CHINA A REPORTER LOOKS AT A REVOLUTION

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27533, 15 December 1954, Page 12

CHINA A REPORTER LOOKS AT A REVOLUTION

IBs/

JAMES CAMERON]

I . . XI. nf n series of five articles on China, written TIUS “by Mr jines Cheron of the “News Chronicle.”

live peace and “° re r £ cog nise the please. I can , name which middle character ofmy name, wmc _ ah I can read Confucius in the SfuXßry" a k n and X»o°r f tg i‘ow O tae S the more tamFiiar double-think, has made English the hardest tongue of al In these circumstances, old_ phrases assume a new meaning, the veiy words of which they are composed have buried implications, accepted only by the devout. There isi a glossary. Today one does not casually fneak ' of “communism out, democracy; for ‘‘P ro^ e “ lve .. feu r revolutionary; the word feudal, means "before nineteen *? r t y ' nin ?" “Landlord” implies robber baron; for “Soviet" read infallible, for Mao read God. “Hero” is a worker who has exceeded his norm; a saboteur is someone who hasn t. For the real outsiders are saved terms like in dividualist, bourgeois or liberal. They were all jolly original and new’ on our side 20 years ago, it is‘ ‘"terest ing to see the pattern absorbed here as readily as a new bicycle. In Chinese, which is a beautiful lananace full of complex imagery, ruTRA is taken off these

much of the curse is raKeii oil time-worn adages. In any c jse, tb ey are not particularly sillier than the opposing jargon of the other side, which talks of Chinese pansionism” (as though these P e °Pjc didn’t have their work cut out to fix up their own mammoth countryside) and tags a secondary meaning on to “progressive,” and produces “fellow traveller” as the final kiss of death. It is no sillier, but it is exasperating to find anything silly in this ancient land, which is P os^,l^ the unsilliest in the world. “hey don’t mean it; they just say it is. They are carving an utterly new ana extraordinary thing out of the groping wilderness of poor old China, and they are defining it in the banal old terms of Marble Arch, of people who still had someone to fight. Who Runs China? Now the affairs of the world’s largest Communist republic, the greatest human community on earth, are run by numbers of likeable, able, often brilliant, non-committal men of a certain age, who all look like schoolboys, who dress to a man in well-tailored dungarees, and who look upon me with much the same guarded astonishment as 1 do them. It is like working on both sides of the zoo bars at once. The inquisitive stranger, thefi, spends many a long hour among these powerful, youngold, skilfully ingenuous veterans of the revolution, sitting among the most dispiriting Tottenham Court road fittings (in midst of which may well be a reproduction of a Tang horse) drinking endless cups of fragrant tea and smoking Chinese cigarettes

dllU axiiuiuixg ( which to my beaten-up palate are indistinguishable from the best English). They give me every courtesy, show every wish to help me in what they consider a doubtless respectable but wholly incomprehensible job. They present me with assessments and figures, which are usually percentages of a nonavailable base, amounting to a great deal philosophically but statistically to the square root of zero. When that happens I am usually fairly glad; if I want to see China’s new prosperity I can walk in the streets, or look from the train windows, or visit the markets, or spend a morning in one of the multitudes of nursery schools among the most enchanting children alive. If I want to see where new China fails then I may wait long enough; if the demonstration exists I shall not see it. So it is no good the viceminister for this or for that wrapping me up in graphs and lining his periods, like a cook spicing a cake, with “under the glorious leadership of Chairman Mao, of “with the inspiring example of the Soviet

Union,” or “since we emerged fnthe yoke of imperialism." tiT; matters I am prepared to accept granted; .1 don’t have to be sola the vicious system the Communist, replaced; everyone knew it; J d have to be told when I am aski». for a definition of “rich peasants’’ thii the proletariat is well fed, I car, it wherever I go; I don’t need to told how grateful People’s China u for the Soviet industrialisation ns tribution, I can read it in any of tfe millions of dedicated hand-outs thS seem to constitute the entire tai duct of the People’s democrat presses. I have come so seriously k admire the Chinese over the last t« weeks that I could kick them in tl» teeth for the imbecile way their leaders talk. The time comes fairly soon, on ■ job like this, when you balance th, awkwardness of being shot down els, where for the heresy of liking t£ new Chinese with the longer-tm; ! risk of compromising with the hets as apparently revealed, A lot S . troublesome reflection is therein wasted before you arc compelled fc sav that revolution in China has uro. 1 duced a nation more united, and » far as one can see. happier than i ever before and that by every ~ cognisable evidence they are, a, they ; endlessly claim, peace-loving, v No Control At the same time it is manifat ' practically no-one has the least con trol of the broad policy and w t . ; formance of their leaders, and that the leaders in their turn know 1 little about the language of inter ' national persuasion as the Russians which is saying something. I swev 1 there are surrealist moments when one has the lunatic impulse to say ! “Just let me run your propaganda ti a while and I would present you as 1 you are—industrious, anxious, well--1 meaning friendly people—but by M ■ means immortal, nor the only ones on earth”; and I’ll do you more good than a million words of jargon from the arid files of the Comintern,. It is vain and pointless to talk ! in terms of personal experience but there it is—the suspicion that mellows when they realise it is not mutual, the resentment born of frusta- : tions that are still more oriental thas Marxist. Yet—you see the simple peu. ant, chosen at random; and he is w palpably well rehearsed that It is pain, ful; you ask for a village, and you flm| yourself in one so immaculate thatiti roads are tramped smooth by the feet of the endless delegations that have preceded you. How do these people live? you ask yourself; and the answer seems to me: in answering silly qiw. tions from nosey foreigners and tellin them how well off we now are. Wool they all say that? I do believe the

would. It would be so nice to heat t from the heart and not from the' Clan of Cadres. The enduring memory of China will always be this curious alternation of hope and despair. The splendid and admirable things you find out for yourself; the bad are somehow always ex- , posed by your guides and mentors. The delight comes from the columns of ; well-clad and clearly beloved child- . ren, the evident lavish care of babies, ■ the friendship for strangers, the un- ; believable friendliness, the simple tad . that everyone looks redeemed? The : weariness comes from the emphasis os [ all the peripheral aspects of Communism—the badges on people's tunic the deism of Mao and Malenkov ■» , the other immortals, the evasivenes ; (no official ever knows the name a! , the street in case it is reactionary, N : one knows the day of the week, to i find out what is the price of a Ida- , phone call you are referred to the Mia- , ister of Communications). You taw . they are good, and they force bits of , paper on you saying they are perfect ■ You want to shout: “Just be happy and well shod and love your babies t you clearly do and your country as yw clearly do and not only shout ail d«y long about peace, but do somethli , about it,” and I am on your ride. & i just keep on telling me about th > glorious leadership, etcetera, and we'f [ have peace if we have- to lick the worii . for it, and in the classic phra*e,’Coli- . stant reader throws up. ; This is probably the greenhorn's reaction. In another week or two I ma: 1 have this petulance killed or cured. Is ; the meantime, let it be said that this is i a totalitarian state; and I am usm| . their wires and mails. This piece of ua- > easiness comes to you, probably for Uu 5 first time, through the courtesy of the i Chinese posts and telegraphs. Whit- } ever I may say. that is probably the . biggest fact of all. t (To be continued)