An Inconsolable Cry: Yu Hua, Fictional History and China's Post-Mao Zhishifenzi
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An Inconsolable Cry: Yu Hua, Fictional History and China’s Post-Mao Zhishifenzi Richard John Lee ORCID 0000-0001-7534-8608 Submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 2018 Asia Institute, Faculty of Arts, University of Melbourne This thesis is submitted in total fulfilment of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. i Contents 1. Post-reform zhishifenzi and Fictional History........................................................................ 1 2. You’re not one of us: Coming of age in China .................................................................... 37 3. Of faith, trauma and farce – Fictional History explains Mao-era China ............................ 72 4. An impetuous brother ........................................................................................................ 124 5. The great emporium ........................................................................................................... 166 6. Lost souls ........................................................................................................................... 207 Conclusion: An inconsolable cry ........................................................................................... 240 Works cited ............................................................................................................................ 246 ii Abstract In this thesis I offer a cultural history approach to the issue of zhishifenzi identity in post-Mao China, and above all between the 1990s and the present. I examine the ideology of the zhishifenzi group – by which I mean both the stratum of educated people who saw themselves as having a leading position in the post-Mao reforms and also intellectuals belonging to that stratum who engage in critical discourse about thought and culture – by reading well-known works by prominent zhishifenzi writers and film-makers produced since the early 1990s. To examine these works, I introduce the category of Fictional History – fictionalized or fiction- inflected narratives of history which I see as reflecting the shared cultural perspectives of the zhishifenzi as a social group. I regard Fictional History as a means by which zhishifenzi assert a distinct identity and ideology, one that contrasts with that of other members of the Chinese middle class which emerged with the post-Mao economic reforms. I argue that Fictional History incorporates five different types of historical experience into a single socio-cultural perspective. These five experiences are: a particular experience of childhood, a particular experience of trauma in history, an experience and perception of marginalization by the rich in the post-reform period, a particular set of gender relationship experiences, and a particular narrative about experiences of social alienation and cultural detachment. It is hoped this research will assist in theorising the social behaviour and agency of an influential grouping in Chinese society as well as offering a new way of conceptualising recent Chinese cultural production. iii Declaration (i) This thesis comprises only my own original work except where indicated in the preface; (ii) Due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used; (iii) This thesis is fewer than the maximum word limit in length, exclusive of tables, maps, bibliographies and appendices. Signed…Richard John LEE Date…11 December 2018 iv Preface I wish to acknowledge the people and the Commonwealth of Australia for providing the material support necessary to undertake this project. v Acknowledgments: I wish to acknowledge the indispensable advice and assistance of Dr Lewis Mayo of the Asia Institute, University of Melbourne. I would also like to recognize the advice and support given me by the members of my advisory committee at the Asia Institute, Dr Zhou Shaoming, Dr Claire Maree, and Dr Michael Ewing. I also wish to acknowledge the assistance and hospitality of the librarian and staff of the Baillieu Library, University of Melbourne and of the librarian and staff of the Learning Commons of Victoria University. 我真感恩 vi 1. Post-reform zhishifenzi and Fictional History This thesis is founded on the proposition that social groups are who they are because of the stories they tell about themselves. The social group this thesis studies is what I call ‘post-reform zhishifenzi ” and the stories that this group tells about itself are what I call “Fictional History”. The terms “post-reform zhsifhifenzi ” and “Fictional History” are chosen because they convey the historical and cultural specificity of both the social group and the set of stories that I see that group as telling about itself. The Chinese word zhishifenzi - which literally means “knowledgeable elements” – goes untranslated in this thesis for two reasons. One is that it has two broad referents – “intellectuals” in the sense of people strongly engaged with problems of thought and culture, and “educated people”, a group understood as different from the “workers, farmers, soldiers and cadres”, who formed the four main officially recognised groups in Mao-era China. Because this thesis focuses on the work of people who were zhishifenzi in both senses - “intellectuals” in the sense of people engaged in critical analysis of thought and culture and “educated people” affiliated with the project of socialist China’s modernisation – the Chinese term is I feel the most appropriate way of conveying their identity. The other reason is that this thesis understands zhishifenzi in a very specific sense – it refers to a distinct social category, namely, the social stratum of those who in post-Mao China were set apart by their education and by their mission to enact China’s technical and cultural modernisation in the era of reforms initiated after the death of Mao Zedong. Zhishifenzi were a clearly identified and self-conscious social grouping which was strongly identified with the project of reform, while being also attached to the institutions of the planned economy. What this thesis terms “reform-era zhishifenzi ” were the group of educated workers (and to some extent university students) who had state-backed employment in the period of Deng-era reforms (essentially from the late 1970s to the early 1990s). From the early 1990s onwards, 1 this group lost much of its coherence as a social category as economic change and the orientation of Chinese society more and more towards the market deprived it of its former prominence. However, this thesis argues zhishifenzi maintained their own distinct ethos through this period, and it is this group of “post-reform zhishifenzi on which this thesis focuses. (To clarify, “reform-era zhishifenzi ” refers to zhishifenzi in the years between c.1976 and c.1989 and “post-reform zhishifenzi ” refers to zhishifenzi in the years between c. 1990 and the present.) “Fictional History” is a term that this thesis has coined to describe a genre of writing produced by well-known Chinese authors of literary fiction and producers of art cinema films that takes the history of modern Chinese society, above all in the Mao era and in the era of reforms after Mao’s death as its subject matter. This work is distinguished by its use of fictional forms and styles to depict historical themes and situations, even when these forms and styles are used in non-fictional works such as documentary films. Fictional History – which is invariably written with capital letters in this thesis – is understood as a distinctive cultural genre, unlike historical fiction, academic history produced by scholars and the official history produced by the Chinese state. This thesis argues that Fictional History is a distinctive manifestation of the social and cultural predicament of the zhishifenzi group when it was losing its social prominence between the 1990s and the 2000s and when it used reflection on history to express, explain and comment on its own identity and values. Who are the Zhishifenzi ? The origins of the post-Mao zhishifenzi as a specific social stratum can be outlined as follows: In the first decade after the death of Mao Zedong, three distinct groups of educated people became influential in the policy debates of the reform state in China. Each group had been shaped in their outlook by their different experiences of the Cultural Revolution. In the first place, the remnants of the established educated class had been traumatized by their persecution in the mass movements of the Mao period as elements of the ‘stinking ninth’ ( 臭 老九 chou lao jiu ) category of black elements. Another distinct group were the revenant sent- down youth ( 知青 zhiqing ) who reflected upon their own experiences of being sent to the countryside in the late 1960s and early 1970s as evidence of the failure of the Maoist 2 revolutionary project. A third group of educated people was comprised of those who had been children during the Cultural Revolution and who were the first generation of students admitted to higher education upon the resumption of the system of university entrance examinations in the late 1970s – this latter group includes one of the key figures whose work is examined in this thesis, the novelist Yu Hua ( 余华). State policy and the events of the late 1970s and early 1980s provided the conditions for this group – made up of the combination of the three different subgroups – to emerge as a dominant social stratum and to exert significant influence over Chinese society in the years between the late 1970s and the early 1990s. This group who collectively constituted the post-Mao