Meh

*

I remember when I said 'meh'

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She said 'meh'

It's hard to imagine more complex subject matter. Anchee Min deserves credit for her efforts. Using the first and third person she tells the story from what may be Jaing Qing's point of view. The third person is also used to give background and historical perspective.

Min fashions not a cold hard Jaing Qing, but one who showers all her affection on her husband to the detriment of her daughter and country. She has ambition, drive and a staunchly feminist streak.

The book is strong in portraying her early life, She is fashioned as the daughter of a concubine who rebeled against foot binding. The start of her life in Shanghai as an actress named Lan Ping is well written but the narrative weakens as Min poses some ideas on how the romance with Mao was maneuvered. The narrative further weakens through the marriage. The Cultural Revolution, which culminated Jaing Qing's career/life is the least developed part.

The internal life as described here falls flat with me. Her three cohorts in the Gang of Four are hardly mentioned. The circumstances of how the Shanghai lovers perished, foreshadowed in the early part, are not revisited.

I think Min is trying to portray a warmer Jaing Qing, but with the exception of describing her love for husband and daughter, she does not develop it.

While not a smooth read, it held my interest throughout. Min deserves credit and respect for tackling such a difficult topic. For a look at what Min is capable of, I recommend "Empress Orchid". Interestingly, both books present a sympathetic portrait of their subjects, both were women in a key positions who have been judged by history to be devastating for China.

Who knew Chairman Mao was so hot?

Oh that was shameless, Mariel. Way to start off a book review! With sex! Bad, bad, bad. Historical figures shouldn't be used to write cheesey love scenes. They should be used to advertise products on tv and that's it! Anchee Min, you're shameless. Have you no shame?

I don't feel like writing two Madam Mao book reviews so I'm going to shamelessly combine reviews of this chick lit book with a review of a biography written by an Australian guy that could have been the Jim Cazaviel character in the film version of The Stoning of Soraya M.
Madame Mao: The White-Boned Demon He's super proud of himself because he's not as sexist as the men he confronts in his investigation of blatant sexism for a book that he'll be paid for writing. The men are like "Oh, why write a book about such a bad woman?" and in the movie it's like "Don't listen to that silly woman! She's a woman!" He's like, "Yes, I know. Women!" They were just as bad she was (the white-boned demon, I mean). And they are hypocrites because nothing the sexy stud muffin Mao did was bad. The men are still oh, women should have been gentle judge-y in tone. I picture a smug Jim Cazaviel face behind the pen. They were both cruel and both made lives of Chinese people more miserable than they had could have been. But why do they have to demonize the woman and erect the memory of the man as a hero? Why did the woman have to be good and it was okay for the man to be a total dick? Both authors come from a place of wanting to find out what happened and then ultimately shy away from how gross of a woman she was with the distance of evil! Get behind me, white boned demon! Why did a woman get to do this to people because Chairman Mao wanted to bone her? Was it that sly of a move to demand marriage? Isn't there an old Chinese proverb about not buying the cow when you can get the sex for free? (I was impressed how she tried to use their fear of women against them, such as removing her clothes to avoid interrogation. At least she wasn't afraid to use both sides of the sex coin. Historically it was a dull sided coin, as far as I'm concerned. Not boring to those who suffer but boring to me sitting here right now.)

Min apparently had a crush on Madam Mao aka the white-boned demon aka Jiang Ching aka Li Runqing. I had wanted to read this book because I was curious why the author had had a crush on their first lady of communism while growing up in China. I guess it was an excuse to put herself in the place of someone who had hot sex with Chairman Mao. I'm so confused! She must have made a list of everyone she didn't like, any slight or fuck over and then when she got a bit of power from the Chairman Mao sex she used it to do them in. Or she did what a lot of assholes did when communism gave them their tiny bit of evil power. Maybe the young Min had fantasies about the bitch girl who had a nicer regulation something or other than she had? Or it could have been her glamorous film career and looks before she took on the guise of a comrade. I don't know. This book doesn't have it. Why was Madam Mao interesting to Anchee Min?

What this book has is first person perspective of the lady. Self serving perspective. It was oh so romantic, this and that person fucked me over, I was the only little girl to suffer from feet binding in China (that was nasty). Maybe it was the thing about serial killers becoming serial killers become their mom was a prostitute. The perspective switches to what really happened in a regurgitation of the first. It wasn't juxtaposed reality enough to warrant the constant back and forth. The prose was cheesey as fuck either way.

I thought that Chairman Mao was hot in the sack.
Chairman Mao was hot in the sack.
It's really frustrating to read a whole book like that! (I'm going to go take a shower.)

I didn't think that her old love affairs or supposed crush on Mao made it okay. It wasn't okay that she "loved" her daughter when she wanted something from her. What was the motive to get closer to a woman like this? I think it had more to do with her notoriety, or Min wasn't good enough of a writer to express her own feelings about the maligned woman. I liked Terrill's book a bit more because at least he got that Qing was pretty much a bad actress in her own life. She'd quote lines from plays she had performed in. Maybe she didn't remember they were even plays. It was all a big lie to her to get what she wanted. Applause, money or position. She thought she identified with Ibson's A Doll's House and the world denied her her spoils. Or it was a line she repeated a lot when she didn't get anything she wanted. It sounded good the first time excuse. Chairman Mao was a position. Wouldn't most who lived in China "love" him? My father used to say to "deny, deny, deny" when confronted with a lie.It was safer (emphasis on er rather than safe) to. Qing had that part down. Never break out of character, even if it means having no character.
Or the bad writing was a demonstration of bad acting... I'm confused!

I love this author normally but this book was blah. The first half was fantastic. Around 70% it lost me. I guess the history of Chairman Mao and communism wasn't as interesting as it sounded. Although, Madam Mao was an interesting historical figure.

Žēl, ka tā arī nekādi nespēju atrast saikni ar šo romānu, jo vēsturiskajam romānam ar patiešām nozīmīgu sievieti vajadzētu būt manā gaumē. Diemžēl rakstības stils, mainot pat stāstījuma balsis, visas parr vienu un to pašu personu un vienotā laika līnijā, man patiešām nepatika . Un tam ir grūti tikt pāri. Droši vien tāpēc tā arī nesapratu, kāpēc galvenā varone vispār iepinās politikā, ko viņa devās uz to nometni, kur satika Mao un arī turpmākās viņas darbības.

Part of my Fall 2017 Best Of Chinese Literature project; more here, and a cool list of books here.

Crafty and ruthless Madame Mao bent the best artists of her generation to creating propaganda musicals during China's Cultural Revolution. The best of them - the so-called "Eight Model Works" - were extravagant operas that are still, with some degree of camp and irony, loved today. Artists gonna art, and the music was good. Apparently. I don't love musicals myself, on account of how they're dumb.

Meanwhile peasants were starving in these "collective farms," where one young girl was saved from hard labor by something called her "proletarian good looks" and cast in one of these films. Years later, this girl returns the favor by writing this fictional biography of Madame Mao. Anchee Min now lives in the US and has become one of China's mightiest writers.

Becoming Madame Mao begins around the 19teens with the binding of the future Madame's feet, and follows her all the way to her death in 1991. That's a pretty broad overview of Chinese 20th century history, and I liked that. It's my impression that Min is going easy on Madame Mao, who was a pretty nasty piece of work - not that you'll come away from this book thinking she was nice, just that you might think she's not quite as mean. Min switches incessantly between first- and third-person narration, which lets her tell the story from Madame Mao's perspective and also from a more judgmental one; it's not a super effective decision, for me. More distracting than anything else; the two perspectives aren't so different that all this switchery was necessary.

But Madame Mao's story is fascinating - a celebrity who became a politician, realizing that the same merciless social climbing strategy worked for both careers, a lifelong striver and schemer with no use for ethics. Min's a terrific writer and this is an engaging book. She's written other books about strong women - like this one dowager empress from like 1900, and her own self - and I'd check them out too. But not if they're made into musicals, because musicals are dumb.

This gets two stars instead of the one it probably deserves because it's an interesting premise. A human side to Madame Mao. But its told in three different voices -- often on the same page -- which makes it difficult to follow and not very engaging. You never get very close to the character, which is the whole point of a book like this. I read in the afterword that it took 5 years to get published, and I wonder if the publisher played around with it a lot or something. I kept thinking it read like someone wrote a synopsis for every chapter, and then decided to publish that interspersed with some first person narrative.

Anyone needing instruction on how to turn a fascinating dramatic story into something paintdryingly boring and tedious need look no further, this is how you do it. And I would also say that paint itself could pick up a few tips on how to dry less interestingly and more slowly.

I have read several books by Anchee Min and this by far is the worst. I enjoyed all of her other books so I kept reading this book thinking it would get better yet it never did. She switches from third person to first person throughout the book and it becomes confusing. In addition, you never get into the character. This book is touted at making the "white bone demon" seem more human but it does not do this. Instead, you are left hating the so called heroine of the book and wondering if it will ever end or make sense.

I loved it. It combines three things I love; China, historical fiction, and a strong female lead.

This book is written as if it were a memoir of the wife of Mao Zidong. Anchee Min pieced the story together with various historical records and all of the characters in the book were actual people. We see her as a young girl refusing to submit to having her feet bound, to a young lady who pursues Mao out of intrigue and a desire for power. From the neglected wife kept hidden from the Chinese people, to one of the minds behind the Cultural Revolution. The author was able to take one of history's cruelest leaders and actually make me cry for her in the end.

Having read Anchee Min's "Red Azalea" beforehand, I found it interesting how the author's own life crossed that of Madame Mao's when she became an actress in one of Madame Mao's propaganda operas.

n  

n    I am not being judged fairly. Side by side Mao Tse-tung and I stood, yet he is considered a god while I am a demon.n  

n
Er, no, no, this *isn't* how to write Jiang Qing - this book more or less erases her intellectual life, depoliticises her to a large extent ('she still doesn't know enough of Communism itself. This doesn't bother her') and reduces her to that mainstay of popular historical fiction, the 'feminist' heroine.

Awash with operatic emotions from triumphantly throwing off the foot binding strips that her concubine mother put on her as a child, to 'hot' sex with various men ('I want Mao to know that I am interested in what he is doing and want to be part of it. But I try not to follow his thoughts so I can concentrate on the pleasure'), and a lot of weeping, this is a reductive portrait of a controversial woman.

Too many complicated political phenomena get attributed to single base emotions, usually of revenge: 'it becomes one of his [Mao's] reasons to call for a great rebellion - the Cultural Revolution. It is to punish scholars nationwide for his early suffering.' And others are written off in a few words: 'in 1934 the god led his followers and performed a miracle. It was called the Long March' - full stop.

More positively, the book is written in an interesting mix of 1st and 3rd person, from Madame Mao's pov set against a more objective - if not more detailed or critical - context. It's clear that the author has done a lot of research and tries hard to navigate through complex times.

But the overriding agenda here is that Madame Mao is the victim of misogyny and treated unfairly by both comrades and posterity. By reducing her to such a cliché, not just is a complicated woman minimised and flattened but her character slips away through the prescriptive stock phrases into nothing.

"Poti sa ma tai bucati sau sa ma sfasii in o mie de farame, dar spiritul meu nu va inceta niciodata sa lupte!"
Autoarea s-a nascut la Shanghai si la 17 ani a fost selectata sa joace intr-unul din filmele realizate de studioul cinematografic al doamnei Mao. In 1984 a emigrat in America unde si-a scris cartea de memorii "Azaleea Rosie" si alte romane care au devenit bestsellere internationale, cum ar fi "Imparateasa Orhidee" si "Ultima imparateasa".
In prezentul roman autoarea ne prezinta biografia unei femei celebre care este cunoscuta in istoria Chinei drept 'demonul cu oase albe'. Este povestea sotiei lui Mao Zedong, o femeie frumoasa care a trecut pe rand de la cea mai puternica, la cea mai temuta, pana la cea mai dispretuita femeie din China.
Naratiunea este alternativa, fie are loc la persoana intai si reflecta nemijlocit gandurile si sentimentele doamnei Mao, fie la persoana a treia la modul obiectiv, rece, consemnand faptele ca un istoric.
In prolog suntem in 1981 si o gasim pe doamna Mao in inchisoare, la 14 ani de la arestarea ei, avand 77 de ani si fiind condamnata la moarte. Ea trage de fiica ei, Nah sa-i scrie autobiografia si sa spuna lumii ca este nevinovata, apoi se pregateste sa se sinucida.
Ne intoarcem in timp in 1919 in China, provincia Shan-dong, cand doamna Mao este o fetita si are o copilarie chinuita. Tatal ei bea si o bate pe mama ei care se chinuie s-o creasca sa fie speciala si frumoasa pentru a se putea casatori intr-o familie bogata. Cand creste fuge de acasa si doreste sa se faca actrita de opera. Se casatoreste cu un mic om de afaceri de care divorteaza si va urma cea de-a doua casatorie a ei cu cel care va deveni unul dintre consilierii lui Mao Zedong. Se va inscrie in Partidul Comunist, apoi se va desparti si de acest barbat.
In continuare va merge la Shanghai schimbandu-si numele in Lan Ping si va incerca sa se realizeze ca actrita. Isi cunoaste cel de-al treilea sot Tang Nah, un critic citit si rafinat. Barbatul va incerca sa se sinucida de 2 ori pentru ea deoarece mariajul lor se destrama.
In 1937 il intalneste pe Mao Zedong, liderul Armatei Rosii, pe care il seduce. Cei doi se casatoresc si ea o va naste in curand pe fiica lor Nah.
In 1948 Mao isi invinge rivalul, pe Chiang Kai-shek si se instaleaza in Orasul Interzis ca un Imparat. Dupa 14 ani de domnie lucrurile incep sa mearga rau si doamna Mao salveaza situatia cu ajutorul artei si asa numitei Revolutii Culturale. Din acel moment China e condusa de catre ea. Toti dusmanii sai sunt fie eliminati fie varati in inchisoare. Mao insa o tradeaza numindu-l pe maresalul Lin Biao succesorul sau care mai apoi este executat si el.
Pe 9 septembrie 1976 Mao Zedong moare si lasa un testament numindu-l pe Hua Guo-feng succesorul sau, trandand-o pentru ultima data pe doamna Mao. Pe 6 octombrie aceasta va fi arestata, fiind numita dusman al Chinei.
Romanul se incheie cu vorbele sale: "Voi, aceia care sunteti fascinati de mine, imi datorati aplauze, iar voi, cei care sunteti dezgustati, n-aveti decat sa scuipati. Va multumesc tuturor pentru prezenta."
Asa cum putem vedea doamna Mao iese de pe scena vietii ca o mare actrita, ceea ce a si fost, fiind cea mai fericita si implinita atunci cand juca in fata publicului si iubind foarte mult arta. Poate la fel de mult ca si puterea.
Protagonista a trait o viata cat 10 oameni la un loc, din copilarie pana la batranete. A fost un copil chinuit care a incercat necontenit sa-si realizeze visul de a fi actrita, calcand plina de sperante pe refuzurile regizorilor. A fost o femeie frumoasa si fermecatoare care nu a avut noroc in casnicii, fiind mereu refuzata de barbatii de care se indragostea, dar razbunandu-se apoi pe ei cand ajunge la putere. A fost dezamagita de sotul ei Mao Zedong care a inselat-o cu femei tinere si chiar si fiica ei i-a spulberat visele maritandu-se cu un nimeni doar ca sa-i faca in ciuda. Intr-un final China insasi i-a dat ultima lovitura. O femeie care a avut de toate si n-a ramas cu nimic.
In incheiere atasez cateva citate pline de invataminte:
"Nu renunt niciodata la speranta, nici macar atunci cand vanturile ma sufla violent din toate directiile. Asta este cea mai mare virtute a mea."
"Acum inteleg ca o fata poate sa faca totul cum trebuie si, cu toate astea, viata ei sa fie distrusa."
"Adevarata saracie inseamna sa nu ai de ales in viata. Sa nu ai nimic de ales, in afara de maritis, de exemplu. Sa nu ai de ales, in afara de a fi prostituata sau concubina, sa-ti vinzi trupul."
"Faci pe desteapta in toate ocaziile neimportante, dar pierzi marile batalii. Pierzi. E ca si cum ti-ai acoperi urechile atunci cand furi un clopot - crezand ca nimeni nu o sa te auda."
"Ii detest pe aceia care fac pe doctorii ce amortesc constiinta, pe cei care ofera transfuzii cu opiu creierelor maselor."
"Trebuie ca mai intai sa ai credinta, pentru ca apoi s-o lasi sa lucreze in favoarea ta, mi-a spus candva un predicator budist."
"Ce se intampla la final nu mai e grija mea. Ratatii imi lasa un gust neplacut."
"Cel mai bun iluzionist este acela care poate sa-ti explice cum se face trucul si apoi sa te faca sa crezi ca exista magie..."