Red Azalea is a memoir of Chinese American writer Anchee Min (b. 1957). It was written during the first eight years she spent in the United States, from 1984 to 1992, and tells the story of her personal experience during the Cultural Revolution.
It was published in 1993 in the United Kingdom by Victor Gollancz Ltd.
The name comes from a proposed film about Jiang Qing that was canceled; Min had auditioned to be a part of that film. [1]
The memoir was originally written in English and was not translated from another language. Min stated that she could not properly convey her feelings in Chinese. [2] According to Min, "In Chinese, we don't have the vocabulary for intimate feelings." [3]
Min stated "I wrote Red Azalea for the ghost of Little Green", referring to a female friend on a collective farm. [4] Min stated that "Little Green" accused a boy of raping her; according to Min, in fact, the friend had consensual sexual intercourse, and authorities put pressure on her to say it was rape. Min stated that the friend experienced insanity after the boy was put to death. [4]
The memoir was written in English. The names of the characters were translated into English instead of being spelled phonetically. For example, Min's first name, Anchee, means Jade of Peace, and her siblings' names are Blooming, Coral, and Space Conqueror. The autobiography deals with themes of ideology and gender and sexual psychology.
In part one, Min tells the story of her childhood in Shanghai under the rule of Mao Zedong during the 1960s. She believes wholeheartedly in Mao's Communism, and is an outstanding student. Her first conflict with this system comes when a favorite teacher is put on trial for espionage and the young Anchee Min is expected to testify against her.
Part two tells of her life on a farm outside of Shanghai with other teenagers. She is moved to a place called Red Fire Farm, a labor camp. She was assigned to work there and has little hope of escaping her life of manual labor. At this point, Min finds a role model to follow and stays on track with Maoism. She soon finds difficulty, however, when a friend is mentally broken by interrogation and humiliation after being discovered in a sexual situation with a man. Abuse of power by her superiors and a lesbian relationship with another farm-worker further erode Min's trust in Maoism. At the end of Part Two, she has been selected to move back to Shanghai and train to be an actress.
Part three is the story of her training at a film studio, in competition with other young trainees. More abuse of power and complex love relationships exacerbate her disillusion with Mao's system. She comes in and out of favor with her superiors in the film studio, depending on who is in charge. Eventually, her acting career falls through, and Min works as a clerk in the studio. At the end of part three, in 1976, Mao dies, and his wife Jiang Qing is arrested. The next few years are briefly mentioned, and the memoir ends with a short explanation of how Min came to live in the United States in 1984.
Helena De Bertodano of The Daily Telegraph wrote that critical reception in Western countries was positive. [4]
Harriet Evans in The China Quarterly wrote that the initial portion is "reads as a plausible account of life" and that the latter portion "suggests something approaching fantasy." [1] According to Evans, "Hence a narrative that starts as an autobiography ends as a novel of romance and intrigue." [1]
Kirkus Reviews wrote that the work is "Fascinating", "haunting and quietly dramatic"; the magazine also praised the "poetic, distinctively Chinese diction" even though the author's use of the English language had "slight awkwardness". [5]
The book was banned in China. [2] De Bertodano stated that the revelations involving a same sex romance and "dissident stance" made the reception in China negative. [4]
The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC). It was launched by Mao Zedong in 1966 and lasted until his death in 1976. Its stated goal was to preserve Chinese socialism by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society. Though it failed to achieve its main objectives, the Cultural Revolution marked the effective return of Mao to the center of power in China after his political sidelining, in the aftermath of the Great Leap Forward and the Great Chinese Famine.
The Gang of Four was a Maoist political faction composed of four Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials. They came to prominence during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) and were later charged with a series of treasonous crimes due to their responsibility for the excesses and failures in the Cultural Revolution. The gang's leading figure was Jiang Qing. The other members were Zhang Chunqiao, Yao Wenyuan, and Wang Hongwen.
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Anchee Min is a Chinese-American author who lives in San Francisco and Shanghai. Min has published two memoirs, Red Azalea and The Cooked Seed: A Memoir, and six historical novels. Her fiction emphasizes strong female characters, such as Jiang Qing, the wife of chairman Mao Zedong, and Empress Dowager Cixi, the last ruling empress of China.
Katherine (ISBN 1-57322-005-1) is the first novel by Anchee Min. It was published by Riverhead Books in 1995.
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Red Scarf Girl is a historical memoir written by Ji-li Jiang about her experiences during the Cultural Revolution of China, with a foreword by David Henry Hwang.
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Ji-li Jiang is a Chinese author. She is most famous for the memoir, Red Scarf Girl, as well as The Magical Monkey King. She grew up and lived in Shanghai, China in a large apartment with her family.
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Lin Boqu was a Chinese politician and poet. An early supporter of Sun Yat-sen and member of the Tongmenghui, as well as a later participant in the Nanchang Uprising and the Long March, Lin came to be seen as one of the elder statesmen of the Chinese Communist Party.
Sun Weishi was the first female director of modern spoken drama (Huaju) in Chinese history. Sun's father was killed by the Kuomintang (KMT) in 1927, and Sun was eventually adopted by Zhou Enlai, who later became the first premier of the People's Republic of China. While in Yan'an, Sun aroused the enmity of Mao's wife, Jiang Qing, beginning a rivalry between the two that lasted throughout Sun's life until her ultimate death at Jiang's hands. During World War II, Sun lived in Moscow, studying theater. Lin Biao was also in Moscow at the time and proposed to Sun before returning to China in 1942, but Sun rejected him. Lin married another woman, Ye Qun, in 1943. Ye held a lifelong grudge against Sun for her earlier relationship with Lin.
Hu Lanqi, also spelled Hu Lanxi, was a Chinese writer and military leader. She joined the National Revolutionary Army in 1927 and the Chinese branch of the Communist Party of Germany in 1930. She was imprisoned by Nazi Germany in 1933 and wrote an influential memoir of her experience, for which she was invited by Maxim Gorky to meet him in Moscow. After the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937, she organized a team of women soldiers to resist the Japanese invasion, and became the first woman to be awarded the rank of Major General by the Republic of China. She supported the Communists during the Chinese Civil War, but was persecuted in Mao Zedong's political campaigns following the Communist victory in Mainland China. She survived the Cultural Revolution to see her political rehabilitation, and published a detailed memoir of her life in the 1980s.
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