(Wang Hairong is a student majoring in English at the School of Foreign Languages)

Chairman: What kind of reactionary slogan did he write?
Wang: All I know is this one—“Chiang Kai-shek lives forever.”
Chairman: How do you say that in English?
Wang: “Long live Chiang Kai-shek.”
Chairman: Anything else?
Wang: I don’t know about anything else. That’s the only one; Zhang Huixian told me about it.
Chairman: Very well! Let him write more and post them outside for everyone to see. Does he kill people or not?
Wang: I don’t know whether he kills people or not. But if they catch him, I think he should be expelled and sent to a labor reform camp.
Chairman: As long as he isn’t guilty of murder, don’t expel him, and don’t send him to a labor camp either. Keep him at school to continue his studies. You can hold a meeting and have him explain: Why is Chiang Kai-shek so great? What good things has he done? Meanwhile, you can also discuss why Chiang Kai-shek is bad. How many people are there in your school?
Wang: There are roughly over three thousand, including faculty and staff.
Chairman: Among your three thousand students, it would be best to have seven or eight Chiang Kai-shek supporters.
Wang: Just one such person would cause quite a stir. Seven or eight—that would be outrageous!
Chairman: Look at you! You get all worked up over a single reactionary slogan.
Wang: Why seven or eight? Chairman: Having a few more will create an opposing force, serve as negative examples for others to learn from—so long as they aren’t murderers.
Wang: Our school has been following the class line. This year’s admissions were 70 percent workers and children of poor and lower-middle peasants. The rest were children of cadres, families of martyrs, and so on.
Chairman: How many worker-peasant students are there in your class?
Wang: Apart from myself, there are two children of cadres. The rest are all workers’ and poor-peasant children. They’ve been doing very well, and I’ve learned a lot from them.
Chairman: What’s your relationship with them like? Do they enjoy being around you?
Wang: I think our relationship is pretty good. I get along with them, and they get along with me too.
Chairman: That’s excellent.
Wang: We have one cadre child in our class who behaves very poorly. He doesn’t pay attention in class, doesn’t practice after class, just reads novels all the time. Sometimes he even sleeps in the dormitory. He often skips Saturday afternoon meetings and doesn’t return to school on Sunday mornings as scheduled. Occasionally, when there’s a class or Youth League meeting on Sunday evening, he doesn’t show up either. Everyone has complaints about him.
Chairman: Do your teachers allow you to doze off or read novels during class?
Wang: No, they don’t.
Chairman: Students should be allowed to read novels and even doze off in class. We need to take care of their health. Teachers should talk less and let students read more. I think the student you mentioned might go far someday. He dares skip Saturday meetings and doesn’t come back on time Sunday mornings. When you get back, tell him that arriving at eight or nine o’clock is still too early—let him come back at eleven or twelve instead. Who said you had to hold meetings on Sunday evenings anyway?
Wang: Back when I was at the Teachers College, Sunday evenings were generally not used for meetings. That time usually belonged to the students themselves. Once, our branch committee decided among a few cadres to hold a party organizational activity on a Sunday night. But many Youth League members objected. Some even went to the political instructor and said that Sunday evening was our own free time, and we wouldn’t be able to make it back then. Eventually, the political instructor agreed with the students and we rescheduled the meeting. Chairman: The political instructor did the right thing. Wang: Here, though, we keep using Sunday evenings for meetings—whether it’s a class meeting, a branch committee meeting, a grade-level assembly, or a Party study group session. From the start of the semester until I left, I counted and found that not a single Sunday evening went by without some kind of meeting.
Chairman: So when you get back, you lead the rebellion. Don’t go back on Sunday; just skip the meeting.
Wang: I wouldn’t dare. It’s the school’s rule that we must return on Sundays. Otherwise, people would say I’m undermining the school’s regulations.
Chairman: Regulations or no regulations—forget all that! Don’t go back. Just say, “I am indeed breaking the school rules.”
Wang: That won’t work. I’ll be criticized.
Chairman: I don’t think you’ll amount to much in the future. You’re afraid others will say you’re violating the rules, afraid of getting reprimanded, recorded, expelled, or even barred from joining the Party. What’s there to fear? At worst, you’ll be expelled. Schools ought to encourage students to rebel. Go back and lead the revolt yourself.
Wang: People will say, “Even the Chairman’s relative won’t listen to the Chairman and leads the charge in breaking school rules.” They’ll accuse me of arrogance and lack of organization and discipline.
Chairman: What’s wrong with you? You’re worried others will criticize you for being arrogant, for lacking organization and discipline—what are you so afraid of? Just say you rebelled because you followed the Chairman’s instructions. I think that student you mentioned may achieve more than you someday. He dares defy your school’s rules. It seems to me that some of you are stuck in abstract, metaphysical thinking.
(At another point, the conversation turned to studying.) Wang: These days, we’re not supposed to read classical works. That cadre child in our class keeps reading classics while everyone else is busy practicing English. He’s reading “Dream of the Red Chamber,” and my classmates are all complaining about it.
Chairman: Have you read “Dream of the Red Chamber”?
Wang: Yes, I have.
Chairman: Which character in “Dream of the Red Chamber” do you like best?
Wang: None of them.
Chairman: “Dream of the Red Chamber” is worth reading; it’s a fine book. Reading it isn’t about enjoying a story—it’s about understanding history. It’s a historical novel, and its language is among the finest in classical Chinese fiction. Look at how Cao Xueqin brings Wang Xifeng to life. That character is written so vividly; you couldn’t possibly create her yourself. If you never read “Dream of the Red Chamber,” how would you ever understand what feudal society was like? To really grasp the book, focus on these four lines: “The Jia family needs no pretense; their halls are of white jade, their horses of gold. The Afang Palace spans three hundred li, yet cannot contain even one member of the Shi clan from Jinling. The Eastern Sea lacks a bed of white jade; therefore the Dragon King summons the Wang family from Jinling. In years of plenty, snow falls heavily—pearls lie scattered like dirt, gold like iron.” These four lines serve as a roadmap for reading “Dream of the Red Chamber.” Have you ever read Du Fu’s long poem “Northern Expedition”?
Wang: No, I haven’t. It’s not included in “Three Hundred Tang Poems.”
Chairman: It’s in “Selected Tang Poems.” (At this point, the Chairman took out the book and opened it to “Northern Expedition,” handing it to me to read.)
Wang: What special precautions should I take when reading this poem? Should I get some sort of inoculation first to avoid being affected?
Chairman: You’re always getting stuck in metaphysics! What inoculations are you talking about? Forget about them! It’s better to let the poem affect you—to immerse yourself fully in the experience, step into the characters, and then emerge. Just read it carefully until you know it well; you don’t need to memorize it. Does your school require you to read the Bible or Buddhist scriptures? Wang: No, why would we need to read those things? Chairman: How can you be a translator without having read the Bible or Buddhist texts? Have you ever read “Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio”?
Wang: No. Chairman: “Strange Tales” is perfectly readable. The fox spirits in that book are actually quite kind-hearted and eager to help people! What’s the English word for “intellectual”?
Wang: I don’t know.
Chairman: Look at you—you’ve been studying English for ages, and yet here you are, an intellectual yourself, unable to even say the word “intellectual.”
Wang: Let me check the Chinese–English dictionary.
Chairman: Go ahead, see if it’s listed.
Wang: Oh dear—this Chinese–English dictionary doesn’t have that entry. It only lists “knowledge,” but not “intellectual.”
Chairman: Let me take a look. (Wang hands the dictionary to the Chairman.) Since it contains “knowledge” but not “intellectual,” this dictionary is useless; many words are missing. Your school should compile a high-quality Chinese–English dictionary, incorporating new political terminology and providing example sentences to illustrate how each word is used.
Wang: How could our school possibly compile a dictionary? We simply don’t have the time or the people to do it.
Chairman: With so many teachers and students in your school, are you really saying you can’t put together a dictionary? This dictionary should be created by you yourselves.
Wang: All right, I’ll bring this suggestion to the school leadership when I get back. I believe we can accomplish this task.
(Once, after the Chairman had met with foreign guests, he spoke with Wang Hairong.) Wang: Did the foreign guests speak English to you, and were you able to understand them? Chairman: I couldn’t understand them—they spoke too fast.
Wang: Then did you speak English during the meeting?
Chairman: No, I didn’t.
Wang: So you neither speak nor understand English—what’s the point of learning it at all?
Chairman: I study English to analyze languages, comparing English with Chinese. If I get the chance, I’d also like to learn a bit of Japanese.
(On another occasion, the Chairman asked Hairong to recite Wen Tianxiang’s poem.) Chairman: Suppose the enemy captures you alive. What would you do?
Wang: Since ancient times, who has avoided death? Let my loyal heart shine through history.
Chairman: Exactly. You should go back and read twenty or thirty classic Marxist-Leninist texts—some materialist works. It seems your theoretical level isn’t very high. When it comes to studying, forget about aiming for top marks or settling for failing grades. A solid B or C will do just fine.
Wang: Why not aim for an A?
Chairman: An A is exhausting. Too much content, too much pressure—overloading can be deadly. Take, for example, Emperor Gaozu of Han’s “Song of the Great Wind”: “The great wind rises, clouds soar; His might extends across the four seas, yet he longs for home. Where can I find brave warriors to guard the four corners?” This poem is truly magnificent, full of grandeur. Yet Emperor Gaozu himself hadn’t read much—he wrote such a powerful piece nonetheless. Our cadre children worry me. They lack real-life and social experience, yet they carry themselves with great pride and a strong sense of superiority. We need to teach them to rely not on their parents or ancestors, but entirely on themselves.