Beautifully conceived and reported collection of musings by Chinese
intellectuals, expertly stitched together by Link (Chinese
Literature/Princeton). These conversations catch Chinese academics,
scientists, writers, and dissidents at their most candid and
despairing about the ebb and tide of democracy and authoritarianism
in mid- and late-80's China. Two themes emerge clearly: that modern
China's intellectuals, adamantly upholding their traditional role
as the national conscience, are suffering deeply under Deng; and
that a fierce pride prevents them from giving up their positions as
dissidents. Link knows of this dilemma firsthand, having
accompanied dissident physicist Fang Lizhi the night that he was
turned away from Chinese leaders' farewell banquet for George Bush
in 1989. Here, the dissidents' discussions portray China's social
world as rife with political corruption, graft, nepotism, and
guandao, or official profiteering; young intellectuals point to the
students' rallying slogan at Tiananmen Square - "Sell the Benzes to
pay the national debt" - as evidence of how far Party morality has
sunk. The work-unit system, China's vast bureaucratic web headed by
Party officials at every level, is described as a suffocating
political octopus that fosters favoritism over efficiency.
University professors lament underfunding for education and their
own horrific living conditions, while historians wonder whatever
became of China's long-ago commitment to "liberty, equality,
fraternity." Perhaps most unsettling is the portrait of China's
disaffected youth, a political lost generation apparently subsumed
by cynicism and ennui resulting from the failure of the student
movement on what Chinese now call "Six Four" - June 4th, 1989. For
his part, Link is both compassionate toward and critical of China's
intellectual elite, concluding that more than brain power is needed
to "alleviate China's pain or restore its morale." An invaluable
opening onto China's best and brightest hearts and minds. (Kirkus
Reviews)
"A lively survey of today's China as seen by [its] brooding intellectuals. A terrific book." —Nicholas D. Kristof, New York Times Book Review Chinese intellectuals have a traditional duty, for which there is no equivalent in the West: to worry, to "take responsibility for all under heaven," to argue the question "What can we
do with China?" In this "utterly absorbing gem of a book" (
Library Journal), Perry Link conveys the worries besetting China's most prominent writers, journalists, scientists, professors, and dissident officials. Link creates "an invaluable opening onto China's best and brightest hearts and minds" (
Kirkus Reviews), allowing the Chinese themselves to tell us why Beijing took to the streets in Sprig 1989.
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