[Peace-discuss] defining the adversary

[E.Wayne Johnson]

Since my first name is Edgar (hence the E. because they call my dad Edgar) 
many of the
Chinese ask me if I am perhaps related to Edgar Snow.

I will keep my eyes peeled for a copy of Schwartz's book.  I recall you 
mentioning him before.
Mao means "hair"  in Chinese and the character suggests the appearance of 
hair.  It also means cat but
is a different character and not used as a family name as it is in German. 
Maybe the book "Rise of Mao"could be advertised as a "hair-raising account 
of the recent events in the Chinese Revolution".

Mao recommended that everyone should read the four great (quasi-ancient) 
Chinese novels that were
illegal during the reign of the Qing Dynasty:
Hong Lou Meng (Dream of the Red Chamber [or Red Mansion])
Xi You Ji (The Journey to the West)
Shui Hu Zhuan (Outlaws of the Marsh or Water Margin or All Men are Brothers)
San Guo Yuan Yi (Story of the Three Kingdoms)

Some of the translations of Hong Lou Meng are really deficient.

Xi You Ji introduces the Monkey King (Sun Wukong or Hou Ge - "Brother 
Monkey)
and Zhu Bajie (a pig-like man who brandishes a rake)

Shui Hu Zhuan is an outstanding adventure story based on real legendary 
events
sort of a over-the-top sort of Robin Hood outlaw gang who got together by 
chance events.
It was a TV series in the late 90s very well done.  I have not found an 
English subtitled version
of the TV series

San Guo Yuan Yi is a legendized account of the foundations of second Han 
dynasty about 300 AD and
recounts real events and real people.  Actually China has changed very 
little
on the deep cultural level.  There is to be but little doubt that
Mao was strongly influenced by the Shui Hu Zhuan and the San Guo Yuan Yi.
That must be true, because he said so.
San Guo Yuan Yi introduces Zhuge Liang (aka Kong Ming) who was
a brilliant thinker, inventor, and military tactician/strategist.
Many movies and TV series are based on the Three Kingdoms legends,
notably Red Cliff 2 which is much easier to understand if you had
read the book.

Of course there is also Sun Zi Bing Fa (Master Sun's Art of War).
Interestingly Sun Zi strongly recommends against War
and has very strong reprimands against pointless imperialism.
Of course American imperialism is not exactly pointless...


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "C. G. Estabrook" <galliher at illinois.edu>
To: "E.Wayne Johnson" <ewj at pigs.ag>
Cc: "peace discuss" <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
Sent: Thursday, July 29, 2010 11:04 AM
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] defining the adversary


>I read Edgar Snow as an undergraduate and was impressed with the picture of 
>revolutionary China, about which one heard little good in Cold War America.
>
> The best thing I read along with it was Benjamin Schwartz, "Chinese 
> Communism and the Rise of Mao" (1951). All these years later, I'm not sure 
> we have any sort of just appraisal of what the 20th c. has to teach about 
> political change, liberation, and human flourishing.
>
> The counterattack of neoliberalism has put paid, so to speak, to that.
>
>
> On 7/28/10 9:39 PM, E.Wayne Johnson wrote:
>> At the 2008 RNC in Minneapolis, the delegates for Ron Paul posed for a 
>> group
>> picture with a replica of the Fort Moultrie Flag (a crescent moon and the 
>> word
>> LIBERTY on a blue field). The flag had been signed by all the delegates 
>> and by
>> Ron Paul. McCain's thugs snatched the flag and said "This is McCain 
>> country. You
>> can't have that." The group did eventually get the flag back thanks to a
>> attorney who observed the snatching of the flag and offered his help.
>> I have been reading Edgar Snow's account of the Chinese Revolution 
>> written in
>> the 1930's.
>> In Hunan Changsha in 1920 a group of student demonstrators rallying for
>> democracy attempted to raise a red flag and were prohibited from doing so 
>> by the
>> police. They told the police that they under Article 12 of the 
>> Constitution they
>> had the right to assemble, organize, and speak, but the police were not
>> impressed. They said they were not there to be taught the Constitution 
>> but to
>> carry out the orders of the governor.
>> "From this time on I became more and more convinced that only mass 
>> political
>> power, secured through mass action, could guarantee the realization of 
>> dynamic
>> reforms" - Mao Zedong, 1937, quoted by Edgar Snow.
>>
>>
>>
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>