Writing Poetry Can Endanger Your Health - by Dave Jaffe Part Nine continued, Section Two

  The Poet as Ruler - Part Two by Dave Jaffe


   Mao Zedong was a poet, but a very traditional one. He often wrote poetry at times of political stress. A son of a middle peasant, he was born in China in 1893 and died in Beijing in 1976.
    In 1935 he took over the fragmented Chinese communist party and ruled it until he died. Aided by his political partner Chou En-Lai, he stressed Chinese self-reliance and modernization. Yet though many people praised him, he committed massive crimes. He and his communist companions imposed a ruthless, top-down style of government on China.
    This wasn't a great departure for most Chinese since they had never known any form of democracy. Many emperors were just as autocratic and ruthless as Mao.
     "Communism kills people inside its borders," said the cultural affairs critic Christopher Lasch in effect. "Capitalism kills people outside its borders." Mao Zedong proved Lasch's first statement about communism to be correct.
    After coming to power the communists killed about a million of their so-called 'class enemies' This alas was on great departure from common practice in the world either. If the Kuomintang had won the civil war they too would have killed millions of their communist enemies. Yet Mao went far beyond this.
     In 1958 he launched what was called 'The Great Leap Forward'. Hundreds of millions of Chinese were herded into large farming communes. They were also encouraged to build backyard furnaces so as to industrialize China which lagged far behind the rich western countries.
     The Great Leap Forward was an abject failure. Somewhere between 25 and 40 million people died from starvation as farmers stopped growing grain. Mao's partners in power pushed him aside, fearful of yet another disaster.
     Yet Mao launched a comeback. In 1966 he took a swim in the Yangtze River. The 73 year-old chairman of the Communist Party was telling China and his political rivals there, "You can't keep this old man down." Aided by his very left leaning comrade Lin Bao, he launched what came to be called 'The Cultural Revolution'.
     Mao had his youthful allies. Millions of young Chinese called 'Red Guards' raged across China, humiliating Mao's rivals in the communist party,smashing up museums,and skipping schools which were mostly closed down.
   They  sometimes attacked their teachers, and destroyed older people's lives. They were armed with what was known as 'The Little Red Book' that was full of Mao's quotations. "It is not wrong to rebel," Mao once said and the red Guards surely agreed with that. They were part of what was a real youth rebellion.
     Finally order was restored, but only after a million-and-a-half people were killed. The Red Guards were disbanded and sent to the countryside to work alongside the peasants.
    Mao's rivals like Lin Bao and Liu Shaoqui were now dead or in prison. Yet though China now had atomic bombs it was terribly isolated on the international stage. Soon Chou En-Lai, who was nearly killed himself by Red Guards, and Mao invited U.S. President Richard Nixon to China in 1972.
     Nixon came there and in Beijing toasted the success of the Chinese revolution. This was quite a switch for Nixon and the U.S.A who had supposedly hated the Chinese communists. Yet Nixon wanted to end the U.S. War in Vietnam and Indo China, and get re-elected president in 1972. The Chinese rulers helped him do both.
    For Mao Zedong the poet and revolutionary, Nixon's visit was another feather in his cap.