The two materials—the alphabet for Chinese phonetic writing and the 700 simplified characters—have been sent to Chairman Mao for review. He looked through the simplified characters. He believes this work need not be rushed, and one must not act hastily just because others are urging. The matter is of great consequence, affecting hundreds of millions of people, and is a long-term undertaking. Do not yield to external pressure and make decisions lightly, only to find yourselves in a passive position. More opinions can be solicited. A plan already exists and can serve as material for continued research and improvement.

Regarding simplified characters: Chairman Mao believes the current simplified characters are not simplified enough. Some differ from the original characters by only one or two strokes, while others still have many strokes. The stroke shapes remain awkward and cumbersome to write. For example, "氵" could be replaced with "讠" (note by the electronic edition producer: two-dot water radical). Writing two dots takes less time than writing three. In creating simplified characters, greater use can be made of cursive forms. Cursive forms are hard to remember. However, some cursive characters can be regularized to serve as basic forms, similar to Japan's katakana. With a small number of basic forms that are regularized, learning and writing become convenient. This would differ from the current order of Chinese characters. The number of Chinese characters must be greatly reduced, which means merging two or three characters into one, so that one character can substitute for several. For instance, the character for "circle," "圆," could simply use "元." "一元" (one yuan), "二元" (two yuan), and "花园" (garden) would also use the character "元." Only this can be called simplification. Borrowing can be utilized, and simple, easy cursive forms can be adopted, rather than cursive forms with complex and difficult strokes. By reducing the number of Chinese characters and greatly reducing the strokes in each character—and for those hard to reduce, using borrowing—true simplification can be achieved. With fewer strokes, writing becomes smoother.

He gave an example: the radical "氵" could be written with a single stroke as "し." To regularize character forms, one cannot follow the original conventions, because the original simplified characters lack any regularity.

Regarding phonetic writing: Chairman Mao believes the alphabet we are using has overly complex strokes, some even harder to write than the Zhuyin alphabet.

Chairman Mao thinks: why insist on square shapes? Square characters have done immeasurable harm for a thousand years. The strokes of the alphabet should lean in one direction. The "Eight Principles of Yong" must be abolished; such a writing method does not meet modern requirements. Currently, some of these letters have many strokes, some are awkward to write, and the stroke directions are complex, too entangled, spreading in all directions, making them hard to write. It is precisely because the stroke directions of Chinese characters are chaotic that cursive script emerged. Cursive script fundamentally breaks the square format.

Because the strokes of original Chinese characters are detestable, they must be shattered. The Chairman approves of making more revisions to the Zhuyin alphabet and also approves of switching to a two-syllable system to replace Chinese characters. For example, the current set of letters is not good for replacing Chinese characters, because some letters and phonetic symbols are even harder to write than Chinese characters and cannot compete, so this kind of phonetic alphabet will be eliminated.

Similarly, the Zhuyin alphabet cannot replace Chinese characters either. Three letters cannot be written together cohesively, and when combined with Chinese characters, they do not appear simpler. If a phonetic alphabet is not simpler than Chinese characters, it will struggle to gain a foothold among the masses. The Chairman is dissatisfied with this set of letters. No matter what, it must be simple, utilizing the simple strokes and cursive forms of existing Chinese characters, with the stroke tendency leaning to one side. Only then can it be accepted by the people. No one has ever considered the "Zhuyin alphabet" as a writing system. To create a phonetic writing system, even if it takes another year, that would still be considered very fast. If it is presented in its current form, I fear everyone will obstruct it. Effort must be spent on designing the alphabet.

In summary, the Chairman hopes the writing system can truly achieve simplicity. If it is not simple, it cannot be promoted. Because writing is primarily about writing, it must not only have a small number of characters but also be easy to write. For example, "云" is not easy to write; changing it to "士" is also difficult. The cursive form "e" is slightly smoother. Our alphabet must be better than the Japanese alphabet, not worse. The current Zhuyin alphabet and simplified characters are still inferior to Japanese kana. More opinions from various quarters must be solicited for improvement.

During this time, Director Guo Moruo met with Comrade Stalin in Moscow. Stalin was very concerned about our script reform and asked, "How is your script reform progressing?" Guo mentioned that under conditions of disunified dialects, Chinese characters still have their uses. Stalin said this is the talk of our intellectuals; for the illiterate, Chinese characters are meaningless. Guo said reform is imperative.

Script reform takes time; even ten years is acceptable. There is no need to rush, but it must be done well.

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Currently, no one demands the abolition of Chinese characters, but one must not go to the other extreme and defend Chinese characters. Learning Chinese characters remains difficult. … Our children spend two more years learning characters than those in countries with phonetic writing systems. Problems arise in our primary school language teaching. For instance, the first volume of the five-year consistent system language textbook is far shallower than those in phonetic-writing countries, yet people still complain there are too many new characters. Teaching it, students find it strenuous, and opinions are raised from all sides. The language proficiency of our primary school students lags far behind that of European countries. On my return from Dalian, I saw on the train Li Lisan's child (a third-grade student) reading Alexandre Dumas' novel *The Three Musketeers* in Russian and finishing it in three days. A Chinese third-grader simply cannot read a book of such depth. In arithmetic, foreign first-grade primary school students already have word problems; we only introduce them in third grade. How greatly this hinders education! If our descendants, generation after generation, must study two extra years compared to others, the loss is simply incalculable. Therefore, we must switch to a phonetic writing system. Considering issues like typing, printing, and telegraphy, the nation's work efficiency also suffers enormous losses. For telegrams, others use electric typewriters; for typesetting, others use machines. The time lost on these tasks is incalculable. As for the difficulty of compiling dictionaries, that is a minor matter. However, the reckless approach of thinking Chinese characters can be abolished immediately is also wrong. First, there must be a proper plan; second, there must be steps for implementation. In the past, script reform was thought to be too easy; now, the pendulum has swung to defending Chinese characters. Both are incorrect. Chairman Mao fiercely attacks square Chinese characters, believing they have done immeasurable harm for a thousand years and must be reformed. *Chinese Language* has been published for half a year, but articles fully explaining why script reform is necessary are rarely seen. For example, there is not a single article comparing the merits and demerits of textbooks in Chinese characters versus phonetic writing. To oppose square characters, solid evidence must be presented. Chinese-character telegrams, typing, and printing can all be compared with phonetic writing. Without doing this, sometimes even advocates of script reform waver. This is mainly because the key reasons for our script reform are not clearly articulated, and the logic in the articles is weak.

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Our program is that the script must be reformed. There must be no talk of not reforming or doubting reform. But how to reform and what the reasons for reform are must be clearly stated.

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Advocating script reform is correct. The shortcoming lies in the lack of detailed investigation, research, and comparison, with no facts to support the arguments in the articles. Often, there is much discussion but little scientific research. For example, on the issue of typing, we need to collect the performance data of the most skilled, moderately skilled, and unskilled Chinese typists and make concrete comparisons with equivalent typing performance data in English and Russian. Only then can we persuade people.

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The so-called "leaning to one side" for character strokes means the stroke tendency must be smooth. For example, the character "水" is not easy to write because its direction changes frequently. The character "三," though its direction is smooth, has too many starting strokes and is not considered easy to write either. Characters like "水" must be reformed.

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"Leaning to one side" does not mean every stroke in every character goes in the same direction. For instance, "千" can remain unchanged, because it resembles the Arabic numeral "4" and is easier to write than "干." The main point is to avoid too many starting strokes. The writing must be fluent, which does not mean eliminating all right-to-left directions. The organization of strokes must also be simple.

Chairman Mao's intention is to carry out a major reform. Such a project will be somewhat complex and must be considered together with substitute characters.

Pinyin writing must be compatible with Chinese characters. It cannot be assumed that it will be implemented immediately upon announcement on a certain day; preparations must be made for it to be used alongside Chinese characters for a period. In the pinyin scheme, some symbols in simplified characters can be replaced with pinyin letters, which is fine, especially for function words. For example, the character "的" can be replaced with a letter. Function words must be extremely simple, with each character consisting of one or two strokes, and it is not necessary to simplify only those that already have commonly used simplified forms. For instance, the character "的" originally had no simplified form, but it is used most frequently and must be simplified.

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Some place names that are difficult to write should also be changed. For example, Zhouzhi (盩厔), Fuxian (鄜县), and Huhu (鄠郿) can all be replaced with pinyin letters.

(Based on materials provided by the Capital Writing Revolution Rebel Liaison Headquarters)