Essay Questions

What does the way in which Shao Bin looks at others say about himself?

Shao Bin looks down on others and this saga that he is actually very arrogant. Because the Communist state allocates things like money and housing, money real estate ownership do not give status or show that a person is hard working and successful. Instead it is education that does this; knowledge is both currency and measure of achievement. In Shao Bin's mind it also equals stays and he is a terrible intellectual snob. He states that "they were wine vessels and rice bags, their existence only burdening the earth, whereas he read hundreds of books and was knowledgeable about strategies." This shows he has something of a God complex in that he believes he can judge the worth of a person and their value to society based on his own criteria, and judged those with less knowledge of literature than him to also have less worth. Shao Bin is arrogant and has a superior and judgemental attitude which does not make him a protagonist who is easy to warm to.

Art is supposed to change people's minds and make them look at things differently. Is it contradictory to have artists creating propaganda for the state?

At the start of the Cultural Revolution, the artists producing Communist propaganda were actually creating art that changed people's minds, as life was forever changed and the status quo shifted. It was necessary to change people's minds so that they didn't try to resist the new Maoist ideology in favor of their old lives which they preferred. The propagandist art then becomes something that doesn't change people's minds, but prevents them from thinking at all. There is an inherent threat in all of the art (look at what happens when you are against the state) and implied reward for cooperation (if you are a faithful Communist then you will be rewarded like this man!) Under Mao there was no art in the traditional sense of the word; there was marketing, images and artwork created with the express purpose of oppressing the people and keeping them in line, the polar opposite of what art is supposed to do.

What does the novel suggest about the author's views on the Communist regime in China?

From the novel we are able to surmise that the author does not think highly of the communist regime in his former country. Much of the book deals with the way in which the regime dehumanizes people and takes away individuality. That is why the importance of keeping hold of one's dreams is seen as so important throughout the book. The government can take away everything from a person but they cannot own their thoughts or suppress their dreams unless the individual allows them to. The author also stresses the injustices that go on every day in China because the people at the top are corrupt. This corruption permeated society so that those who are at the top of anything at all are able to act in a corrupt way and remain unpunished. The book is sometimes more of a political statement than a novel and this in of itself shows us that the author believes the system in China to be corrupt and unjust.