Three on China
Clark, C. Walter Jr.
Three on China Red China Today, by Hugo Por-tisch. Quadrangle Books. 383 pp. $6.95. Love and Hate in China, by Hans Koningsberger. McGraw-Hill. 150 pp. $3.95. China: Empire of the 700 Million, by...
...The notable similarities in observation and conclusion of these three studies accentuate their authenticity and underline the importance of comparison through wider reading for those who seek to understand China today...
...that the obsessive concern of the leadership about the young generation stems from legitimate doubts about the ability of the youth, in mass, to accept wholeheartedly the ideology of revolution...
...These include Inner Mongolia, the ancient capitals of Sian and Loyang in the northwest, and key cities in the southeastern provinces of Kwangsi and Yunnan, which border North Vietnam...
...It is not surprising, therefore, to find sharp differences in the view offered by the three authors on a number of aspects of life in China...
...It is fragmented into thirty-three short chapters, and the transition from one to the next is often awkward and artificial...
...The Portisch volume, Red China Today, suffers from its format...
...that puritanical morality is one of the most obvious features of contemporary China, matched, as one might expect, by an obsession for cleanliness and physical training...
...Koningsberger is justifiably impressed by the contrast between the standard Western, particularly American, image of China and his own personal observations...
...that remarkably effective organization and forceful persuasion are abiding characteristics of the Chinese Communist Party, its functionaries, and subsidiary institutions...
...5.95...
...These are three welcome additions to our still meager knowledge of Communist China, and the Hamm book, at least, is "must" reading for concerned Americans...
...TTugo Portisch, an Austrian editor...
...The Hamm study, China: Empire of the 700 Million, is the best eye-witness account of Communist China I have yet read...
...While poverty remains symptomatic of China today, as it does of all developing nations, the relative abundance of the food supply, of consumer goods, and of jobs is reported and documented by each author...
...Koningsberger's book, Love and Hate in China, is the briefest of the accounts, and while it is not as broad nor as thorough as the others, it has the advantage of a more-or-less single theme...
...All three books reveal considerable research in preparation for the visits and writing, research essential for accurate and informative reporting and analysis...
...The author carries a background of competent research and dedication to accuracy into his observations and writing...
...that bitterness toward Russia is pervasive and deep-rooted...
...The result is excellent reporting, sound interpretation, and penetrating analysis...
...Perhaps the clearest agreement concerns the state of the Chinese economy...
...Doubleday...
...There is even disagreement on whether loudspeakers in trains can or cannot be turned off, or whether undeveloped film can or cannot be taken out of China...
...Only Hamm, whose account is certainly the best of the three, enjoyed the opportunity of visits to interior sections, less economically advanced and frequently off-limits to foreigners...
...What seems significant, however, is not that such differences appear but rather the obvious agreement in the three reports on major aspects of Chinese life...
...Other major areas of agreement in the three accounts include these: that the Chinese are willing, if not enthusiastic, followers of their leaders...
...that China's glorious past is vital in the Chinese view of themselves and their present mission...
...310 pp...
...China: Empire of the 700 Million, by Harry Hamm...
...and also that China, increasingly isolated from the two superpowers, strives to build socialism "out of its own strength" and to win its allies among the developing peoples and to establish equitable relations with individual Western countries...
...For unspecified lengths of time between the autumn of 1964 and the spring of 1965, the three authors toured the more populous and more accessible eastern third of China...
...Eight of the chapters are devoted to historical background and here errors occur: Hung Hsiu-ch'uan, leader of the Taiping Rebellion, was not the product of a Western missionary education, nor was Japan opened to the West before China...
...that the pride of nation, fired with an awareness of China's past relations with colonial powers, is channeled into intense hatred for the United States, viewed as the inheritor of colonialism, and into deep affection for the oppressed peoples of Asia, Africa, and Latin America...
...Although this is not an economy of abundance, neither is it an economy of starvation and disorganization characteristic of so many areas of the "third world" and of China itself in the 1959-61 period of the Great Leap Forward...
...Reviewed by C. Walter Clark Jr...
...His account, more than the others, focuses on the realities of revolutionary dedication, of dichotomous contrasts between good and evil, love and hate, and of the puritanical morality and concern for human welfare present today in China...
...The comparisons, in each case, are favorable to China...
...Of particular significance, in the light of recent developments on the mainland, is the description and analysis of the intensified anti-revisionist campaign under way during Hamm's visit...
...There is, for example, disagreement concerning the aesthetic quality of the Imperial grounds and memorials in and near Peking, disagreement on whether the dress of the Chinese is characterized by drab sameness in cut and color or by its variations, whether sexlessness is or is not the appropriate description of contemporary Chinese women...
...Three separate pairs of eyes, trained on the same object, frequently see three different things...
...and Harry Hamm, a West German reporter, are the most recent contributors to an expanding store of eye-witness accounts of Communist China...
...All three, by virtue of previous travel, draw comparisons between China and East European states and developing countries...
...There are other less striking errors...
...Change is one of the outstanding features of contemporary China, necessitating continuing study and first hand observation...
...Hans Koningsberger, a Dutch citizen, novelist, and American resident...
...He finds the people —the masses—as well as individual officials and functionaries, to be real and human, contrary to the image of political robots, slaves, or "blue ants" present in much of Western literature on modern China...
Vol. 30 • September 1966 • No. 9
