Battle for China's Past : Mao and the Cultural Revolution

the enemy class of rightists or about his role in the disastrous Great
Leap Forward, both events that helped shaped the way the Cultural
Revolution developed (Xu Zidong 2006).
Autobiographical ‘fiction’
There is a group of writers who write in Chinese and publish in China,
apparently without too much constraint. Examples of this group are Lao
Gui (1987), Zhou Changmin (1993), and Liang Xiaosheng (1988). 5 There
are a number of reasons for the publication of these works without
apparent censorship. First, the books fall in line with the official policy
of condemning the Cultural Revolution. Second, they were published in
the form of novels, which, according to the authorities, do not present a
record of history. Third, they were published by minor publishers in
remote provinces and thus initially escaped the central authorities’
control. Fourth, they do not name real personalities. Finally, in general,
these books are about ordinary people’s ordinary lives and therefore
sensitive and high-ranking CCP officials are not involved.
These so-called fictional books are actually autobiographical. Zhou
Changmin’s address is printed in his book, and thus I was able to
contact him. He told me that every story in the book was a retelling of
true events and only the names of the characters were not real. Xu
Zidong (2006) has done a content analysis of about 50 novels of this
kind and finds that they can be summarized into four categories: 1)
victim stories, that is tales of good people being victimized by bad
people; 2) tales with a moral, showing how the writers overcame the
bad events in their lives; 3) stories of absurdity (as seen from today’s
point of view); and 4) stories of misunderstanding and mistakes. Zhou
Changmin’s memoirs have all these elements.
Family memories
CONSTRUCTING HISTORY
Many others, like Deng Maomao, have written about relatives who were
prominent CCP personalities. These include Zhu Min (1996), Dong Bian
et al. (1992), Dian Dian (1987), Zhang Hanzhi (1994a and 1994b), Liu Siqi
and Wang Hebing (1993), Wang Guangmei and Liu Yuan (2000), Wang
Guangying and Liu Pingping et al. (1992). 6 A brief examination of these
memoirs shows that most writers and their parents were portrayed as
the victims of the Cultural Revolution radicalism but were restored to
positions of power and glory or vindicated later. 7
Understandably, memoirs by the victims or relatives of victims of the
Cultural Revolution radicalism often tell stories of brutality and experiences
of suffering. Generally, they do not blame Mao directly and personally,
but only indirectly by pointing their fingers at the Gang of Four and
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