To Shao Lizi¹
(September 8, 1936)
Mr. Lizi:

Reading the newspaper I found that it remains focused exclusively on "bandit
suppression" and contains not even a single word about resisting the Japanese
bandits. How can such wise sages be so narrow-minded! I would venture my
view that the Mr. Lizi of the era of Consciousness² seems to have thoroughly
remolded himself as soon as he embarked on an official career. The situation at
present is going from bad to worse. It is not just that crying can be heard all
along the road, but in fact the whole country and the whole nation are crying!
Why can't you abandon the old and start afresh, restore the banner of the
Consciousness, and bring joy to the whole country and the whole nation? I pray
that you will read the letter to the Guomindang from the Communist Party. It has
been said: If a man of Yue bends his bow to shoot someone, I too will bend my
bow to shoot him, but if my own brother bends his bow to shoot him, I shall shed
tears and cry and try to reason with him.³ Surely you gentlemen do not regard
these tearful, crying words of reason as far-fetched, do you? To "open up the
Northwest" and "construct the Northwest" are certainly great ambitions on the
part of you gentlemen, but your methods are not appropriate. As a matter of fact,
Japanese imperialism has just such ambitions, and is going at it with airplanes
and cannons that shake the very earth. If you gentlemen wish to compete with
them in "opening up" and "constructing," and care to go at it with airplanes and

Our source for this letter is Mao Zedong shushin xuanji, pp. 54-55, where it is reproduced
from a copy in the Central Archives.
1. Shao Lizi (1891-1967), a native of Zhejiang, had been briefly attracted to
Communism in 1920, and had studied at Sun Yatsen University in Moscow in
1926-27. From 1928 to 1931, he was secretary general of Chiang Kaishek's military
headquarters. At this time, he was chairman of the Guomindang's Shaanxi government.
2. Juewu (Consciousness) was a supplement to Guomin ribao (Republican Daily),
published in Shanghai. Shao Lizi had helped to found the newspaper in 1915, and served
as its editor until 1925. He was also editor of the supplement from its foundation in
1919. Both papers moved gradually to the right after Shao left Shanghai for Guangzhou
in 1925.
3. The reference is to a passage from Mencius, VI, II, III, 2, which Legge (Vol. 2, p.
427) translates as follows: "There is a man here, and a native of Yüeh bends his bow to
shoot him. I will advise him not to do so, but speaking calmly and smilingly, for no other
reason but that he is not related to me. But if my own brother be bending his bow to shoot
the man, then I will advise him not to do so, weeping and crying the while, for no other
reason than that he is related to me."
cannons that shake the very earth to knock them out of the competition, then
your own "opening up" and "constructing" will certainly not have succeeded;
clearly it is a problem of method here. Speaking of this question of method, all
the citizens agree that it is possible to take counsel with one another, and I refuse
to believe that you alone, sir, find it impossible. If this is the case, then there is
actually no reason why the Guomindang and the Communist Party cannot cooperate with one another. It is said in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms: "The
trend of events in the empire is that when it has long been united, division must
follow; when it has long been divided, unification must follow."4 Your younger
brother and you, sir, have been separated for ten years, and now we once again
have the opportunity to join together. Do you have such intentions, sir? In any
event, I cannot write all that I would convey to you, and wish to express herewith
my kindest regards and hopes for your every success!

Mao Zedong

4. Mao here quotes the very famous opening lines from the Romance of the Three
Kingdoms, one of his favorite traditional novels, already referred to above.