* This article is based on a first draft prepared for a workshop or contemporary Chinese literature and performing arts at Harvard in June 1979 and a fuller version written on a visiting fellowship at the Department of Far Eastern History and the Contemporary China Centre of the Australian National University, May-July 1980. My debts are numerous, especially to Bonnie McDougall and Geremie Barmé and to many people in China.

1. Goodman's, DavidBeijing Street Voices (London, 1981) is an invaluable guide to samizdat literature.Google Scholar

2. As did those who published their work in Hong Kong in the 1970s, notably the contributors to the collection Gan you geyin dong di ai (Songs to Move the Earth to Grief) published there in 1974.

3. Allowing for many more readers than the few hundred copies in which most were issued.

4. For example, the film-script “ Zai shehuide dang'an li ” - on which see below -first appeared in Wotu; and part of the volume Bingchen qingming jianwenlu (Things Seen and Heard at the Qingming Festival in 1976), a collective memoir of the movement of April 1976 edited by “ Huaizhou, Tong ” (Peking, 1979), first appeared in the magazine Beijing zhi chun (The Spring of Peking).Google Scholar

5. An authoritative expression of the attempt to keep change to a minimum was Hua Guofeng's long political report to the 11th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in August 1977.

6. On the philosophers in 1978 see Brantly Womack, “ Politics and epistemology in China since Mao,” CQ, No. 80 (December 1979), pp. 768–92.

7. Wenhuibao, 11 August 1978. A good selection of stories from late 1977 and 1978, including these two, was translated and edited by Barmé, Geremie and Lee, Bennett as The Wounded (Hong Kong, 1979).Google Scholar For a good contemporary survey of the 1978 scene, see Barmé, Geremie, “ Flowers or more weeds? Culture in China since the fall of the gang of four,” The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs, No. 1 (January 1979), pp. 125–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8. The decision was announced in the Renmin ribao (People's Daily) on 16 November 1978, and followed by many press articles in the weeks that followed, of which a good selection can be found in Xinhua yuebao (New China Monthly), No. 409 (November 1978).

9. Report and editorial in Renmin ribao, 17 November 1978, and Xinhua yuebao, No. 410 (December 1978), pp. 82–85.

10. “ Minzhu yu yishu,” Shanghai wenyi. No. 11 (November 1978), pp. 4–10.

11. Widely printed, including Hongqi (Red Flag), No. 1, pp. 14–21, and Renmin ribao, 24 December 1978. On the meetings see the long article by Qi Xin “ Zhonggong wanchengle jizhuanwan - San zhong quanhui de taiqian-mohou ” (The CPP's U-turn -The inside story of the Third Plenum ”), Qishi niandai (TheSeventies), No. 2 (February 1979), pp. 7–17.

12. Anhui wenyi was allowed to resume a more elevated title, Anhui wenxue (Anhui Literature), from the beginning of 1980.

13. This is to judge from a volume of documents issued in amended form the following year: Wenyijie bo luan fan zheng de yici sheng hui: Zhongguo wenxue-yishu-jie lianhehui disanjie quanquo weiyuanhui disanci kuoda huiyi wenjian fayan ji (Documents and Speeches of the Third Expanded Meeting of the Committee of the All-China Federation of Associations of Literary and Art Circles) (Peking, 1979).Google Scholar

14. As, for example, by Liao Jingdan, a deputy head of the Central Committee's Propaganda Bureau, as reported in Renmin ribao, 31 December 1979, p. 4.

15. An exception of the story “ Xing ” (“ Star ”) by Liu Jie in the Zhongshan University student magazine Hongdou (Red Bean), No. 4 (1979), pp. 12–23. It is striking that in 1980 one of the few civilian magazines to devote a lot of space to this topic was the conservative Shidai de baogao (Report on the Age), which featured it strongly in its third issue.

16. Li Yang, “ Nide gaozi weishenme buneng yingyong ” (“ Why your manuscript is unusable ”), Ningxiawenyi (Ningxia Writing and Art), No. 2 (March 1979), pp. 56–58.

17. Guan Jian (Blinkered View), Wenyibao (Literature and the Arts Gazette), No. 6 (December 1978), p. 36.

18. To Margaret Harkness in April 1888. The words of which so much have been made were: “ Realism, to my mind, implies, besides truth of detail, the truthful reproduction of typical characters under typical circumstances.” (Marx, and Engels, , On Literature and Art (Moscow, 1976), p. 90).Google Scholar

19. Shao Hua and Si Ji, “ Wenxue chuangzuo zhong de yishu he zhengzhi ” (“ Art and politics in literary creation ”), Wenyibao, No. 11/12(1979), pp. 51–57 and 74.

20. Li Jie, “ Jiaru wo shi yige zuojia ” (“ If I were a writer”), Yuhua, No. 7 (1979), p. 37.

21. Chen Chunlong and Liu Hainian in Guangming ribao (Enlightenment Daily), 16 February 1979, p. 3.

22. “ Guangyu ‘ xie yin’an mian ‘ he ’ ganyu shenghuo ‘ ” (“ ‘ Writing about the dark side ‘ and’ interfering in real life ‘ “) Shanghai wenxue, No. 3 (March 1979), 49–57.

23. “ Liu Binyan zai Heilongjiang jianghua quan wen “ (“ Full text of Liu Binyan's Heilongjiang talk - revised transcript of a recording “) Guangjiaojing (Wide angle), No. 90(March 1980), pp. 10–23.

24. See the two reports in Anhui wenyi, No. 3 (March 1979), pp. 3–9.

25. “ Zai wenyi gongzuo zuotanhui he gushipian chuangzuo huiyi shang de jianghua “ (“ Talk at a Forum on Literary and Art Work and a Conference on the Creation of Feature Films, 19 June 1961 “), printed widely, including Hongqi, No. 3 (March 1979), pp. 2–16.

26. At the end of 1978 and the beginning of 1979 there were press reports of the lengths to which people who wanted to keep copies of poems from Tiananmen in April 1976 or photographs of the wreaths and demonstrations had to go in order to hide them, so great was the danger to one caught with such material. Possession of a manuscript copy of The Second Handshake (see below) was also punishable with imprisonment in 1975 and 1976.

27. I offer the term “ long story “ as a less outlandish equivalent than “ novella “ for zhongpian xiaoshuo, a piece of fiction longer than a short story but shorter than a novel.

28. “ Daqiang xia de hong yulan,” Shouhuo (Harvest), No. 2 (March 1979), pp. 5–38.

29. ‘ Dishige dankong “ (“ The tenth bullet-hole “), Shiyue (October), No. 1 (April 1979), pp. 128–57; and “ Lüliangshan de xiju “ (“ Comedy in the Lüliang Mountains “), Xingang, No. 3 (March 1979), pp. 46–53.

30. Yuxiang, Qian, “ Lishi a, ni shenpan wo ba,” Guangzhou wenyi (Canton Writing and Art), No. 5 (May 1979), pp. 12–17;Google Scholar and Long, Yu, “ Ta shuyu nayilei ren? “, Zuopin (Literary Works), No. 4 (April 1979), pp. 28–35.Google Scholar

31. He, Jin, “ Chong feng,” Shanghai wenxue, No. 4 (April 1979), pp. 14–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

32. The controversy over the story in the Shanghai press is summarized with references in Xinhua yuebao (wenzhai ban) (New China Monthly: Literary Digest), No. 8 (August 1979), p. 201. Jin He's article on why he wrote the story was printed in Shanghai wenxue, No. 8 (August 1979), pp. 72–75. The previous issue carried three articles on it on pp. 90–96.

33. “ Jianji cuole de gushi,” Renmin wenxue (People's Literature), No. 2 (February 1979), pp. 65–76.

34. Gao Xiaosheng, “Li Shunda zao wu,” Yühua, No. 7 (July 1979), pp. 4–15. On Gao see the articles by Xie Yongwang, Wenyibao, No. 2 (February 1980), pp. 5–11 and Dong Jian, Renmin ribao, 28 May 1980, p. 5. A volume of his stories published in various magazines, 79 xiaoshuo ji (1979 Stories), was published by the Jiangsu renmin chubanshe (Nanjing, 1980). It includes several other fine stories deeply informed by his many years of village life since being made a “ rightist ” in 1957.

35. “ Jiu hou tu zhen yan,” Anhui wenyi, No. 4 (April 1979), pp. 16–18. Sun is another former “ rightist “ of the late 1950s.

36. Chen Guokai, “ Wo yinggai zenme ban? “, Zuopin, No. 2 (February 1979) pp. 37–50.

37. Jiesheng, Kong. “ Zai xiaohe neibian,” Zuopin, No. 3 (March 1979), pp. 31–42.Google Scholar

38. See the letter from Sichuan on p. 64 of Wenyibao, No. 7 (1979).

39. Li Jiangang, “ Da dao Jia Wei “ (“ Down with Jia Wei “), Changjiang wenyi, Nos. 4–5 (April-May 1979), pp. 48–59.

40. See pp. 2–7, 8–9, 10–11, 30, and 89–92 of Dushu, No. 1 (April 1979).

41. Fang Yumin, “ Tushuguan bixu simen dakai “ (“ The doors of libraries must be opened wide “), Dushu, No. 2 (May 1979), pp. 11–16.

42. On Qin's 1956 article published under the psendonyin He Zhi see my “ The Hundred Flowers,” Index on Censorship, Vol. 9, No. 1 (February 1980), pp. 7–12; two articles that raised again the issues it dealt with were Li Xiaoba, “ Cong 56-nian He Zhi de wenzhang tanqi ” (“ Remarks prompted by He Zhi's 1956 article ”), Yanhe (River Yan), No. 4 (April 1979), pp. 32–38, and Chen Shen, “ Chongdu ‘ Xianshizhuyi - guangkuode daolu ‘ ” (“ ‘ Realism, the broad road ‘ reread ”), Yanhe, No. 5 (May 1979), pp. 63–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

43. Hu Yu, “ Rang ‘ Baijia zhengming ‘ de fangzhen zai wenyijie kaihua jieguo “ (“ Let the line of ‘A hundred schools contending ‘ blossom and bear fruit in literature and art “), Wenyibao, No, 7 (July 1979), pp. 61–64.

44. Li Jian, “ ‘ Ge de ‘ yu ‘ que de ‘ “ (“ Praise and villainy “), Hebei wenyi (Hebei Writing and Art), No. 6 (June 1979), pp. 5–6, reprinted in Renmin ribao, 31 July.

45. Heng Guo, “ Cong ‘ Gedepai ‘ xiangqi “ (“ Thoughts on the ‘ praise-merchants ‘ “), Changjiang wenyi, No. 7 (July 1979), pp. 76–77.

46. Jiang Zilong, “ Qiao changzhang shangren ji “ (“ Factory-manager Qiao takes up his post “), Renmin wenxue, No. 7 (July 1979), pp. 3–26. A sequel, “ Qiao changzhang hou zhuan “ (“ More on factory-manager Qiao “), was published in Renmin wenxue. No. 2 (February 1980), pp. 3–21.

47. Yang, Zhang, Dierci woshou (Peking, 1979).Google Scholar

48. See Zhang's afterword on pp. 410–11 of the novel, the photograph of him looking emaciated in a hospital bed after his release from jail in Zhengming, No. 18 (April 1979), and the article on him and the novel by Wang Weiling in Wenyibao, No. 9 (September 1979), pp. 47–50. A different version of the novel, probably taken from a handwritten copy that reached Hong Kong, was serialized in Guanchajia (The Observer) from issue 14 (December 1978) onwards under the title Yige kexuejia de gushi (A Scientist's Story); the author is here called Hu Zonghua.

49. Shanghai: Baihua wenyi chubanshe, 1979.

50. “ Ren yao zhijian “ (“ People or monsters? “), Renmin wenxue, No. 9 (September 1979), pp. 83–102 On this article see also Meng Weizai in Wenyibao, Nos. 11/12 (November-December 1979), pp. 82–85.

51. Wang Jing, “ Zai shehui de dang’an li,” Dianying chuangzuo, No. 10 (October 1979), pp. 22–43.

52. What began as an argument over the merits of the script itself developed during 1980 into a controversy over the ethics of literary polemic. Dianying chuangzuo printed excerpts from its overwhelmingly favourable correspondence on the subject on pp. 93–96 of its January 1980 issue. In late January and February “ Archives “ was much discussed at a high-level conference on drama policy, and published reports (e.g. Renmin ribao, 26 February 1980, and Wenyibao, No. 3 (March 1980), p. 6) showed that the authorities, though alarmed, were trying to avoid using their most heavy-handed methods in dealing with this and other “ immature and flawed “ works. In both April (pp. 49–53) and May (pp. 60–64) Wenyibao devoted articles to it, the latter more sympathetic than the former, but neither being condemnatory. But in March the first openly published issue of a new conservative journal, Shidai de baogao (Report of the Age), carried a hostile letter from two readers and a thoroughly nasty attack on the good faith of the script's author (pp. 216–24). This provoked the editors of Anhui wenxue to carry in their August issue (pp. 3–10) an attack on the Report's revival of the style of reviewing that had led to the lethal intolerance of the “ cultural revolution,” and Wenyibao had a similar article the same month (pp. 17–19), which was balanced in September with another attack on the script (pp. 33–39) and a survey of manuscripts submitted on “ Archives “ and similar works (pp. 38–41). And so it went on. The controversy was summarized in Gansu wenyi, No. 11 (November 1980), pp. 90,91, 86 and in Xinhua yuebao (wenzhai ban). No. 23 (November 1980), pp. 141–52.

53. Kewei, Li, “ Nüzei,” Dianying chuangzuo, No. 11 (November 1979), reprinted in Dongxiang, No. 18(1980), pp. 54–66.Google Scholar

54. Chen Cun, “ Liang dai ren,” Shanghai wenxue, No. 9 (September 1979), pp. 17–28.

55. Li Chao, “ Chun han,” Zhongshan, No. 3 (1979), reprinted in Xinhua yuebao (wenzhaiban), No. 12 (December 1979), pp. 122–28.

56. Hong, Lao, “ Gemo,” Dangdai (Contemporary), No. 3 (1979), pp. 71–77.Google Scholar

57. Liu Binyan, “ Shidai de zhaohuan “ (“ The call of the age “), Wenyibao, No. 11–12 (December 1979), pp. 36–46.

58. Bai Hua, Renmin ribao, 13 November 1979, p. 3.

59. The volume openly published on the conference, Zhongguo wenxue. yishu gongzuozhe disici daibiao dahui wenji, edited by the Wenlian (Chengdu, 1980), only gives the speeches of leading cultural officials.Google Scholar

60. “ Huainian Xiao Shan,” in Suixiang lu (Reflections) (Hong Kong 1980), Vol. I, pp. 14–32; Xiaoqin, “ Yuan ta yong yuan chengwei guoqu - jinian wode fuqin Shao Quanlin “ (“ May it never happen again: commemorating my father Shao Quanlin “), Shikan, No. 5 (May 1979), pp. 33–44.Google Scholar

61. Zhen, Liu, “ Peng Zong de gushi “ (“ Stories about Commander Peng “), Beijing wenyi, No. 5 (May 1979), pp. 46–49.Google Scholar

62. Sha Yexin, Li Shoucheng and Yao Deming, “ Jiaru wo shi zhende,” Qishi niandai (TheSeventies), No. 120 (January 1980), pp. 76–96; Liu Ke, “ Feitian,” Shiyue (October), No. 3 (1979), pp. 116–39.

63. Dai Qing, “ Pan,” Guangming ribao, 25 November and 2 December 1979, and in Xinhua yuebao (wenzhaiban), No. 13 (January 1980), pp. 129–34.

64. On the novel see, in addition to the author's afterword, a group of articles in Anhui wenxue, No. 3 (March 1980), which includes one on the circumstances in which the book was prepared for publication and about the author herself by Jiang Liu, who evidently wrote from personal knowledge as Wang had worked on Anhui wenyi (pp. 68–71); and on pp. 75–76 a letter from the author about popular reactions to the novel.

65. “ Yangbai de ‘ wuran,’ “ Yuhua, No. 11 (November 1979), pp. 4–8.

66. “ Ai, shi bu neng wangjide,” first published in Beijing wenyi in November 1979, reprinted in Xinhua yuebao (wenzhai ban). No. 22 (October 1980), pp. 122–28 and in Zhang Jie xiaoshuo juben xuan (Selected Fiction and Scripts by Zhang Jie) (Peking: Beijing chubanshe, 1980). On the controversy that it aroused see especially Huang Qiuyun's defence in Wenyibao, No. 1 (January 1980), pp. 26–29; Li Xifan's unpleasant moralistic attack in Wenyibao, No. 5 (May 1980), pp. 47–51; and the summary of the polemics in Gansu wenyi, No. 9 (September 1980), pp. 87–88 and Xinhua yuebao (wenzhai ban), No. 22(October 1980), pp. 161–68.Google Scholar

67. Liu Zhen, “ Ta haoxiang mingbaile yi diandian,” Qingming, No. 2 (1979), pp. 96–105.

68. Wang Zhongcai, “ Bai yun “ (“ The white cloud “), Shikan, No. 10 (October 1979), p. 8.

69. Huang Yongyu, Shikan, No. 9 (September 1979), and Xinhua yuebao (wenzhai ban), No. 11 (November 1979), p. 144.

70. Feng Yu, “ Erfen qian,” Shikan, No. 12 (December 1979), p. 58.

71. Bai Hua, “ Yanjing,” Shanghai wenxue, No. 1 (January 1980), pp. 32–33.

72. Bai Hua, “ Yi shu jiaxin,” Renmin wenxue, No. 1 (January 1980), pp. 24–40.

73. Wang Ruowang, “ Ji'e sanbuqu,” Shouhuo, No. 1 (1980), pp. 116–73.”

74. Jin He, “ Modiao mingzi de ren,” Shouhuo, No. 1 (1980), pp. 174–83.

75. Liu Binyan, “ Jinggao,” Zuopin, No. 1 (January 1980), pp. 3–7.

76. See the text in Zhengming, No. 29 (March 1980), pp. 11–23.

77. Sha, Na, “ Shoukao he jinzhuo “ (“ Manacles and a golden bracelet “), Anhui wenxue, No. 3 (March 1980), pp. 3–5.Google Scholar

78. Min, Zheng, “ Xiwang yu shiwang,” Shikan, No. 3 (March 1980), p. 32.Google Scholar