection from Rimsky-Korsakoff’s “Scheherazade;” and Wagner’s “The Flying Dutchman” overture. #

At the end of the concert, the announcers returned to assure the audience that the ocean was nothing more than “China’s blue-colored territory” and that becoming a maritime power was part of the nation’s “renaissance.” #

“We will go straight to the sea,” they declared, “and never look back! Happy New Year!” #

Mo Yan Gets the Nobel Prize for Literature

Sheila Melvin — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 17:11:03 +0000

Nobel Prize for Literature Goes to Chinese Writer Mo Yan #

A Nobel Prize has at long last been awarded to a Chinese who lives inside China, and outside prison. #

Mo Yan, the 57-year old author of numerous novels and short stories, was awarded the prize this morning. He is the second Chinese to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature. However, the first – Gao Xingjian – lives in Paris and is a French citizen who says he has no intention of ever returning to China. Liu Xiaobo, the winner of the 2010 Peace Prize, is a literary critic who is imprisoned in China for his political activities. Chinese press coverage is thus calling the prize, China’s “first.” #

The awarding of the prize to Mo Yan will certainly be seen in China as another step in the nation’s cultural rise. It will also finally help lay to rest the Nobel Literature Prize obsession that has possessed China’s cultural and literary establishment for decades now – a mania that Liu Xiaobo, when he was a free man, called “childish.” (The Nobel Literary Prize obsession has been documented by Julia Lovell in her 2006 book “The Politics of Cultural Capital: China’s Quest for a Nobel Prize in Literature.”) #

Many of Mo Yan’s works have already been translated into English, including Red Sorghum (which the director Zhang Yimou made into a film in 1987), The Republic of Wine, and Big Breasts & Wide Hips. Mo’s translator is the prolific Howard Goldblatt, who compares the author’s work to that of Charles Dickens. Mo himself admits to being influenced by William Faulkner and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, a link the Nobel Prize committee seems to have picked up on in commending Mo “who with hallucinatory realism merges folk tales, history and the contemporary.” #

Mo’s writing is often epic, visceral, and bawdy. Many of his tales are set in his hometown of Gaomi, in Shandong Province, where the author was home eating dinner when he received news of the prize. Among these is Big Breasts & Wide Hips which tells the story of a monstrous boy named Jintong who grows up surrounded by women – including an all-powerful Mother, whose milk he insists on drinking for years beyond infancy – and buffeted by the many cataclysmic events that struck the Chinese people in the 20^th century. #

In the horrifically gripping opening scene of Big Breasts, Shangguan Lu (the mother) is in labor, alone; her husband and mother-in-law are too busy delivering a donkey foal to be at her side. This is just as well, since the birth of her last child – a seventh daughter – so enraged her husband that he threw a hammer at her head, splattering part of her skull onto the wall. Taking a break from the donkey delivery, the mother-in-law stops in to see how Shangguan Lu’s labor is progressing: #

“I thought you’d have had it by now.” [She] reached out to touch her belly. Those hands – large knuckles, hard nails, rough skin, covered with blood – made her cringe; but she lacked the strength to move away from them as they settled unceremoniously onto her swollen belly, making her heart skip a beat and sending an icy current racing through her guts. Screams emerged unchecked, from terror, not pain. The hands probed and pressed and, finally, thumped, like testing a melon for ripeness. At last, they fell away and hung in the sun’s rays, heavy, despondent, as if she’d come away with an unripe melon…. She watched one of those hands descend weakly and, disgustingly, thump her belly again, producing soft hollow thuds, like a wet goatskin drum. ‘All you young women are spoiled. When your husband came into this world, I was sewing shoe soles the whole time…’” #

The mother-in-law departs, saying “Our donkey’s about to foal. It’s her first, so I cannot stay with you.” Shangguan Lu then prays for the donkey. #

Mo has been criticized within China for being too close to the establishment; he is a recipient of the 2011 Mao Dun Literary Award and some interpret his writing as praising authoritarianism. China’s Weibo is already alive with criticism of the choice – as would be the case no matter who won. It seems fairer to say that Mo walks a fine line, does his best to stay true to himself as a writer, and, perhaps wisely, avoids the punditry circuit. Indeed, his self-chosen name means “doesn’t speak.” #

In a 2009 speech at the Frankfurt Book Fair, quoted by Raymond Zhou in China Daily, Mo briefly explained his philosophy: #

“A writer should express criticism and indignation at the dark side of society and the ugliness of human nature, but we should not use one uniform expression. Some may want to shout on the street, but we should tolerate those who hide in their rooms and use literature to voice their opinions.” #

He also added a well-known anecdote about Beethoven and Goethe, walking together in the Czech spa town of Teplitz, when they saw the Empress passing by; Beethoven continued onward, but Goethe removed his hat and bowed. #

“When I was young, “ Mo Yan said, “I thought what Beethoven did was great. But, with age, I realized it could be easier to do what Beethoven did, and it might take more courage to do what Goethe did.” #

Interview with Mo Yan: #

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2012-10/11/c_131900918.htm #

Measuring China’s “National Revival”

Sheila Melvin — Sat, 25 Aug 2012 00:05:50 +0000

Citizens of the PRC are accustomed to having reams of statistics thrown at them – indeed, contemporary Chinese rhetoric demands that any important speech begin with a recitation of numbers and percentages. The accuracy of such statistics is not taken for granted – even officials at the State Statistics Bureau have been known to advise that the stats they themselves release are best viewed as orders of magnitude. #

Even so, a statistic released in early August – and circulated widely on Weibo, the popular Chinese microblog service– came so far out of the blue that it was the subject of much mirthful twittering. Calculated by Yang Yiyong, of the National Development and Reform Commission, it announced that the “Chinese national revival” was 62% complete as of 2010. (By way of comparison, it was 46% complete in 2005.) The apparent vagueness of the goal and the specificity of progress toward its attainment led to a rash of critical, often derisive commentary about the wonders of China’s “mathematical management.” Some also noted that the revival percentage roughly correlates with the number of years the Communist Party has been in power. #

Indeed, the entire, quasi-religious concept of “national revival”- more often translated as “national rejuvenation” – is closely linked to the Party’s vision of itself as the Chinese people’s savior. The basic line of this “magnificent, soul-stirring epic” is best summarized by the Party History Research Center. #

“The Chinese nation created a glorious civilization during its 5,000 plus year history, making outstanding contributions to the progress and development of human society. Then China went into gradual decline. After the Opium War of 1840, Western powers invaded China one after another. Having become a semi-colonial semi-feudal society, China found itself in an abyss of misery deepening by the day. To save the nation from subjugation and ensure its survival, countless people with lofty ideals desperately looked for a solution but to no avail.” #

Sun Yat-sen was among those who tried to save China– the Qing Dynasty was overthrown in 1911 – but he was ultimately unable to “bring an end to China’s subjugation and humiliation and the Chinese people’s tragic circumstances.” Then, in 1921, “the Communist Party of China, a proletarian political party armed with the advanced theory of Marxism, was born in China. History put the heavy responsibility of national independence, liberation, and revitalization on the shoulders of Chinese Communists.” Things then moved quickly. “On the waste heap of old China, the Party led the people in swiftly completing the task of reviving the national economy, conducting land reform and various other democratic reforms, winning the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea, and advancing various tasks of new democracy.” Fast forward – past a few “mistakes” – and we are in the current “golden era.” There is still work to be done – like reviving China’s cultural power – but under the leadership of the Party, anything can be achieved. “When it comes to the Chinese nation’s great revitalization, the key is the Party and the hope lies with the Party. #

To ensure that this vision of China’s revival is shared, Party propaganda organs constantly remind Chinese citizens of the great attainments made under its rule and the great difficulties it has overcome on their behalf. “The Road to Rejuvenation” is the name of a movie, a theatrical production, and a massive permanent exhibit at the National Museum of China. (An insightful review of the museum exhibit by Ian Johnson is here.) When the Party looks back at the “Road” it has traveled, there are a number of convenient blind spots in its rear view mirror – entire years, even decades, are erased because they were given over to devastating political “mistakes” like the Great Leap Forward and the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. But, when it looks forward, it has a very clear road map or “national revival blueprint” under which a “well-off society” will be achieved by 2020. That year, of course, is just one behind the 2021 centennial of the founding of the Party – when the “national revival” will presumably be near100% complete and a new metric will be needed for measuring continued progress under Party rule. #

Army Art in Beijing

Sheila Melvin — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 16:04:06 +0000

The August 1^st, 1927 founding of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is an anniversary marked each year by a host of commemorative events. Because the People’s Liberation Army is one of the most important arts organizations in the country, most of the celebratory activities are cultural. #

Events held in Beijing this year included several performances of the model revolutionary ballet “The Red Detachment of Women;” an opera (based on an old movie) called “The Eternal Radio Signal” (which was about as good as it sounds); and a major art exhibition at the National Art Museum of China. #

Sheila recently wrote about the exhibition – the biggest military-themed art expo ever held in China – in the International Herald Tribune, in an article entitled “Chinese Army Exposes Its Artistic Side.” #

In this posting, we have included several interesting images that did not get included in the article. The first painting – “Sewing the Flag on the Eve of Liberation” – at first glance looks derivative. (As one friend put it, “Betsy Wang!”) In fact, the scene is inspired by the story of “Jiang Jie,” or Sister Jiang, a renowned revolutionary heroine – supposedly based on a real martyr – who is the subject of a novel, a stage drama, an opera, and a movie. In this painting, the imprisoned Jiang and her Communist sisters are cheerfully embroidering golden stars on a red bed quilt to make a flag that will mark the founding of the People’s Republic. Those who know the story will be aware that execution by the guns of the KMT awaits the glowing Sister Jiang, who is symbolic of selfless dedication to the Communist Party. #

The next painting, “Xibaipo – 1949″ shows Mao Zedong seated in a shaft of sunlight as Liu Shaoqi lectures the troops. Xibaipo is the village in Hebei from which Communist Party and the People’s Liberation Army conducted the last stages of the revolution from May 1948 to March 1949. When they left Xibaipo, it was to March to Beijing. If you look at the walls, you will see that they are hung with CCP flags; the two framed portraits on the wall are of “Zhu-Mao,” that is Zhu De and Mao Zedong. If you look carefully, you can see a young Deng Xiaoping in the audience – and probably many other future leaders, too. The books lying on tables may be copies of the “Chinese Land Law;’ a National Land Law Conference was held in Xibaipo and chaired by Liu Shaoqi – this is probably what he is lecturing on. The land law, which began to be propagated as early as 1947, made 100 million peasants owners of their own land and bought their support for the Party. #

The first painting below – “Nan Sha Sky Shower” – was done by the curator of the exhibition, Li Xiang. The soldiers, he explained, are bathing in the rain after being stationed on the Nan Sha Islands (known elsewhere as the Spratleys). It was dry and there was no fresh water, so they are eager to take advantage of the downpour. Mr. Li – who himself visited the Nan Sha to “experience life” there – pointed out the plant strategically placed to block one soldier’s private parts. The exhibition featured paintings of all the contested islands in the South China Seas. #

The next image – “In the Interest of the People” – is a detail of an astonishing woodblock print by Dai Daquan and He Fenglin. It shows Mao Zedong carrying a coffin – the one and only time he ever did this. Zhu De is also a pallbearer. The coffin holds the body of Zhang Hao, a Cominterm representative who was also a nephew of Lin Biao. Unfortunately, sites mentioning Lin – Mao’s designated successor, who allegedly tried to assassinate him in 1972 and died in a plane crash while fleeing to the USSR – are blocked in China so we can’t tell you any more about Zhang. The sea of mourners you see surrounding the coffin carry banners or floral arrangements that contain the Chinese word dian, which means to mourn or grieve. #

The last image comes from a series of paintings – the guns are pointing at the viewers, and the PLA is “Ready!” #